ETHICAL DILEMMAS IN THE TRAINING OF HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
PROF. Midion M. Chidzonga
BDS; FFDRCSI; MMedSc (Clin Epid); PGDipIntResEthics; PGDipHPE; MPhil (HS Edu).
DEAN,
University of Zimbabwe College of Health Sciences
Oral and Maxillofacial surgeon
MEDICAL ETHICS, BUSINESS ETHICS, ETC
• No such thing
• There is only ethics • Different set of ethics,
• Professional life • Spiritual life • At home with family • Training of health professionals.
ETHICS IS ETHICS
• To live ethically
• One standard across the board
• Not always easy
• Strive to live and work ethically to achieve greater success.
THE ETHICAL DILEMMA
• An undesirable or unpleasant choice reaching to a moral principle or practice
• Do we do the easy thing or the right thing?
KING SOLOMON
• The ways of right living people glow with light the longer they live the brighter they shine but
• The road of wrong doing gets darker and darker, travellers can’t see a thing they fall flat on their faces.
• CHRISTIANITY: • “Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them.”2
• ISLAM: • “No one of you is a believer until he loves for his
neighbour what he loves for himself.”3
• JUDAISM: • “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man.
This is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary.”4
• BUDDHISM: • “Hurt not others with that which pains yourself.”5
• HINDUISM: • “This is the sum of duty; do naught unto others what you
would not have them do unto you.”6
• ZOROASTRIANISM: • “Whatever is disagreeable to yourself, do not do unto
others.”7
• CONFUCIANISM: • “What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to
others.”8
• BAHAI: • “And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou
for thy neighbour that which thou chooses for thyself.”9
• JAINISM: • “A man should wander about treating all creatures as
he himself would be treated.”10
• YORUBA PROVERB (Nigeria): • “One going to take a pointed stick to pinch a baby bird
should first try it on himself to feel how it hurts.”11
THERE ARE REALLY ONLY TWO IMPORTANT POINTS WHEN IT COMES TO ETHICS.
• THE FIRST IS A STANDARD TO FOLLOW.
• THE SECOND IS THE WILL TO FOLLOW IT.
• Ethics is how we ought to live and do our business.
TRAINING OF HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
• Recruitment
• Training Process
RECRUITMENT
• Student selection
• Qualifications
• High fliers
• National needs
• Student numbers
DILEMMAS
• National needs Versus Facilities
• Infrastructure
• Pass rates
• Colleagues
• Standards of care to which health workers are trained.
• Training Facilitator• Student/lecturer ratio • Deteriorating infrastructure• Low cost of training
• Dilemmas • High pass rate/failure rate• Gender issues• Lower grades• Affordability
• Training • Failure rates • Commitment of trainers • Training environmental • Facility development
• Dilemmas • Commitment • Ill preparedness. • Economic development • Western standards • Production relation to resources • Equitable distribution• Fair financing
APPROPRIATE TRAINING
• Training
• Licensure
• Continuing education
• International optimal standards.
SUPPORT FROM THE HEALTH SYSTEM FOR ITS WORKERS
• Train people and then not support them, basic level
• Resource intensive training procedures, not available
TEACHING STANDARDS
• Ethics health care
REFERENCES
• 1.Proverbs 4: 18-19, The Message
• 2.Matthew 7: 12
• 3.The traditions of Mohammed, quoted at www.thegoldenrule.net, 23 September 2002.
• 4.Talmud, Shabbat 31a, quoted in “The University of the Golden Rule in World Religions,” www.teaching-values.com, 23 September 2002.
• 5.Udana-Varga 5, 1, quoted in ibid.
• 6.Mahabharata 5, 1517, quoted in ibid.
• 7.Shast-na-shayast 13:29, quoted at www.thegoldenrule.net, 23 September 2002
• 8.Analects 15:23, quoted at ibid.
• 9.Epistle to the son of the Wolf, 30, quoted at www.fragrant.demon.co.uk/golden, 23 September 2002.
• 10.Sutrakritanga 1.11.33, quoted at ibid.
• 11.Ibid.
• 12.Cash R. Ethical issues in Health work force development. Bulletin of worker health Organisation 2005; 83: 280-284,
Thank you for your
time