The study of medical ethics is almost as old as medicine itself and an excellent foundation stone for any medical study. From the core principle of “First Do No Harm” to the difficult topic of “When does life begin? Medical ethics helps to create a framework from which we as medical professionals can operate ensuring that at all times the health and wellbeing of our patients remains at the forefront of all medical practice.

Starting out the course with the deceptively simple question “What Is Medical Ethics?” The foundation for this course is discussion and debate with every afternoon ending with classes splitting into two to discuss a pressing topic in modern medicine using topics ripped directly from today’s headlines. The course will also cover the ethics of consent, the history of ethics in medicine, social media use and personal responsibility and disparities in healthcare. Students will come away from the course with new insights and the varied viewpoints of their peers giving them a different view on the most important topics in medicine today.

The Medical Ethics course runs from 9:30am – 4pm for 5 consecutive days with an hour break for lunch. We teach at a low student to tutor ratio (8:1) meaning that students are supervised and encouraged throughout their course.

Day 1

Morning Session: What is Medical Ethics?

After all introductions to lecturers and fellow students we will discuss as a class what we believe the field of medical ethics consists of giving students chance to show any prior knowledge they may have coming into the course. This also gives us the opportunity to discuss in a broad fashion what we personally believe ethics to be and a foundation of understanding to build from through the rest of the week.

Afternoon Session: Class Debate

Each afternoon session will conclude the day with a class debate on various hot button topics. These may vary based on topics consistently debated in medicine such as assisted dying and medical funding to medical topics ripped from the headlines. Students will be given their topic of debate and two teams determined each morning to allow them to prepare their arguments and consider the question in detail.

Debates will be structured as follows;

• Each team has a five minute statement period to argue yes or no as assigned that morning
• Once both statements have been given a two minute response period is given for each team to respond to their opponents' arguments
• Finally, teams will be given a two minute closing statement encompassing their core argument and any counter-arguments formulated through the debate

Debating in this manner, especially arguing for the ‘opposite side’ allows us to develop and strengthen both our arguments and our beliefs and is a unique opportunity to look at these topics from an alternative perspective

Day 2

Morning Session: Ethics of Consent

Everything we do as caregivers is done with the consent of our patient, in this session we will discuss the ethics of consent, when is consent able to be given, what if we cannot attain consent and what do we do in an emergency? Consent, whilst initially seeming to be a simple topic, can become complicated very quickly!

Afternoon Session: Class Debate

Day 3

Morning Session: Hippocrates and the Roots of Medical Ethics

Looking back in time to the history of organised medicine we will discuss one of the primary roots of modern ethics in medicine; the Hippocratic Oath. In this session we will discuss how the Hippocratic Oath can still hold a place in medicine and the almost immutable nature of some ethical principles, whether some aspects are still relevant to us today and the traditional nature of medicine as a scientific practice.

Afternoon Session: Class Debate

Day 4

Morning Session: Social Media Use and Personal Responsibility

Jumping back into the modern day we will focus on ourselves as individuals within a healthcare profession and the very modern risks and pitfalls we face as professionals. We will discuss the ethics of professional and personal responsibility and how in a medical field the two are more closely intertwined than almost any other profession. Covering topics such as personal liability in an emergency, personal conduct and behaviours which could result in a medic being struck off we will delve into this complex topic and discuss previous case studies to come to a conclusion on how and why we hold medical professionals to such a high standard.

Afternoon Session: Class Debate

Building from our touching on sports science earlier in the day we will build on this to discuss muscular anatomy; it’s structure, relation to the skeleton, and methods of action by which it works to allow the body to push, pull and move. We will also study the relation of tendons to muscles in the body, how injuries may occur when an in-balance in strength exists between the two, when this is likely to happen and what we can do to avoid such injuries.

We will also cover methods we can use to measure relative strength in a patient and what it can tell us about their overall health, the benefits of exercise for a patient in terms of their musculoskeletal system as well as their health in general and how we can broach this subject with patients in a beneficial manner.

Day 5

Morning Session: Disparities in Healthcare

The final day of the week we will begin by discussing the availability of healthcare to various groups, factors which may not be immediately apparent in impacting patient care including class, ethnicity, gender and more. We will cover how trust in the medical establishment can have a big impact on patient willingness to seek or receive treatment, how we can go about dealing with this as a society and why some groups are historically far less likely to trust the medical industry as a whole.

Afternoon Session: Career Discussion

We will close out the week with a discussion on medical careers in orthopaedic care ranging from medicine to physiotherapy and everything in-between. Students will have the opportunity to discuss with their lecturers their specific career paths and gain an insight into how to go about formulating a career plan and progressing into their desired career.

• Students must be studying a minimum of A-Level Biology or Chemistry.
• The course supports university and work experience applications, as almost all universities and employers now require previous laboratory experience before considering an applicant.

During this 5-day course, students will learn skills beneficial for any university application including:

• Show an understanding of what medical ethics entails
• Be able to confidently speak in front of peers on a complex topic
• Be confident in debating peers in difficult issues
• Be able to discuss the ethics of consent in an intelligent and balanced way
• Show knowledge of the history of medical ethics and be able to discuss the foundations of ethical practice