The Ethox Centre and Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities at the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, look forward to welcoming you from 12th-14th September 2019 to the 36th EACME conference in Oxford, on the theme of Rethinking Ethics in 21st Century Europe.
About the conference:
Just as thinking in medical ethics has shaped medicine and medical sciences, developments in medicine and new technologies have also been shaping medical ethics since its beginning. Clinical and research practices have always had to be rethought and norms redefined in response to biomedical advances and social change. Developments in ethics, society and medicine are inseparable.
In the 20th Century, bioethics responded to developments in medical research, life extending treatments, assisted reproduction and to changing social attitudes to medical practitioners and paternalism. Through the development of concepts such as those of informed consent, confidentiality, minimal risk, duties of care and the idea of independent review of research, the 20th Century played an important role in ensuring that developments in medicine respected patients and commanded public trust. The emerging questions concerned boundaries of medical intervention or scientific research and respect for the patient or research participants.
Despite the valuable contributions made by 20th Century bioethics, in recent years, however, new challenges are being presented by advances in neuroscience, big data, genomics and global connectedness, and by their convergence. Personalised medicine and big data approaches are changing the focus of medicine and increasingly blur boundaries between clinical interventions and research activities. These developments raise important questions about the extent to which 20th Century ethics is fit for purpose.
We currently observe a shift in research agendas and a redefinition of normative as well as national boundaries in Europe, and beyond. These changes raise the question as to whether medical ethics in the 21st century needs to revisit its principles and approaches. Do we need to rethink bioethics for the 21st Century? The 2019 EACME conference in Oxford will respond to a pressing need for ethics, humanities and social sciences research on these new challenges.
The annual EACME conference presents an open platform for research contributions and debate about ethical issues in health care practices, policies, and medical sciences as well as new approaches in clinical ethics, research ethics and ethics teaching.
