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Curriculum

The Center seeks to help all students, faculty, and staff come to a better understanding of the interwoven components in health ethics, arts, and humanities by facilitating collaborative teaching partnerships in each of the schools, colleges, departments, and programs which are part of the University of Utah Health Sciences & Main Campuses.

Curriculum taught by Center Members

*make sure to check each tab for details
    MEDICINE

    SCHOOL OF MEDICINE (SOM)

    CORE CURRICULUM

    FOUNDATIONS of Medicine

    Required course for first-year medical students

    MD ID 7300 - Foundations of Medicine

    Ethics, arts, and humanities topics are interwoven throughout the curriculum of this course. Each unit ties in with the Medical School themes and relates back to the those previously introduced. At the end, a capstone case study integrates the ethics, arts, and humanities concepts taught throughout the course.

    The following units have been taught by Center faculty:

    • Values in the Practice of Medicine
    • Classic Cases
    • Privacy and Confidentiality
    • Informed Consent
    • Justice Issues in Medicine
    • Ethical Theory with practical decision making as small groups
    • Real Life (and death)
    • Intro to Legal Issues
    • Patient Decision Making
    • Research ethics
    • "Person-centered care when death may be near"
    • Ethics Capstone (integrating into case study the above ethical and legal concepts)
    • Additional units:
      • Host & Defense: "Disaster Preparedness" / "Tuskegee & Beyond"
      • Molecules, Cells, & Cancer: "Ethical issues surrounding genetic syndromes"
      • Pediatric Clerkships: ongoing sessions on informed consent

    LAYERS of Medicine

    Required course, runs longitudinally throughout all four years of medical school

    MD ID 7101 - Layers of Medicine 1
    MD ID 7102 - Layers of Medicine 2
    MD ID 7103 - Layers of Medicine 3
    MD ID 7104 - Layers of Medicine 4

    This course is an ongoing dialogue about the interdisciplinary complexities and challenges of healthcare. The dialogue is rooted in both the very large and the very small. Students attend to the 'big picture' conceptualization of what medical care means and the broader socio-cultural factors that shape its delivery. At the same time, they observe the unique particularities of the patient-doctor relationship: analyzing scenarios which are both ethically and practically challenging and examining issues of professionalism in medicine.

    UNIT Directors:  Gretchen Case, PhD, & Karly Pippit, MD

    A few of the topics covered:

    • Sex- and gender-specific medicine
    • Healthcare delivery
    • Culture and medicine
    • Global health
    • Public health
    • Ethics
    • Arts and Humanities
    • Professionalism and Communication

    ELECTIVES

    Dr/Pt Relationship in Literature & the Arts

    Two intensive electives for advanced medical students exploring healthcare through the arts and humanities

    INTMD 7992
    Writing:      Transition to Residency through Reflective Writing

    with Susan Sample, MFA, PhD

    • Read and respond to personal essays, prose, and poetry on doctoring and the doctor-patient relationship
    • Reflect on ethical and moral dilemmas common in residency
    • Learn writing skills to help you develop as a professional
    • Exercise your right brain; be creative!
     

    INTMD 7994
    Art in Medicine:      Imagining Medicine

    with Gretchen Case, MA, PhD

    • What might medicine look like hundreds of years from now?
    • How has today’s medicine been imagined in the past?
    • Explores the past, present, and future of medicine through films and texts, ranging from science journalism to science fiction, with points of view from inside and outside of the medical professions
    • Of particular interest to future administrators, researchers, and any student who wants to look at medicine from a broad and creative perspective

    HEALTH LAW for Non-lawyers

    Spring 2022 and 2023 have been cancelled due to lack of funding, but will be taught in 2024 if there is funding

    INTERPROFESSIONAL EDUCATION ELECTIVES (IPE)
    UUHSC 6810/6811

    with Leslie Francis, PhD, JD & Teneille Brown, JD

    This course is designed to introduce a variety of issues concerning health law to professionals in health care, such as nurses, physicians, and pharmacists. During our work teaching medical students we realized there was a hunger for more curricular content in health law. This course provides a forum for unique interdisciplinary education where students can explore differences in their professional ethics and norms. The focus of the course is health law, but when possible, instructors will draw their cases from legal issues arising in genetic medicine.

    Some of the topics covered:

    • Informed consent
    • Standards for medical malpractice
    • Confidentiality of genetic information
    • Duty to treat
    • Use of genetic data in reproductive decision-making
    • Physician-assisted suicide

    COURSES TAUGHT
    PRIOR TO THE
    2022-23
    ACADEMIC YEAR

    LITERATURE & MEDICINE

    Fall 2006/Spring 2007

    STUDENT DISCUSSION GROUP

    with Tess Jones, PhD, and Mark Matheson, DPhil, Division of Medical Ethics and Humanities

    MEDICAL ETHICS

    REQUIRED COURSE - 4th Year Medical Students

    The timing and content of this course are based on two assumptions. First, that 4th year medical students have had sufficient exposure to clinical medicine to appreciate the relevance and importance of their ethical issues in medicine. And second, that medical ethics presents issues of sufficient importance that all medical students must have a solid foundation in these issues and concepts before they begin their post-graduate training.

    Course Objectives:

    • Explore the complexities of ethical issues in the practice of medicine
    • Provide the foundation of philosophical and moral reasoning skills
    • Encourage reflection and professional moral commitments in the practice of medicine and promote discussion between professionals
    • Employ this knowledge and these skills in a clinical setting

    Topics covered:

    • Introduction to Medical Ethics
    • Informed Consent in Clinical Medicine and Reesearch
    • Ethical Theory and Difficult Cases
    • Medical Mistakes
    • Palliative Care and End of Life Issues
    • Justice - Access to Healthcare
    • Health Law - Friend or Foe?
    • Conflicts of Interest
    • Doctors Dealing with Disasters
    • What Constitutes a "Good" Doctor?

    Patient-Physician Relationship

    The Patient-Physician Relationship is a component of Medical Professionalism, a 1st year medical student course.

    The following two small groups sessions are a beginner's guide to medical professionalism both as a dynamic activity of contemporary practice and as a set of values and virtues associated with the noble and ancient history of medicine. The materials for these sessions include:

    • Readings for discussion
    • One "outside" writing assignment due at Session I
    • One "in-class" brainstorming session due during Session II

    Session I - "Contemporary Professionalism and Professional Virtues"

    Objectives of this small group session are:

    • To define professionalism as it is understood in the contemporary practice of medicine
    • To identify professional virtues such as compassion and respectfulness; honest and integrity; courage and conscientiousness
    • To discuss literary selections and case stories as examples of ethical and professional conflicts
     

    Session II - "Oaths, Codes, and Rules of Professionalism"

    Objectives of this small group session are:

    • To identify among the historical documents of medical professionalism
    • To identify those virtues, values, and behaviors that define professionalism
    • To record those qualities and behaviors for a code of professionalism
    PHARMACY

    COLLEGE OF PHARMACY (COP)

    While the Center has a long history with the School of Medicine, we look forward to expanding our collaborative partnerships throughout all the schools and colleges within the Health Sciences in order to enhance understanding of health ethics, arts, and humanities on all learning levels.

    For examples of opportunities we can facilitate in the future, read more about what we've been doing within the School of Medicine and on Main Campus.

    NURSING

    COLLEGE OF NURSING (CON)

    While the Center has a long history with the School of Medicine, we look forward to expanding our collaborative partnerships throughout all the schools and colleges within the Health Sciences in order to enhance understanding of health ethics, arts, and humanities on all learning levels.

    For examples of opportunities we can facilitate in the future, read more about what we've been doing within the School of Medicine and on Main Campus.

    HEALTH

    COLLEGE OF HEALTH (COH)

    While the Center has a long history with the School of Medicine, we look forward to expanding our collaborative partnerships throughout all the schools and colleges within the Health Sciences in order to enhance understanding of health ethics, arts, and humanities on all learning levels.

    For examples of opportunities we can facilitate in the future, read more about what we've been doing within the School of Medicine and on Main Campus.

    DENTISTRY

    SCHOOL OF DENTISTRY (SOD)

    While the Center has a long history with the School of Medicine, we look forward to expanding our collaborative partnerships throughout all the schools and colleges within the Health Sciences in order to enhance understanding of health ethics, arts, and humanities on all learning levels.

    For examples of opportunities we can facilitate in the future, read more about what we've been doing within the School of Medicine and on Main Campus.

    Main Campus

    MAIN CAMPUS

    UNDERGRAD

    Block U

    MEDICAL HUMANITIES PROGRAM

    Block U is no longer being offered starting Fall 2022

    UGS 2250/2255: Block U: Medical  Humanities

    Medical Humanities was a collaborative effort from faculty who are part of the College of Humanities, Center for Health Ethics, Arts, and Humanities (CHeEtAH), and Utah Center of Excellence ELSI Research (UCEER).

    This year-long course was designed to introduce undergraduate students to a variety of Ethical, Legal and Social Implications of Research (ELSI) issues and facilitating their process in creating an ELSI module for the widely-used Learn.Genetics: Genetic Science Learning Center website. In the fall semester, students were introduced to a range of ELSI issues, such as the history of eugenics, genetic testing and screening, concerns about enhancement, and discussions of disability and “normalcy.” Then, in the spring, students worked closely with staff from Learn.Genetics to envision, design, and develop, a module for their website that will introduce their selected ELSI issue to the website’s target audience (primarily secondary school educators and students). In one of the earliest iterations of this course, the students learned about arguments for and against parents using preimplantation genetic diagnosis to perform sex selection, and then designed a module that conveys the tension between advocacy of reproductive rights and concerns about sex discrimination. 

    RATS

    RESEARCH ADMINISTRATION TRAINING SERIES

    RED 731: Case Studies in the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR)

    The responsible conduct of research (RCR) is a relatively new discipline. It is focused on the multifaceted social and ethical issues that arise in the practice of scientific research. But scientific research itself is hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of years old. Reflecting on this history of biology, chemistry, physics and medicine provides insightful examples of both responsibly conducted research, and irresponsibly conducted research, by some of the most famous scientists in history. Participants will examine a number of notable cases from the history of science and will consider how prominent scientists and their research would fare in the modern age of RCR.
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