March 19, 2009
(With Jeanann Boyce) Legal institutions must try to avoid getting blinded by the hype and inappropriately sweeping in—and perhaps over-regulating—of both the novel and the mundane applications of this still relatively young technology. As nanotechnology progresses, and both humans and … Read More
March 19, 2009
The Ministry of Health (MOH) issued a government order on Monday requiring hospitals to get approval before doing things such as artificial heart implants and homogeneous organ transplants. (Xinhua)
March 19, 2009
Doctors have successfully implanted an embryo with matching tissue type as an ill sibling to act as a donor once born. (Copenhagen Post)
March 19, 2009
From the moment President George W. Bush imposed federal funding restrictions on embryonic stem cell research, Big Biotech, patient advocacy groups, celebrities and the media have been obsessed with eviscerating the policy. Indeed, although the Bush administration funded about $175 … Read More
March 19, 2009
Business Ethics (Volume 18, Issue 2, April 2009) is now available by subscription only. Articles Include: “Conflicting stories of virtue in UK healthcare: bringing together organisational studies and ethics” by David Dawson, 95-109. “Ethical leadership across cultures: a comparative analysis of German … Read More
March 19, 2009
JAMA (Volume 301, Number 11, March 18, 2009) is now available by subscription only. Articles Include: “Religious Coping and Use of Intensive Life-Prolonging Care Near Death in Patients With Advanced Cancer” by Andrea C. Phelps. Paul K. Maciejewski, Matthew Nilsson, Tracy A. … Read More
March 18, 2009
A drug used to treat narcolepsy — and often taken to increase alertness and improve cognitive performance — may have the potential to become addictive, a small pilot study has shown. (Nature News)
March 18, 2009
Here’s the final installment of the E-mail debate between conservative Catholic legal scholars Robby George and Doug Kmiec over whether President Obama’s executive order on embryonic stem cell research authorizes federally funded human cloning. In the first E-mail in this post, Kmiec responds … Read More
March 18, 2009
Researchers in the School of Life & Health Sciences at Aston University in Birmingham, UK are developing a novel new way to model how the human brain works by creating a living representation of the brain. They are using cells … Read More
March 18, 2009
The impending national discussion about broadening access to health care, improving medical practice and saving money is giving a group of scientists an opening to make a once-unthinkable proposal: Shut down the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine at … Read More
March 18, 2009
An innovation by Princeton researchers may lower the cost of mapping human DNA to $100 and help usher in the era of personalized medicine. (PhysOrg)
March 18, 2009
Top-tier US-based pharmaceutical companies are moving their clinical trials overseas at warp speed, raising questions about ethics, quality control, and even the scientific value of their findings for people back in the US. (Virtual Medicine Center)
March 18, 2009
West suburban man’s plan to kill himself with right-to-die group’s help is on hold. (Chicago Tribune)
March 18, 2009
Cancer patients who rely on religion to cope with their terminal illnesses are more likely to use intensive life-prolonging care, according to a study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association. (CNN)
March 17, 2009
If ever there was a safe recreational drug, modafinil seemed to be it. The greatest little pick-me-up since the cup of joe — or so its enthusiasts said — the anti-narcolepsy medication has also helped recreational and casual users stay … Read More
March 17, 2009
The poverty of Cairo’s slums forced a young couple to sell nearly everything they had. When that wasn’t enough, each of them sold a kidney. The clandestine pre-dawn operation in a small private hospital ended with the man and wife … Read More
March 17, 2009
Medical educators are keenly aware of it, too, and of a conflict at the heart of medical training: what may be best for making a skilled, independent-thinking doctor may not always be best for patient comfort or safety. (New York … Read More
March 17, 2009
Research ethics boards are essential for protecting the rights and well-being of research participants. Currently, however, investigators, research institutes and funders are complaining that the system does not work. A chief complaint is that multicentre trials are over-reviewed and mired … Read More
March 17, 2009
Defense attorneys are for the first time submitting a controversial next-generation lie-detection test as evidence in U.S. court. In an upcoming juvenile-sex-abuse case in San Diego, the defense is hoping to get an fMRI scan, which shows brain activity based … Read More
March 17, 2009
More than five years ago, Dr. Lawrence C.B. Chan and colleagues in his Baylor College of Medicine laboratory cured mice with type 1 diabetes by using a gene to induce liver cells to make insulin. (PhysOrg)
March 17, 2009
China’s Ministry of Health has issued temporary ban on clinical use of therapeutic cloning, effective from May 1,its official Web site said Tuesday. (Xinhua)
March 17, 2009
Call for Abstracts 6th International Conference on Clinical Ethics Consultation Portland, OR May 11-14, 2010 Abstracts accepted April 15-September 15, 2009 For more information please visit the website www.ethics2010.org For more information contract John Tuohey PhD at ethics@providence.org Â
March 16, 2009
Commentary: “Drill Babies, Drill:Â If harvesting embryos is OK, how about fetuses?” William Saletan argues that now that the United States is opening the door to more embryonic stem cell research, scientists should turn to the harvesting of fetal organs for … Read More
March 16, 2009
SHORTLY AFTER the president announced his new policy on funding embryonic stem-cell research, CNN’s Larry King devoted a special program to the subject. His first guest was Mary Tyler Moore, the international chairwoman of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation who … Read More
March 16, 2009
Putting limits on some kinds of genetic research has always been a bit like trying to regulate spam.Somehow those unwanted and often-offensive junk e-mail messages continue to invade our inboxes, despite a five-year-old federal law that was supposed to lead … Read More
