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The 20th annual Pediatric Bioethics Conference: "Narratives and Communication: Bridging Science, Stories, and Ethics in Pediatrics"
2025-07-17 08:00 - 2025-07-19 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
The 20th annual Pediatric Bioethics Conference—Narratives and Communication: Bridging Science, Stories, and Ethics in Pediatrics—is a three-day conference to explore how communication impacts pediatric clinical care and research as well as the inﬂuence of narrative in shaping the ethical practice of pediatrics.
Join us for this year’s pediatric bioethics conference in exploring the intersection of narrative, communication and pediatric bioethics. On July 17, we will explore the words we use in pediatric clinical care and research. Words can be used to convey empathy, demonstrate competence and encourage trust. This year, we will explore the science, theory and practice of how we communicate with our patients and families as we seek ways to improve patient experience through quality communication.
Speakers will explore questions such as:

How can clinicians share decisions with parents?
How can language choices encourage or prevent shared decision-making?
Do family members other than parents have a role in pediatric decision-making?
How can clinicians deliver bad news while ensuring patients don’t lose hope?
Which method for studying communication is most accurate?
How can the words we use both perpetuate and mitigate bias and stigma?
How does the language we speak affect the way we think?

On July 18 to 19, we will explore questions related to the ethical implications of story-telling in pediatrics and the signiﬁcance of narrative in clinical care and pediatric bioethics. Stories allow us to make sense of and share perspectives, beliefs and experiences.
Join us as we critically examine the relationship between narrative, pediatrics and bioethics, touching on topics such as:

How do narratives shape the practice of pediatrics?
What insights do narrative ethics provide?
What are the limits of considering narrative?
How can we support moral imagination?
Who controls narratives?
What is the role of truth in narrative?
How do stories promote learning?

Early bird registration through June 8, 2025.
See registration for full pricing details.
Seattle Children’s nurses are able to register and attend the conference free of charge thanks to the generosity of our donors.
Do you have general questions about registration? Contact Emily Rice.
Questions about the Treuman Katz Center for Pediatric Bioethics and Palliative Care? Contact Us.

Individuals Who are Incarcerated as Transplant Living Donor Candidates: Ethical and Psychosocial Considerations
2025-07-17 14:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Online
On behalf of the American Society of Transplantation and the Society for Transplant Social Workers, you are invited to attend a webinar on ethical and psychosocial considerations in the evaluation of individuals who are incarcerated as living organ donors. Dr. Lainie Ross is one of the speakers. The registration link is below. You do not need to be an AST or STSW member to register.
Speakers:

Ms. Farrah Desrosiers
Dr. Michael Moritz
Dr. Lainie Ross

Moderator: Dr. Vineeta Kumar
This webinar is hosted by PSECOP, with support from LDCOP, KPCOP, LICOP, and the Society for Transplant Social Workers (STSW).

Conflict management workshops at Penn
2025-08-14 09:00 - 2025-08-17 17:00 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
The Penn Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy is pleased to announce our next 2 in-person conflict management workshops: Thursday-Sunday August 14-17, 2025 and Thursday-Sunday September 11-14, 2025.
The 4-day workshop will be held at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and will run from 9:00-5:00 each day. The Penn Program in Clinical Conflict Management has offered over 150 workshops and conflict resolution seminars since the program’s launch in May 2010.
In this Intensive, students will:

Learn how to navigate and improve challenging clinical relationships (patient-provider, family-provider, inter-staff conflicts)
Learn the techniques of facilitation among a diverse set of stakeholders
Learn to effectively manage clinical disputes among and between caregivers, patients and surrogates through mediation
Discover to how to define problems and assess underlying interests to generate mutually acceptable options
Role-play in variety of clinical situations as both disputants and mediators
Practice mediation with professional actors
Use video-tapes of simulations to improve mediation techniques and strengthen interpersonal skills
Receive constructive feedback in a supportive environment

This workshop is intended for nurses, physicians, clergy, social workers, clinical ethics consultants and members of ethics committees who face clinical ethics conflicts in their role in the healthcare system.
DESCRIPTION:
Professional mediators possess a unique skill set applicable to the facilitation of difficult conversations between individuals in emotionally laden situations. An effective mediation process can generate solutions that address the underlying interests of all disputants and resolve conflicts that appear intractable. This skill set has increasingly been recognized as invaluable to the work of clinical ethics consultants as they navigate conflicts between and among patients, families, surrogates and providers. Moreover, given wide-spread agreement that communication failures lie at the root of many clinical conflicts, mediation values and catalyzes the effective communication of individual concerns, values, perspectives and feelings — all of which are essential to the clinical ethics consultation process. This hands-on Workshop introduces the principal techniques of mediation through the use of simulated role plays with a focus on conflicts caused by communication breakdowns, highly charged value-conflicts, and cultural differences.
Instructor-Student ratio of 1:3. Space is limited. Students can earn Penn course credit or take the intensive as a workshop. Cost of the workshop is $2,500, which includes breakfast, lunch and materials. Tuition benefits can be applied for students taking it for credit. To apply for the workshop:
https://hosting.med.upenn.edu/forms/mdprogram/view.php?id=35058
Workshop Instructors:
Autumn Fiester, PhD | Director, Penn Program in Clinical Conflict Management; Associate Chair for Education
Aliza Narva, JD, MSN, HEC-c | Director, Clinical Ethics Consult Service, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania
Stacey Smith, MSN, MA, MSL, HEC-c | Lead Healthcare Ethicist, National Center for Ethics in Healthcare
Mary Walton, MBE, MSN, HEC-c | Emeritus Director, Clinical Ethics Consult Service, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania
For more information, contact: fiester@upenn.edu

A Bioethics Conversation: Autism Care and Research
2025-08-14 14:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Online
The webinar will bring together panelists with three distinct perspectives to reflect on ethics issues in autism care and research and consider how bioethics can move the conversation forward.
Register here to hear from panelists Zuzana Kazan; Brent M. Kious, MD, PhD; and Joel Michael Reynolds, PhD, as they share their insights on these important topics. For more information about the webinar and panelists, visit our blog.
After the panelists present opening remarks, the webinar will shift to a moderated panel discussion, with audience questions welcomed.
The webinar will be broadcast via Zoom and is free and open to the public. You can register here.

To Suffer What We Can't Evade: What is Medicine’s Role in Responding to Suffering?
2025-08-26 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
In medicine, suffering matters: encountering suffering and helping patients cope with, and navigate through suffering, are key functions of healthcare. In addition, the concept of suffering plays an important role in many high-stake areas of medical ethics including medical aid-in-dying and/or euthanasia, moral distress/burnout, and policies addressing “futility,” or medically-ineffective treatment. Yet for all its gravity and salience, the concept of suffering is underdetermined. In this webinar, I will briefly survey the history of “suffering” in American biomedicine. Then, I will discuss my own research on suffering and offer recommendations on how clinicians and bioethicists can [1] think more clearly about suffering, [2] respond to suffering ethically, and [3] accompany patients well along the road of suffering and illness.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:

Review theories of suffering in medicine and bioethics.
Discuss the two kinds of suffering: suffering undergone, and suffering experienced.
Analyze the ethics of suffering: what can suffering justify?
Consider humanistic ways of engaging suffering: can suffering be healed?

Speaker(s)

Tyler Tate, MD, MA, is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Stanford University, where he works as a pediatrician, palliative care physician, writer, and ethicist. Dr. Tate’s scholarly interests include suffering and flourishing, love and emotions, religion and bioethics, narrative medicine, and pediatric ethics. He practices pediatric palliative care and serves as a clinical ethicist at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford. He is also core faculty in the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics (SCBE). Prior to going to Stanford he was an assistant professor at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) in Portland, Oregon where he practiced both adult and pediatric palliative care. In 2024, he received a Hastings Center Cunniff-Dixon Early-Career Physician Award and was named a Greenwall Foundation Faculty Scholar. He completed his pediatric residency, clinical ethics fellowship, and master’s degree in bioethics at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA, and his palliative care fellowship at Duke University in Durham, NC.

Science at Risk: Funding the Future of Medical Innovation
2025-09-05 07:30 - 09:30 (America/Chicago) | Hybrid, PA
Regenerative medicine using stem cells stands at the forefront of innovation in health care, offering the potential to treat various medical conditions. Yet, despite the promise of this science, recent federal policy changes have created new barriers to funding, conducting, and approving clinical trials and therapies, posing significant challenges to advancing patient care.
This installment of the Baker Institute’s annual policy lecture series brings together physician-scientist Dr. Emerson Perin and patient advocate Micaela Alpert, who will discuss the future of regenerative medicine. The conversation will explore how to streamline regulatory processes, accelerate the review and approval of clinical protocols, and secure funding for research. Co-sponsored by the Baker Institute Center for Health Policy and The Texas Heart Institute, this event is supported by a grant from the George and Mary Josephine Hamman Foundation.
It is free and open to the public.
Follow @BakerInstitute on X to join the conversation online with #BakerLive.

Science Under Siege: A Conversation With Dr. Peter Hotez & Dr. Michael Mann
2025-09-09 12:00 - 13:30 (America/Chicago) | Hybrid, PA
From pandemics to climate change, the world faces deeply interconnected and critical challenges. Yet efforts to confront these crises are increasingly obstructed by a powerful, organized force: rising opposition to science, often driven by political and ideological agendas. This erosion of trust in scientific expertise not only threatens effective policymaking but also undermines democratic discourse and public health.
Michael E. Mann, a leading climate scientist, and Peter J. Hotez, a renowned vaccine researcher and physician-scientist, have spent decades working at the intersection of science, policy, and public communication. Both have worked to advance evidence-based responses amid a rise in disinformation and denialism, navigating an environment where scientific consensus is increasingly politicized.
This event is a collaboration between the Baker Institute Director’s Lecture Series and the Science and Tech Policy Program‘s Civic Scientist Lecture Series, sponsored by Dr. Virginia Clark, with additional support from Benjamin and Winifer Cheng, Rice University’s George R. Brown School of Engineering, and Weiss School of Natural Sciences. It is free and open to the public. Lunch will be provided.
Moderator
Neal Lane, Ph.D.
Senior Fellow, Science and Technology Policy, Baker Institute for Public Policy; Professor, Physics and Astronomy Emeritus, Rice University; Former Presidential Science Advisor, OSTP (1998-2001)
Featured Speakers
Peter J. Hotez, M.D., Ph.D., is the Baker Institute fellow in disease and poverty. He is dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine, professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology and co-director of Texas Children’s Center for Vaccine Development at Baylor College of Medicine where he also holds the Texas Children’s Hospital Endowed Chair of Tropical Pediatrics. Dr. Hotez is an internationally recognized physician-scientist with expertise in neglected tropical diseases and vaccine development, and the author of four books with Johns Hopkins University Press. In 2015-16 he served as U.S. Science Envoy in the State Department and for the White House. He holds several honorary doctorates and is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA), Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), American College of Physicians (ACP), and American Medical Writers Association (AMWA).
Michael E. Mann is Presidential Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of Pennsylvania, with a secondary appointment in the Annenberg School for Communication. He also serves as vice provost for climate science, policy, and action and director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability, and the Media. He has received numerous honors, including NOAA’s Outstanding Publication Award and recognition by Scientific American as one of 50 leading visionaries in science and technology. He was a contributing author to the award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.
Mann has received major accolades for science communication and leadership, including the 2018 AAAS Award for Public Engagement with Science, the 2019 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, and election to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2020. In 2024, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Society. He is the author of more than 300 peer-reviewed publications and seven books, including “The New Climate War” (PublicAffairs, 2021) and “Our Fragile Moment” (PublicAffairs, 2023).

The Epidemiology of Health Equity for Those Impacted by Mass Incarceration
2025-09-11 12:00 - 13:30 (America/Denver) | Online
You are warmly invited to attend the upcoming Ethics Grand Rounds, hosted by the Clinical Ethics Education Council at the CU Center for Bioethics and Humanities. This live virtual event will feature a compelling discussion led by Dr. Kate LeMasters!
As always, the views expressed are those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center or UCHealth. We encourage open dialogue and critical thinking as we explore these topics together.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
Distinguish the many levers of the criminal legal system (e.g., jail, probation) and how criminal legal sentencing impacts individual, community, and population health. Discuss how bioethics is central to the intersection of the criminal legal system and health equity. Understand how community-engaged approaches can be used to assess how criminal legal policies and laws contribute to health (in)equity.

CME Credit will be offered for live participation.*
Certificates of Participation from the CU Center for Bioethics and Humanities are available upon request.

If There’s Vapor, There’s Fire: Regulation and Use of E-Cigarettes
2025-09-12 12:30 - 13:30 (America/New_York) | Online
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates tobacco products, including e-cigarettes or vapes. In recent years, there have been debates about whether e-cigarettes should be promoted as safer than combustible tobacco and what role the FDA or other policymakers should take in limiting e-cigarette use among youth. In this seminar, we will consider opportunities and barriers to policies that reduce tobacco use and mitigate disparities among socioeconomic groups. Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University.
Presenters:
Abigail Friedman, PhD
Associate Professor of Public Health (Health Policy); Faculty Director of Online and Non-Degree Programs, Yale School of Public Health
Daniel Aaron, JD, MD
Associate Professor of Law, S.J. Quinney College of Law, University of Utah
Moderator:
C. Joseph Daval, JD
Research Scientist, Program On Regulation Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL), Brigham and Women’s Hospital

University of Louisville's Virtual Health Care Ethics Speaker Series - Child Participation in Decision-Making: From Adult-Centered to Child-Centered Models
2025-09-17 11:00 - 12:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
This presentation examines current models of child participation in health care decision making, with a focus on the AAP’s recommendation of child assent, revealing the ways in which child assent may actually cause pediatric health care professionals (HCPs) to make the following mistakes: (1) HCPs may think of child participation as an option only when dissent is determinative; (2) HCPs may believe their role to largely be uni-directional information disclosure; and (3) HCPs may sideline the parent, believing parental influence to be counter to good child engagement. The presentation will then review the psychological, sociological and ethics literature on child participation and recommend strategies that re-center the child-patient in medical decision-making.

Third Annual Faith Sommerfield Memorial Lecture
2025-09-18 17:30 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Join us for a discussion on grief and the challenges of accessing end-of-life care in the United States, featuring Jennifer Senior, a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and bestselling author known for her writing on grief, and Dr. Arthur Caplan, Ph.D., an internationally renowned author on bioethics and the founding head of the Division of Medical Ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine.
The Completed Life Initiative hosts this annual lecture in partnership with Columbia University’s M.S. in Bioethics program in commemoration of Faith Sommerfield, the late founder of the Completed Life Initiative. The lecture serves as both a tribute and a platform to advance critical conversations around end-of-life care, personal autonomy, and the right to die with dignity.
Registration closes on Tuesday, September 16th.
Speaker Bios:
Jennifer Senior
Jennifer Senior is a staff writer at The Atlantic and winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing for “Twenty Years Gone,” an unflinching portrait of a family’s reckoning with loss in the 20 years since 9/11. It was published as a stand-alone book in April of 2023 under the title “On Grief: Love, Loss, Memory.”
Prior to joining The Atlantic, Jennifer spent five years at The New York Times—first as one of its three daily book critics, then as a columnist for the Opinion page. Before that, she spent eighteen years as a staff writer for New York Magazine, writing profiles and cover stories about politics, social science, and mental health. In addition to the Pulitzer, Jennifer has won a variety of journalism prizes, including two National Magazine Awards, two Front Page Awards, a GLAAD award, and the Erikson Prize in Mental Health Media.
Jennifer is also the author of All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood, which spent eight weeks on The New York Times Best Seller list, was translated into twelve languages, and was named one of Slate’s Top 10 Books of 2014. Her work has been anthologized four times in The Best American Political Writing, and her feature about the suicide of the psychologist Philip Brickman was selected for The Best American Science Writing of 2021.
Jennifer has been a frequent guest on NPR and numerous television programs, including The Chris Matthews Show, Morning Joe, Washington Journal with Brian Lamb, Anderson Cooper 360, Good Morning America, and Today. She has also been a speaker at TED’s annual conference and the Sydney Opera House.
Arthur Leonard Caplan
Dr. Arthur Caplan, PhD, is currently the Drs. William F. and Virginia Connolly Mitty Professor and the founding head of the Division of Medical Ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine’s Department of Population Health. Prior to coming to NYU Langone, Dr. Caplan created the Center for Bioethics and the Department of Medical Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania, and he founded the Center for Biomedical Ethics at the University of Minnesota.
Dr. Caplan is the author or editor of 35 books and more than 880 papers in peer reviewed journals. He has served as the chair of a number of committees and advisory groups, including for the United Nations, the National Cancer Institute, and the Department of Health and Human Services. He is a regular commentator on bioethics and health care issues for WebMD/Medscape, WOR radio in New York City, Sirius Doctor Radio, and various other national and international media outlets.
Dr. Caplan was a USA Today 2001 “Person of the Year” and was described as one of the ten most influential people in science by Discover magazine in 2008. He has received numerous awards for his work, including the McGovern Medal of the American Medical Writers Association, the Franklin Award from the City of Philadelphia, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities.
Dr. Caplan holds eight honorary degrees from colleges, universities, and medical schools.

CARE Panel: The Role of Advocacy in Health and Research Policy Setting
2025-09-22 12:00 - 13:30 (America/Chicago) | Online
This session will focus on the ethics of advocacy in research and policy. Advocacy groups, from patients to shareholders, play an increasingly influential role in shaping which questions are asked, how resources are allocated, and whose voices are heard in addressing matters of public concern. While these organizations can drive innovation and elevate underrepresented concerns, they also raise important ethical questions about funding, conflicts of interest, and equity in decision-making.
Panelists:
Susannah Rose, MSSW, MS, PhD (Vanderbilt University Medical Center), examines critically patient advocacy organizations, their financial ties to industry, and their influence on health policy.
Macarius Donneyong, PhD, MPH (The Ohio State University, College of Pharmacy and College of Public Health), studies patient-clinician relationships and has contributed to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) on priority setting in therapeutic research to maximize public health benefits.
Rebecca Wolitz, JD, PhD (The Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law), explores shareholder advocacy and its role in shaping corporate governance, offering a striking parallel to patient-led advocacy in health research.
Register here!

PGTME Early Career Scholars Meeting 2025
2025-09-24 11:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
We are pleased to invite all junior scholars working in pediatric research ethics, gene therapy ethics, or clinical trial ethics to register for this year’s Early Career Scholars Meeting, presented by the NYU Grossman School of Medicine Division of Medical Ethics Working Group on Pediatric Gene Therapy & Medical Ethics (PGTME). The meeting will be held virtually on September 24th, 2025, 11am-1pm ET.
The purpose of this meeting is to showcase the work of early career scholars and facilitate connections between junior scholars working in similar fields. The meeting will feature an introduction from PGTME co-chair Dr. Alison Bateman-House, flash presentations from your fellow junior scholars, keynote presentations from senior experts in the space, and an open forum to connect with other attendees. If you consider yourself a junior scholar in these fields and this is of interest to you, please register using this form!
Want to share your work in a 10-minute virtual flash presentation at the meeting? Submit a 250-word abstract to go along with your registration! Abstracts can come from in-progress work, completed projects, and/or early ideas for future work, so long as they are your own original work in the fields of pediatric research ethics, gene therapy ethics, or clinical trial ethics broadly construed. NOTE: Abstract submission is not required for registration, although it is encouraged.
Abstract deadline: The abstract submission deadline has passed, but registration is still open!
Registration deadline: September 24th, 2025, 11am ET
If you have any questions about the Early Career Scholars Meeting, please email ayden.eilmus@nyulangone.org

Hygienic Modernity Imperialism and Sanitary Projects in 19th century Middle East: The Case of Damascus
2025-09-24 16:00 - 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
In the nineteenth century as hygiene became a measure of a nation’s level of civilization, the efforts of weaker nations, like the Ottomans Empire, to modernize public health were undermined by the Western powers that criticized their inadequate public health measures and questioned their sovereignty.
Dr. Benan Grams
Historian of the modern Middle East, specializing in the social history of diseases, medicine, and public health. Obtained doctoral degree from Georgetown University and teaches at Loyola New Orleans.
Room 300, 3rd floor, Malkin Sacks Commons Building, Newcomb Institute and also via Zoom
Click here to register

Learn More About Columbia's New Dual Degree Master of Science in Bioethics/Master of Science in Social Work Program
2025-09-25 18:00 - 19:30 (America/New_York) | Online
Columbia University’s new Master of Science in Bioethics / Master of Social Work dual degree program brings together top-tier professional education in bioethics and social work, to provide extraordinary synergies and unique professional opportunities. This new dual degree prepares social workers to address pressing bioethical challenges in healthcare and serve as leaders in bioethics.
Join us for this session featuring both Bioethics and Social Work faculty to answer questions about the new program. In addition, social workers who work in bioethics will discuss how their dual training has proved essential for their careers, opening up novel avenues.

2025 Healthcare Ethics and Moral Distress Consultation Intensive Training Seminar
2025-09-28 09:00 - 2025-09-30 17:00 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Join us September 28 through September 30, 2025, in beautiful Charlottesville, Virginia for our 13th annual Healthcare Ethics and Moral Distress Consultation Intensive Training Seminar. Nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the grounds and gardens of the University of Virginia are the perfect setting for an immersive weekend spent developing or deepening your consultation knowledge and skills.
This in-person, intensive 3-day training program is designed for multidisciplinary practicing healthcare professionals who wish to develop or deepen their healthcare ethics and moral distress consultation knowledge and skills and prepare for the healthcare ethics consultation certification exam. The training is grounded in the ASBH core competencies for healthcare ethics consultation and will emphasize the four content domains for certification determined by the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. It is the only program in the United States to offer training in Moral Distress consultation, building on 18 years of experience at UVA Health. Participants will receive a certificate upon course completion. Registration details coming soon! You can view the 2024 syllabus here
FORMAT: This interactive and multidisciplinary seminar combines didactic sessions with case discussions and hands-on exercises. The course culminates with attendance at UVA’s weekly Healthcare Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services meeting.
SCHEDULE: The program begins at 9 am Sunday, September 28 and ends at 2 pm on Tuesday, September 30. Sunday and Monday are dedicated to healthcare ethics consultation. Tuesday focuses solely on moral distress consultation and can be attended independent of the rest of the program.
PREREQUISITES: Participants will be expected to obtain and read Core Competencies for Ethics Consultation prior to the training (available at www.asbh.org).
REGISTRATION: The cost is $1,800/person for the complete course (Sunday through Tuesday) or $500/person for the Moral Distress Consultation sessions only (Tuesday, September 30). Pre-registration is required. Questions: PLEASE CONTACT: Charlene Kaufman @ cmk2b@uvahealth.org
MEALS: Breakfast: Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday
Lunch: Sunday and Tuesday
LODGING: A block has been reserved at the Courtyard by Marriott (434-977-1700) next to the Medical Center.

Courtyard Charlottesville – University Medical Center for 127.00 per night – Last Day to Book : Saturday, September 06, 2025
Book your group rate for HEC Conference

THINGS TO DO IN AND AROUND CHARLOTTESVILLE: Charlottesville is vibrant small town with lots to do. It’s a foodie haven with museums, theaters, and an active music scene. Outdoor opportunities include exploring the Historic Downtown Mall (pedestrian-only with 120 shops and 30 restaurants), hiking the Blue Ridge Mountains, enjoying the fall foliage on the Skyline Drive, touring the University grounds and gardens (including Edgar Allan Poe’s room on the Range), visiting Monticello (and dining at nearby historic Michie Tavern), picnicking at Carter Mountain Orchard (apple cider donuts!), and sampling the goods at a plethora of local wineries, cideries, and distilleries.

COURSE FACULTY:
The training will be co-led by:
Mary Faith Marshall, PhD, FCCM, HEC-C: Course Co-Director; Kornfeld Professor of Bioethics
and Director, Center for Health Humanities and Ethics, School of Medicine and Professor, School of Nursing; member Ethics Consult and Moral Distress Consult Services; member Medical Center Ethics Committee
Dawn Bourne, DNP, FNP-C, HEC-C: Assistant Professor, School of Nursing; Director, Moral Distress Consult Service; member Ethics Consult Service
Julia Taylor, MD, MA, HEC-C: Associate Professor of Pediatrics; Core Faculty, Center for Health Humanities and Ethics; Director Ethics Consult Service; member Moral Distress Consult Service

Faculty:
Susan Aronhalt, MSW, LCSW: member, Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services
Dawn Bourne, DNP, FNP-C, HEC-C: Assistant Professor, School of Nursing; Director, Moral Distress Consult Service; member Ethics Distress Consult Service
James F. Childress, PhD: Hollingsworth Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies; Core Faculty, Center for Health Humanities and Ethics; member, Medical Center Ethics Committee
Katerine Egressy, MD, MPH, FCCP: Assistant Professor of Medicine; member Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services
Andrew Legan, MD: Assistant Professor of Psychiatry; member, Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services
Dea Mahanes, DNP, RN, CCNS, CNRN, CCRN, FNCS, HEC-C: Clinical Nurse Specialist, Neurancy Neuroscience Intensive and Intermediate Care Units; member Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services; member, Medical Center Ethics Committee; Chair, Medical Center Organ Transplant Committee
Mary Faith Marshall, PhD, FCCM, HEC-C: Director, Center for Health Humanities and Ethics; member Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services; member, Medical Center Ethics Committee
Peter Murray, MD, MSM, HEC-C: Associate Professor of Pediatrics; Chairperson, Medical Center Ethics Committee; member Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services
Jeffery Spike, PhD, HEC-C: Ethics Scholar-in-Residence at Children’s National Hospital in Washington D.C. and a Clinical Professor at George Washington University School of Medicine and Health
Julia Taylor, MD, MA (Bioethics), HEC-C: Associate Professor of Pediatrics; Core Faculty, Center for Health Humanities and Ethics; Director, Ethics Consult Service, member Medical Center Ethics Committee
Nicholas Yates, MD, MA (Bioethics), Pediatrician, community member Ethics and Moral Distress Consult Services; member, Patient Care Consulting Subcommittee

2025 Healthcare Ethics and Moral Distress Consultation Intensive Training Seminar
2025-09-28 09:00 - 2025-09-30 17:00 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Join us September 28 through September 30, 2025, in beautiful Charlottesville, Virginia for our 13th annual Healthcare Ethics and Moral Distress Consultation Intensive Training Seminar. Nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the grounds and gardens of the University of Virginia are the perfect setting for an immersive weekend spent developing or deepening your consultation knowledge and skills. kk
This intensive program is ideal for those looking to:

Deepen their practical knowledge of ethics consultation in clinical settings
Strengthen their ability to navigate complex moral challenges
Prepare with confidence for the Healthcare Ethics Consultation Certification exam
Develop/enhance skill in moral distress consultation

This training focuses on the key content domains outlined by the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. Through interactive sessions, real-world case discussions, and expert-led instruction, participants will gain the tools and insights needed to lead with clarity and compassion in ethically complex situations.
You can view the 2024 syllabus here
Hotel discount available through September 6th, 2025.

REGISTRATION: The cost is $1,800/person for the complete course (Sunday through Tuesday) or $500/person for the Moral Distress Consultation sessions only (Tuesday, September 30). Pre-registration is required. Questions: PLEASE CONTACT: Charlene Kaufman @ cmk2b@uvahealth.org

Public Perceptions of Health Equity and How Communication Can Shape Understanding and Action
2025-10-03 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
Health equity is a particularly politically-charged construct in the U.S. in 2025. However, public understanding of concepts related to health equity and health disparities has been polarized along political party lines for many years. Dr. Gollust will present survey data from 2020-2023 describing the extent of political differences in the public’s understanding of health disparities in the context of COVID-19, alongside qualitative data on public health communicators’ perspectives about their strategies addressing these topics within a challenging political information environment. Then, she will present emerging research that suggests how information can shape public understanding of health equity and influence public support for policies that could improve population health.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:

Understand trends in public opinion about health disparities and related concepts in the United States.

Identify strategies communicators are using to try to promote public understanding of health equity.

Recognize evidence-based communication approaches that have promise in shaping public understanding of health equity.

This is an event of the Office of Academic Clinical Affairs (OACA), hosted by the Center for Bioethics.
Speaker(s)

Sarah Gollust, PhD, is a Professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, as well as Affiliate Faculty in the Center for Bioethics. A social scientist who studies the intersections of communication, politics, and health policy, Dr. Gollust has examined media influences and public opinion around significant health issues, including obesity, health equity, the Affordable Care Act, and cancer screening. She also examines how research is translated into policymaking. She is a co-lead of the Collaborative on Media and Messaging for Health & Social Policy, an interdisciplinary group of researchers who study how media and messaging shape public opinions, attitudes, and behaviors. Dr. Gollust completed a predoctoral fellowship in Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health, a postdoctoral fellowship in population health at the University of Pennsylvania, and she received her PhD in Health Services Organization and Policy from the University of Michigan.

Bioethics Information Session
2025-10-08 18:00 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Columbia University’s Master of Science in Bioethics program grounds students in interdisciplinary approaches and models to address the most pressing bioethical challenges. The Bioethics program prepares students to act as responsible and responsive leaders in this new and ever-growing field.
Join us for this session in which distinguished Bioethics faculty will provide you with insight into the program and answer any questions you may have about the courses they lead at Columbia University.

What You Don’t See Will Harm Them: Culturally Informed Care in a World of Hidden Values, Hidden Systems, and Hidden Harm
2025-10-09 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Denver) | Online
You are warmly invited to attend the upcoming Ethics Grand Rounds, hosted by the Clinical Ethics Education Council at the CU Center for Bioethics and Humanities. This live virtual event will feature a compelling discussion led by Dr. Chelsey Patten with Dr. Aasim Padela as a respondent!
Please feel free to share information about this event widely. Please note, the views expressed are those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center or UCHealth. We encourage open dialogue and critical thinking as we explore these topics together.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
1. Identify ethical considerations in discussing culturally or religiously sensitive aspects of medical treatment, with a focus on transparency, trust, and patient autonomy.
2. Analyze how hidden assumptions and incomplete informed consent processes impact patient-provider relationships and decision-making in culturally informed care.
3. Evaluate systemic barriers — such as inadequate EHR documentation, opaque pharmaceutical labeling, and workflow design — that limit the practice of culturally informed care.
Propose actionable strategies for clinicians, ethicists, and healthcare leaders to build systems that proactively integrate patient values into care planning.
CME Credit will be offered for live participation.*
Certificates of Participation from the CU Center for Bioethics and Humanities are available upon request.
Registration is required to attend. Follow this link to register!
For additional information or questions, please contact CBH Clinical Ethics.

Drug Use for Grown-ups: Where the Liberty, Policy and Science Collide
2025-10-09 16:00 - 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Hybrid, PA
The Murphy Institute’s Center for Ethics will welcome Dr. Carl Hart as the featured speaker for the first installment of 2025-2026’s Public Lecture Series.
Dr. Carl Hart is the Mamie Phipps Clark Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychology at Columbia University, with a joint appointment in Psychiatry. A neuroscientist and psychologist, his research focuses on the behavioral and neuropharmacological effects of psychoactive drugs in humans. He is the author of the award-winning High Price and Drug Use for Grown-Ups, and co-author of the widely used textbook Drugs, Society and Human Behavior. Dr. Hart has published over 100 scientific and popular articles and received the 2022 Abraham L. Halpern Humanitarian Award for his contributions to human rights and drug policy reform. Through his research and public engagement, he continues to challenge misconceptions about addiction and promote science-based approaches to drug use and justice.
The Center for Ethics public lectures serve as a vital platform for intellectual exchange, where scholars and practitioners from a broad range of intellectual and professional disciplines and concerned citizens can engage with pressing ethical questions. Since 2001, the Center for Ethics has hosted more than 200 guest speakers discussing contemporary topics in ethics. Lectures are free and open to all members of the Tulane community as well as the general public.
This event is co-sponsored by Tulane University’s School of Medicine’s MS in Bioethics and Medical Humanities and The Program in Medical Ethics and Human Values. Tulane University’s Department of Psychology, and by 89.9 WWNO.
Live Stream: youtube.com/live/XCrR6T5bIUI

ELSI Friday Forum: "Knowing or Not Knowing: The Ethics of Returning Genetic Risk Information for Alzheimer's Disease"
2025-10-10 09:00 - 10:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Online
Abstract: The return of genetic and biomarker information in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) research has emerged as a pressing ethical question as disease-modifying treatments become available and expectations around disclosure shift. This ELSI Friday Forum brings together two leading ELSI researchers whose work interrogates these tensions.
Jessica Mozersky, PhD (Washington University in St. Louis) will draw on findings from her recent cohort study evaluating who declines to learn AD biomarker results and will discuss the ethical significance of respecting the “right not to know.” Ruth Ottman, PhD (Columbia University) will present findings from her longitudinal community-based study of Latinos in northern Manhattan that examines the psychosocial, behavioral, and cognitive impacts of learning late-onset Alzheimer’s disease risk based on APOE genotype disclosure versus nondisclosure. Moderated by Emily Largent, JD, PhD, RN (University of Pennsylvania), this session will explore the ethical, cultural, and policy implications of returning AD genetic risk information.

Adoption on the Frontlines of Reproductive Justice
2025-10-10 12:30 - 13:30 (America/New_York) | Online
In the intense US debate over access to abortion, opponents to access offer adoption as an alternative. In this seminar, an expert panel will delve into the legal and ethical issues in the American approach to adoption as an abortion alternative and the experiences women who have relinquished their children, framing adoption as an issue on the leading edge of reproductive justice. Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University.
Presenters:

Malinda Seymore, JD, Professor of Law, Texas A&M University School of Law
Gretchen Sisson, PhD, Sociologist, Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health, University of California San Francisco

Moderator:

Barbara Wilkinson, MD, MA, Instructor, Harvard Medical School; Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Register here to receive the Zoom link and call-in details in your automated confirmation email.

The seminar recording will be uploaded to our YouTube channel in the weeks following the event date, pending no technical issues. Registrants will receive a follow-up email containing the recording link when it is ready.

35th Annual Jonathan J. King Lecture: "When Care Comes First: A Radical Reimagining of Medical Ethics"
2025-10-14 17:30 - 18:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Hybrid, PA
35th Annual Jonathan J. King Lecture
Join us on Tuesday, October 14th, 2025, at 5:30 pm (PDT) for our 35th Annual Jonathan J. King Lecture, “When Care Comes First: A Radical Reimagining of Medical Ethics” featuring Dr. Arthur Kleinman.
Arthur Kleinman, MD, author of the acclaimed The Illness Narratives: Suffering, Healing, and the Human Condition, is a world-renowned expert and luminary whose influential career spans anthropology, global health, ethics, psychiatry as well as narrative and cultural medicine. Educated at Stanford and a distinguished professor at Harvard for nearly five decades, Kleinman has notably served as Chair of both Harvard’s Department of Social Medicine and Department of Anthropology and directed Harvard’s Asia Center. He is also the author of multiple books, including The Soul of Care and co-editor of seminal volumes such as Reimagining Global Health. Kleinman’s prestigious accolades include membership in the National Academy of Medicine, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Franz Boas Award from the American Anthropological Association. A revered mentor, Kleinman has guided generations of scholars in transforming global perspectives on health and human suffering.
Registration links:
Virtual registration URL: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/ev/reg/r5fu2tf
In-person registration URL: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/ev/reg/v5fbema

Children’s Autonomy in Health Care: "Medical Decision-Making for Minors: Two Puzzles"
2025-10-15 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Speaker
Joseph Millum
Senior Lecturer
St Andrews University
Dr. Millum is currently Senior Lecturer in the Department of Philosophy at St Andrews University. He also serves as a consultant to the World Health Organisation and he is the Chairperson of the International Society for Priorities in Health. Prior to arriving at St Andrews, Dr. Millum worked at the US National Institutes of Health for 15 years – in the Clinical Center Department of Bioethics and the Fogarty International Center.
Dr. Millum’s research spans various topics in bioethics and applied ethics. These include: (1) Health care priority-setting; (2) Health research priority-setting; (3) Consent; (4) The ethics of research with human participants; (5) Bioethical theory; (6) The ethics of parenthood. His books include Global Justice and Bioethics (2012), The Moral Foundations of Parenthood (2018), Global Health Priority-Setting: Beyond Cost-Effectiveness (2020), and A Theory of Bioethics (2021).
Abstract
This talk will engage two puzzles surrounding medical decision-making for older children and adolescents. The first concerns decision-making by minors. The law and professional guidelines typically support allowing minors over a certain age to make some decisions for themselves (e.g., regarding sexual health) but not others (e.g., refusal of life-saving care). This is puzzling because the same individual may be deemed competent to make one decision but not another, even though the decisions are equally complex. The second concerns decisions that are made on a child’s behalf. Parents frequently make decisions that are contrary to their children’s interests. This is puzzling because it appears to conflict with the “best interests” standard for pediatric decision-making.
In both cases, thinking about the philosophical foundations of clinical practice can help give principled guidance. Regarding decisions by minors, we can distinguish two rights that together constitute “decision-making capacity.” One is the power to waive one’s rights by giving consent; the other is a claim against others that they not interfere with one’s decisions. I suggest that individuals with borderline decision-making capacity can have the first but not the second—this explains why we should respect adolescent decisions that align with the patient’s interests and values, but can overrule decisions that are highly contrary to the adolescent’s interests. Regarding decisions made for minors, I argue that the “best interests” standard should be replaced by a “reasonable subject” standard. This standard would balance the interests of the child with the interests of others. It explains why parents can take their own needs into account in making decisions that affect their families and why it can be permissible to enroll young children into non-beneficial research studies, while still protecting children from choices that would sacrifice their well-being.
We are offering Continuing Education credit in Medicine, Nursing, and Social Work. To register to receive CE credit, click here (separate registration required).

"Finding Moral Agency and Resisting Threats to Professional Identity"
2025-10-16 16:00 - 17:00 (America/New_York) | Online
The Bioethics Network of Ohio (BENO) is hosting its next virtual education seminar on October 16th from 4-5pm Eastern with Dr. Sabrina Derrington.
Sabrina Derrington, MD, MA, HEC-C
Director, Center for Bioethics,
Children’s Hospital Los Angeles
Associate Professor of Clinical Pediatrics,
Keck School of Medicine of USC
When the ability for healthcare professionals to provide good patient care is constrained by political, legal, or economic forces, we can experience distress and threats to professional or personal identity. What does it mean to be a “good” clinician in these circumstances? In this session Dr. Derrington will consider the ethical obligations of individuals, professionals, and organizations in response to health injustice and offer steps healthcare professionals can take to reclaim moral agency and build moral community.
BENO Quarterly Education Sessions are held virtually on Zoom. They require prior registration but are open to all. In addition, individual & instutional BENO members have access to the recorded library of BENO Education Sessions.
You can register here
We hope to see many of you on October 16th and encourage you to share with colleagues, students, or friends you think may be interested in this education. You we welcome to reach out to me, or to our BENO administrator, with any question.

Ethics for Lunch with Dr. Tia Powell: What Bad Cases Teach Us
2025-10-30 13:00 - 14:00 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Dr. Tia Powell, former Director of the Masters of Bioethics Program at Montefiore Einstein and one of the nation’s leading bioethicists, will engage in an interactive discussion of clinical ethics case.
Speaker:
Tia Powell, M.D., Professor of Epidemiology and Psychiatry, Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Medical Center; Cofounder, Slow Code Media
Moderated by: Robert Klitzman, M.D., Program Director, Bioethics; Professor of Psychiatry, Columbia University Irving Medical Center
For further information, please contact Marie Gugnishev, mg4441@columbia.edu.

Oaths and Expertise: The Bioethical Consequences of Health Policy as Medical Decision-Making
2025-10-31 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
In this session, participants will explore the shifting health policy climate towards one that is more pervasive and invasive in medical practice. Whether via bans on youth gender care, curtailing of publicly funded insurance eligibility, or policies that shape access to reproductive healthcare (to name just a few), the laws, litigation and regulations that impact access to medical care are exerting more power over the pursuit of health than ever before. Dr. McNamara will review the history of health policy in pediatrics and reproductive medicine up until present day and explore emerging trends. She will then build the argument that policy functions as medical care, and operates without the self-regulating guardrails that shape medical practice. If we hold health policy to bioethical standards, perhaps we can conceptualize an idealized framework by which policy and healthcare should intersect.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:

Define policy, health policy, the social contract and bioethically sound health policy.
Describe the past and present relationships between policy and healthcare with historical examples.
Conceptualize emerging trends in health policy and apply bioethical principles to their impacts.
Build a shared understanding of effective engagement in health policy development processes.

This is an event of the Office of Academic Clinical Affairs (OACA), hosted by the Center for Bioethics.
Speaker(s)
Meredithe McNamara, MD, MS, FAAP, is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Yale School of Medicine and Affiliate Faculty in the Yale Institute for Global Health. Dr. McNamara is a board-certified pediatrician and Adolescent Medicine specialist who provides full spectrum healthcare to adolescents and young adults aged 11-25. This care encompasses, among others, mental health, substance use, eating disorders, sexual health, menstrual disorders, harm reduction, gender diversity, and general primary care in community and school-based settings. In addition to her work as a practicing clinician, she conducts research on scientific disinformation in health policy that impacts youth access to healthcare. As the Co-Director of the Integrity Project, her research and writing is operationalized in policy processes via testimony, public comments and litigation. She has testified in several state-based litigation processes challenging state-level bans on youth gender care, and before US Congress. She has co-authored numerous amicus briefs, including one filed with the US Supreme Court. Her work is inherently multi-disciplinary and she collaborates with legal/policy scholars, bioethicists, scientific subject matter experts and, most importantly, members of the communities most impacted by policies of interest.

Moral Distress and Burnout Among OB-GYNs After Dobbs
2025-11-07 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
Since the US Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson, 17 U.S. states have functionally banned abortion, creating clinical and ethical challenges for physicians practicing in these jurisdictions. In this presentation, Dr. Buchbinder will present findings from her qualitative research with obstetrician-gynecologists (OB-GYNs) providing care in states with abortion bans. Findings reveal pervasive impacts of state abortion bans on OB-GYNs—including moral distress, conflicts with clinical colleagues, health and wellbeing consequences, and reduced job satisfaction—with implications for physician health, workforce sustainability, and patient outcomes. Institutional practices to support and protect OB-GYNs in restrictive policy environments may help to mitigate the impacts of abortion bans on physicians’ wellbeing.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:

Understand how abortion laws and policies are impacting the ability to provide comprehensive reproductive health care.
Describe ethical challenges that abortion bans raise for physicians.
Identify tangible solutions for supporting and improving professional wellbeing among clinicians engaged in reproductive healthcare.

This is an event of the Office of Academic Clinical Affairs (OACA), hosted by the Center for Bioethics, and co-sponsored by the following U of MN Units: Program in Health Disparities Research, Medical School; Center for Race, Indigeneity, Disability, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, College of Liberal Arts; Community-University Health Care Center (CUHCC); Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication, College of Liberal Arts; Center for the Study of Political Psychology, College of Liberal Arts; Masonic Cancer Center (MCC); Minnesota Population Center; Healthy Weight Research Center; Rural Health Research Center; Business Advancement Center for Health (BACH), Carlson School of Management, College of Pharmacy; Medical School; School of Public Health; School of Nursing.
Participants are eligible to receive a Certificate of Attendance to submit to their respective professions for CEUs. Certificates of Attendance are available only to webinar attendees who are present for 75% or more of the talk.
Health professions students are eligible for IPE credit. IPE credit is available only to webinar attendees who are present for 75% or more of the talk and complete a written reflection form.
This talk will be recorded and posted with our other event recordings.
Speaker(s)
Mara Buchbinder, PhD, is Professor and Chair of Social Medicine and Adjunct Professor of Anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as core faculty in the University of North Carolina Center for Bioethics. Dr. Buchbinder is a medical anthropologist with broad interests in cultures of health, illness, and medicine in the United States. Her recent work focuses on how patients, families, and healthcare providers navigate social and ethical challenges resulting from changes in medical technology, law, and health policy.
