What About the Family?
An interdisciplinary course on ethical issues in health care
How can familial relationships inform people’s approach to living with illness or disability? What are the choices people make around treatment options? What is the influence of broader social and cultural values on their responsibilities?
Health care is not only of great importance to individual patients. The impact of medical decisions can also have a devastating effect on a patient’s family and relatives. Care providers have very little opportunity to involve the family in the care given to a patient. Legislation and guidelines relating to healthcare revolve around the individual, despite the fact that patients make many of their decisions in consultation with the family. Questions needing more family-based ethics arise throughout the care sector, from home care and genetics to questions concerning the beginning and ending of life.
In this summer school on ethical issues in health care, we will focus especially on questions related to person-centered and shared decision making, screening (from preconception till adult screening) healthy ageing and ‘end of life care’. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, we welcome PhDs and Postdocs working in the field of ethics, as well as those working in health care (public health) more broadly: communication, sociology and medical anthropology.
Set in the beautiful, historical city of Groningen, participants will spend the week enhancing their knowledge and understanding of the theoretical approaches to ethics of families, and their applications. Participants will have many opportunities to present their own research and benefit from feedback from internationally renowned scholars.
Course information
Target Audience
This summer school is designed for PhD students and Postdocs working in the field of ethics. We also welcome those working in health care (public health) more broadly, communication, sociology and medical anthropology.
It is expected that the participants have a sufficient command of the English language to actively participate in the discussions and to present their own work in English.
Programme
The summer school will start on Sunday 11 August with a city tour and welcoming drinks. The educational programme will start on Monday 12 August and end on Friday 16 August, and will include lectures on family ethics; embodiment, technology and family; decision making in health care and genetics and many other topics.
Workload
The workload is estimated at 84 hours.
Prior to the summer school:
- Preparatory readings: 20 hours (120 pages; 6 pages per hour)
- Preparation of a topic for a research paper; to present via a short oral description to Faculty and other Summer School students: 6 hours
- Preparation of a case for discussion: 2 x 5 hours
- 1 critical assessment of an article: 8 hours
During the summer school
- Lectures and seminar-based discussion: 40 hours
Preparatory work
1. Preparatory readings. A reading list will be available by the 11 June, with papers divided into groups corresponding to each session. Each participant is expected to prepare questions for discussion arising from each set of papers. For each session, one of those questions should be send to the lecturer in charge of that session before 1 August 2019.
2. Prepare a topic for research paper (optional). You will present your research paper idea to your fellow students and the summer school Faculty via a short oral presentation (5-10 minutes) on the first day of the summer school. Your presentation can use slides (e.g. PowerPoint) if you wish; but this not required.
3. Prepare two cases for discussion related to one of the summer school questions or themes. You are expected to select and prepare a case for discussion on days 3 and 4. This case can come from your own research project, your own professional practice or personal experience, or from research or public reporting/debate. It should be about ethical issues, complications or challenges for decision-making in health care that connect to the reality of patients to be embedded in close social relationships and real or imagined responsibilities. The preparation should include that you assemble sufficient detail and related information (e.g., links to news items or discussions, literature that you bring with you, etc.) to inform a small group discussion, to then be presented to the whole group. At least one case should be related to the impact of genetics/genomics on families.
Housing information
Housing (7 nights, from Saturday 10 August to Saturday 17 August), in Upsilon international student house is available upon request for €245.
Application procedure
To apply, kindly fill out the online application form. Please upload the following documents with your application:
- CV (max 2 pages)
- Motivation letter (max 1 page)
The deadline for application is 1 June.
For more information click "LINK TO ORIGINAL" below.
This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:
https://www.rug.nl/education/summer-winter-schools/summer_schools_2019/what_about_the_family/