CGS offers master's in Bioethics

The new degree will focus on ethical questions in medicine. A new master's degree in Bioethics will be available this fall through the College of General Studies and the University's Center for Bioethics. The degree is "designed to give medical professionals the tools and training they need to grapple with the ethical questions created by the practice of medicine in the '90s," according to CGS spokesperson Luise Moskowitz. Glenn McGee, a member of the Center, explained that the popularity of the Bioethics Center's website, which received 60,000 hits last month, spurred the idea of offering a master's degree. "Some people were begging to have the graduate school open a degree program," he said. The new program offers a CGS-based degree in cooperation with the Medical School, consisting of nine course units on topics such as medicine and society, the philosophy of medicine, health care policy, bioethics from a philosophical perspective and the historical, sociological or anthropological conditions of medicine. Students in the program will also be required to complete either an internship or research project. "We're always aiming to develop programs that pull the community into Penn and make it appealing," Moskowitz said. CGS officials said they have received approximately 125 applications for the program's May 1 deadline, but only plan to admit a class of between 15 and 20 students, adding that they believe that the number of students admitted to the program will increase in the future. When beginning to design the degree approximately a year-and-a-half ago, professors hoped to attract medical students or professionals in health care or medical-related fields -- such as malpractice lawyers, social workers, nurses, physicians and psychiatrists -- who are likely to face medical ethics questions. Undergraduate pre-medical students are not eligible for the degree. Courses for the new program will be offered during the day and at night to accommodate professionals pursuing the degree through night school as well as students in other graduate schools. Full-time students could complete the degree in one school year. The program is not intended for students pursuing a career in bioethics, but instead it offers an "enhancement degree for medical practitioners who find they need additional skills to deal with the dizzying array of situations 21st century technology has created in their various health care settings," Moskowitz said. A graduate from the degree program, for example, would not be a "bioethics expert," but would be able to consult patients and "help physicians with the delicate art of negotiating in medicine when they are faced with complicated, conflicting ideas," McGee said. He said that "ethics is like a virus," adding that for a person "infected with this curiosity, not only do they want to learn more, but it spreads and they turn themselves into teachers." First-year Medical student Alex Nemeth has caught this "virus." He said that he became interested in bioethics after attending a medical school lecture and has applied for the degree. But although Nemeth said all medical students are exposed to the subject through lectures and coursework, he explained that such a cursory introduction was not enough for him. "Most of what we learn about scientific and clinical medicine are tools, but it takes more than scientific and clinical criteria to learn how to use those tools," Nemeth said. "Doctors need to be involved in all aspects of medicine, not just taking care of patients," Nemeth said. "They need to know ethics, science, politics and business of medicine -- if not involved in all of those other aspects, they're doing a disservice to their patients."