The purpose of this article was to characterise undergraduate medical ethics programmes in the UK and to identify opportunities and threats to teaching and learning. Completed responses were received from 22/28 schools (79%). Seventeen respondents felt that their ethics teaching objectives were effective. Twenty ethics principles should be taught in the course and 13 said that teaching and learning should be fully horizontally integrated. A lack of basic ethical competence did not preclude graduation in 15 schools. The most successful aspects of the courses were considered to be their integrated nature and small-group teaching; weaknesses were described as the need for even more integration and strongly theoretical aspects of ethics. This study describes how ethics was taught and assessed in 2004. The results show that although ethics now has a prominent place in the curriculum, more can be done to provide more effective teaching.
Teaching and assessing medical ethics: where are we now?
19 December 2022