Biomedical Ethics Teachings to Postgraduate Doctors

Postgraduates programs in bioethics are available globally in Canada, USA, Australia, UK, Europe and now with the efforts of UNESCO across much of Asia including India, China and Japan (1). In Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the first formal move in introducing bioethics teachings in the medical students’ curriculum was made at Aga Khan University, Karachi in 1984. It was in 1997 that workshops and courses focused on local ethical dilemmas were made mandatory for the postgraduate clinical training of the residents at AKU (2). Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) in 2001 stipulated that bioethics must be included in the medical curriculum (3). The Centre for Biomedical Ethics and Culture was established at the Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation in 2004 and began the Postgraduate Diploma Course in Bioethics in 2006 (4). Informal postgraduate teaching of bioethics is conducted in different institutions at Karachi and also by Karachi Bioethics Group (formed in 2004). This platform allows postgraduates, residents and faculty to educate themselves about emerging bioethical issues through discussions (5). A bioethics curriculum for postgraduates has been implemented at Sobhraj Maternity Hospital (SMH) from January 2007. SMH is a public sector hospital, located centrally in Karachi, Pakistan. On average, approximately 200 patients are seen daily in the outpatient department. The various problems faced by the doctors are busy outpatient department leading to overcrowding, shortage of staff with one doctor dealing with forty patients and lack of general resources. Due to this scenario, various ethical concerns that arise include issues of patient-physician relationship, truth telling, privacy, confidentiality, disclosure and informed consent. Hence there is a great need for training of the postgraduates in biomedical ethics so that they can carry out their clinical practice in an ethical manner. This paper highlights the experience of teaching biomedical ethics to postgraduate trainees for Membership of College of Physicians and Surgeons (MCPS), Pakistan examinations, who come for two years training and doctors who come for their six month internship in Obstetrics & Gynecology specialty to SMH.