The Canadian Medical Association (CMA) has left the World Medical Association (WMA) because of ethics failings of its new President, Dr Leonid Eidelman. Apparently Eidelman's inaugural speech was in parts plagiarised from content produced, among others, by Dr Christopher Simpson, a former President of the Canadian Medical Association. As far as Eidelman is concerned, he says his speech was written by speech writers, and he was unaware of the plagiarism.
Let me just say that Eidelman ought to resign, whether or not his speech was written by others. He delivered plagiarized content as if it was his own, so the fact that he used speech writers is irrelevant, he remains responsible for what he says. The WMA did not force Eidelman to resign, it did not fire him.
The thing with the WMA is this: ethics failings are kind of power for the cause. That's what it does. It is a morally bankrupt organization, and it has been a morally bankrupt organization for a long time. Its plagiarizing current President, by comparison, nearly falls into the category of 'good guy'.
In 1992 it wisely chose to elect a Nazi war criminal as its President, Dr Hans Sewering. Sewering was reportedly a member of the SS and the Nazi party. He signed death warrants for some 900 children with disabilities who were then murdered in a Nazi extermination centre.
In 2010 the WMA elected Ketan Desai to is President. He was found guilty by the High Court of Delhi of corruption and abuse of power in 2001. The High Court ordered his removal from his job as President of the Medical Council of India. Investigators had charged him with seeking a massive bribe from a private medical college in return for approving admissions of students for the 2010-2011 academic year.
So, the WMA has a knack for picking the wrong people. The only thing that is odd about the CMA's timing is that they chose to resign their membership from the WMA over a comparably trifling matter, namely a vanity speech giving by its incoming President. Desai's failings were apparently of no concern at the time to the CMA.
The CMA's President, Dr Gigi Osler is quoted in the Toronto Star newspaper, '“We must continue to hold ourselves to a high standard of
professionalism and ethical behaviour,” said Osler. “We are going to
strive to uphold honesty, humility, integrity and prudence.”
This, of course, is the same medical association whose views on professionalism are akin to that of a trade union rather than that of a proud professional association. Dr Jeff Blackmer, the Director of the Canadian Medical Association’s Ethics Office wrote on behalf of the association that medical doctors are neither obliged to provide abortion services, nor are they obliged to transfer patients on to doctors they know will provide abortions to women seeking one. He holds the same view on medical aid in dying, and - one wonders - on what other medical services. Of course, doctors are monopoly providers of this service, abortion is legal in Canada, and pregnant women are entitled to receive that service free of charge (ie publicly funded) from said monopoly providers. The CMA's take is that the refusal to provide or transfer is perfectly compatible with professional conduct, when, by definition, that isn't the case.
Apparently Eidelman and Blackmer got into a bit of a bunfight over Eidelman lecturing the CMA over its support for medical aid in dying. Blackmer rightly criticises Eidelman for claiming that the CMA thought assisted dying is comparable in terms of its seriousness to prescribing antibiotics.
It appears to be the case that the WMA has again managed to appoint a reactionary doctor with questionable ethics as its President. One does wonder why anyone would take too seriously any longer its pronouncements on matters medical ethics. In its conduct it really is not dissimilar to the Roman Catholic Church. There is a lot of hand waving and posturing, but when it comes to actual conduct, it disqualifies itself as an arbiter of matters ethics.
So, kudos to the CMA for leaving the WMA; even though the point in time is ill-chosen, it was a long overdue decision.
Showing posts with label medical ethics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label medical ethics. Show all posts
Monday, October 08, 2018
Tuesday, July 25, 2017
2017 Bioethics journals h5 / h5-median index
I suspect I could have had this easier, but be that as it may, I searched for bioethics/health care ethics/ medical ethics journals on google scholar to see how they fare in terms of citations over the last five years.
h5 h5-median
Quite possibly the below table will be displayed in odd ways on your screen.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated July 2017. Any mistakes are my own, please alert me if you discover discrepancies between what I am reporting and what you're able to find on google scholar.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated July 2017. Any mistakes are my own, please alert me if you discover discrepancies between what I am reporting and what you're able to find on google scholar.
h5 h5-median
Nursing Ethics 34 44
Journal of Medical Ethics 31 42
Journal of Medical Ethics 31 42
Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics 27 40
Science and Engineering Ethics 30 45
Bioethics 25 31
Neuroethics 23 36
bmc medical ethics 23 32
Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 20 25
Hastings Center Report 19 32
bmc medical ethics 23 32
Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 20 25
Hastings Center Report 19 32
American Journal of Bioethics Neuroscience 18 28
Health Care Analysis 16 22
Nursing Philosophy 15 29
Developing World Bioethics 15 28
Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 15 16
Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 14 18
Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 13 18
HEC Forum 12 28
Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 12 19
Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 12 15
American Journal of Bioethics Primary Research 11 15
Journal of Medical Ethics and History of Medicine 9 17
Journal of Medical Ethics and History of Medicine 9 17
Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics 8 13
Ethik in der Medizin 8 10
South African Journal of Bioethics and Law 8 9
Medical Ethics Journal 7 9
Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics 6 12
Monash Bioethics Review 6 8
Asian Bioethics Review 5 10
Christian Bioethics 5 6
Journal international de bioethique 4 8
Ethics in Biology, Engineering and Medicine 4 6
European Journal of Bioethics 4 4
National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 3 5
*h5-index is the h-index for articles published in the last 5 complete years. It is the largest number h such that h articles published in 2012-2016 have at least h citations each
**h5-median for a publication is the median number of citations for the articles that make up its h5-index
Monday, July 18, 2016
2016 Google Scholar Metrics for Bioethics journals
I'm afraid the list isn't quite complete as for some reason at least one well-known quality publication, the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, just doesn't pop up. It's also the case that some journals that were covered in the past have disappeared from google's radar, even though they continue to exist. This info from google's media release might explain the inclusion and exclusion of particular journals: 'Publications with fewer than 100 articles in 2011-2015, or publications that received no citations over these years are not included.'
Quite possibly the below table will be displayed in odd ways on your screen, mea culpa.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated July 2016.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated July 2016.
*h5-index is the h-index for articles published in the last 5 complete years. It is the largest number h such that h articles published in 2010-2014 have at least h citations each
**h5-median for a publication is the median number of citations for the articles that make up its h5-index
H5 index H5 median
Journal of
Medical
Ethics
29 42
Nursing
Ethics
29
36
Science and
Engineering Ethics
26 36
The American
Journal of Bioethics
26 36
Journal of
Law, Medicine and Ethics
26 34
Neuroethics
24
30
Bioethics
22
31
Ethics 20 35
bmc medical
ethics
20
29
Hastings
Center Report
19 29
American
Journal of Bioethics Neuroscience 19 28
Medicine,
Health Care and Philosophy 17 22
Journal of
Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics
16 18
Journal of
Medicine and Philosophy
15 25
Nursing
Philosophy
15 23
Perspectives
in Biology and Medicine 13
15
Public
Health Ethics
14 27
Developing
World Bioethics 14 20
Health Care
Analysis
14 19
Journal of
Bioethical Inquiry
14 18
Theoretical
Medicine and Bioethics
14 17
HEC Forum
13 26
Cambridge
Quarterly of Healthcare
Ethics 13 20
The Journal
of Clinical Ethics
13 18
NanoEthics
11 16
Indian
Journal of Medical Ethics
10 12
Asian
Bioethics Review
8
18
International
Journal of Feminist Approaches to
Bioethics 8
15
Narrative
Inquiry in Bioethics
8
13
South
African Journal of Bioethics and Law
8
10
Ethik in der
Medizin
7
12
Clinical Ethics 7 8
Christian
Bioethics 5
10
Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics
5 8
Monash
Bioethics Review
5
6
Journal
international de bioethique
4
7
National
Catholic Bioethics Quarterly
4
4
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Surveys and surveys - The Canadian Medical Association should know better
Strangely, the Association seems to put a lot of store in an on-line poll it inflicted on its members, where only 29% of those who responded said that they were willing to provide assisted dying to eligible patients while 63% objected. I'm surprised the Association's staff would have even mentioned this survey. It's troubled by obvious ( and quite deadly, pardon the pun) methodological problems that renders it useless.
The Associations Vice President Professional Affairs, Dr Jeff Blackmer produced a 34 slide presentation titled (no doubt to the horror of most living medical ethicists) 'End-of-Life Care in Canada: A Principles Based Approach to Assisted Dying'. There will be only few people left in bioethics who have not come to realize that the much celebrated principles approach to medical ethics guarantees arbitrary recommendations and outcomes. The principles approach is neither action guiding nor action justifying, it's useless as a tool of ethical or policy analysis and justification. Blackmer decided to add random other principles to the Georgetown Mantra, including vacuous nice sounding stuff like the 'dignity of life' (yes, really, he did!). We spent a fair amount of time in our Royal Society of Canada Report on the subject matter dissecting this particular issue.
After delivering to his audience this hotchpotch of principles, there's an unconnected slide with recommendations, followed by 8 or 9 slides reporting the results of the CMA's on-line poll. Blackmer reports that of about 80 000 doctors in Canada about 1400 clicked their way thru the on-line poll. At a minimum the negligible turnout suggests that most doctors in Canada didn't care to complete a survey that they probably realized ultimately tells us nothing about Canadian doctors' views on assisted dying. The reason for this is methodological. These kinds of surveys may or may not be representative, we just cannot know, because the survey participants may or may not be representative. If anything we should be suspicious of these results, because no professional survey organisations ensured that the sample was actually representative. Those who feel strongly about the subject matter - physicians opposed to it - will fire up their supporters to reject assisted dying and proclaim no collaboration.
Other surveys, including one reported in our above mentioned report, suggest significantly higher levels of support. It is all the more disheartening that a seasoned journalist like the Globe and Mail's Andre Picard takes the 29% figure at face value in his twitter reporting of the Blackmer presentation. (See the image above.) Doing that permits the anti-choice activists to feel good about their campaign strategy, their encouraging their like-minded doctor supporters to click thru the survey would pay off if people fell for this nonsense. I left a slightly more polite comment to this account under Blackmer's public slide presentation, but it was quickly deleted. Go figure.
The CMA recognizes that we will be getting assisted dying in some form or shape (determined by the criteria set out in the Supreme Court of Canada judgment on this subject) and that a small number of its members will be called upon to provide assisted dying services to their patients. The Association is rightly concerned about ensuring patient access while protecting its objecting members' conscience choices. There is a precedent for this. Abortion. Objecting doctors will be obliged to transfer their patients to a colleague they know will oblige them, without unreasonable delay. The CMA is apparently supportive of this compromise.
The train toward assisted dying in Canada has departed but hasn't reached its destination yet.
Monday, August 03, 2015
Google scholar h5 indices for English language bioethics/health care ethics/medical ethics journals
I suspect I could have had this easier, but be that as it may, I searched for bioethics/health care ethics/ medical ethics journal on google scholar to see how they fare in terms of citations over the last five years. I'm afraid the list isn't quite complete as for some reason at least one well-known quality publication, the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, just doesn't pop up.
Quite possibly the below table will be displayed in odd ways on your screen.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated August 2015.
Usual CoI blurb applies. I co-edit two of the journals in this list. List up-dated August 2015.
Journal of Medical Ethics 28 38
Nursing Ethics 28 36
The American Journal of Bioethics 28 34
Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics 26
33
Science and Engineering Ethics 22 34
Bioethics 22 28
Hastings Center Report 20 27
Neuroethics 20
25
bmc medical ethics 19
25
Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 18 22
Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics 16 22
Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 16 20
Perspectives in
Biology and Medicine 15 21
Health Care Analysis 14
23
Nursing Philosophy 14 22
NanoEthics 14 20
Developing World Bioethics 14 17
Public Health Ethics 13 18
Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 13 17
The Journal of Clinical Ethics 12 23
HEC Forum 12 20
Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 12 16
Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 11 16
American Journal of Bioethics Primary Research 11 15
Indian Journal of Medical Ethics 10 10
Asian Bioethics Review 9 13
Ethik in der Medizin 9
12
International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 8 11
South African Journal of Bioethics and Law 7 11
Christian Bioethics 6
7
Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics 5 9
Monash Bioethics Review 5
6
Journal international de bioethique 5
6
Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics 4
5
National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 3
4
Turkiye Klinikleri Journal of Medical Ethics-Law and History 2 3
*h5-index is the h-index for articles published in the last 5 complete years. It is the largest number h such that h articles published in 2010-2014 have at least h citations each
**h5-median for a publication is the median number of citations for the articles that make up its h5-index
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