Evaluating ethics teaching in medical education

Abstract

Ethics is a key aspect of society, presenting a critical view of cultural concepts and standards and indicating a distinction between right and wrong. In medical education, its teaching encompasses ways to care for human lives and address social relations pertaining to the profession responsibly. In Brazil, the number of ethical-professional lawsuits against physicians is increasing, and the issue may have its origins in medical school. Thus, this integrative review seeks to investigate how ethics, bioethics, and medical education are addressed by medical literature, focusing on aspects of medical ethics teaching such as methodology, course load, main topics discussed, and deficient aspects or those that require adaptation. Active methodology with the use of textbook literature emerges as the preferable teaching model, while insufficient course load and need to adapt ethics teaching to current social demands are the main deficits observed.