Teaching of public health ethics in India: a mapping exercise

Abstract

Public health ethics has been receiving increasing attention in recent years. Frequently, public health practitioners have to confront complex decisions, with numerous and often conflicting ethical implications. The objective of this study was to obtain information on the teaching of public health ethics in India by making a detailed examination of the public health and community medicine curricula. The specific areas of interest included the content and structure of the courses and electives available to students. The results of this study indicate that ethics courses are yet to find their rightful place in the teaching of public health in India. The curricula vary across institutes in terms of the time and content devoted to the teaching of public health ethics. It is suggested that public health programmes in India develop and incorporate ethics courses so as to keep pace with the emerging challenges in the field. An interdisciplinary consortium should preferably be formed at the national level to take up this academic endeavour.

Ethics education in public health: where are we now and where are we going?

“…Thus, PHE education should ideally be adapted to students' contexts and needs, as well as to local social objectives. Regardless of the method used, actively involving students seems to be one of the most important components of PHE training (Pati et al 2014). To this one can add the need to actively involve PH educators and SPH in making PHE broadly relevant to students, and an important part of their training.…”

“…We identified only one study, conducted in India (Pati et al 2014), and its authors found no standardization of curriculum nor any consensus about ethics education in public health. Concerning MPH programs offered by 31 institutions in India, only 11 had a dedicated module for ethics (elective and compulsory).…”

“…Concerning MPH programs offered by 31 institutions in India, only 11 had a dedicated module for ethics (elective and compulsory). In the Diploma in Public Health, with some exceptions, ethical training was not included, as was also the case for postgraduate programs in community medicine (Pati et al 2014). Even if specific topics were covered in independent ethics courses (in workshops, seminars, etc.…”

“…In the context of PHE education, the aim is to provide a foundation for critical reflection and ethical judgment on the part of public health professionals, students and researchers (Callahan and Jennings 2002), so that they can be better equipped to deal with the various challenges and dilemmas they will face in their practice (Pati et al 2014). Callahan and Jennings (2002) delineate four categories of contexts in which ethical issues can occur in public health: 1) health promotion and disease prevention, 2) risk reduction, 3) epidemiological and other public health research, and 4) structural and socioeconomic disparities.…”

Education in care ethics: a way to increase palliative care awareness in India

“…Healthcare ethics education in India is making progress, but it is still in its infancy. A recent mapping exercise of teaching of public health ethics revealed that little attention is paid to ethics training in medical education (Pati et al 2014). In medical and nursing curricula, some attention is often given to healthcare ethics, but this is not always the case and does not seem to properly prepare the students for the ethical difficulties that they will encounter in medical and nursing practice.…”