RELGST 1726 - HEALING AND HUMANITY
Minimum Credits: 3
Maximum Credits: 3
Medical ethics courses (such as Pitt’s “Morality and Medicine”) focus on critical analysis of societal questions such as abortion, euthanasia, genetic engineering, allocation of scarce resources such as organs for transplant, and the opioid crisis. There is no doubt these questions need to be addressed. However, I contend there is a “micro-ethics” of medicine thousands of individual interactions between healers (meaning any persons involved in delivering some part of a person’s healthcare) and the people they care for. Their words, actions, demeanor, and the built environment in which they work can all contribute to, or detract from, the ultimate well-being and humanity of the person receiving the care. In this course, we will discuss these “micro-ethics” in detail, beginning with the religious and philosophical underpinnings of what it means to be well and what it means to be human. We will then look at how two individuals in relationship can work towards healing through listening, questioning, speaking, and communicating non-verbally. We will examine how placing those individuals in the context of a system of overlapping relationships affects their interaction. We will assess the impact of different factors about the healer, the person seeking healing, and their shared environment that detract from their relationship. Finally, we will propose and critique ways of strengthening that relationship both within the existing environment of the US healthcare system in 20 and by altering that environment.
Academic Career: Undergraduate
Course Component: Lecture
Grade Component: LG/SU3 Elective Basis
Click here for class schedule information.
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