Appraisal to Hastings Center

The Hastings Center celebrated its 40th anniversary this year. This Center was my primary resource for PhD dissertation and my ethical research. I want to say THANK YOU to all at HC for your work and contribution to the ethics. For its the four decades this Center introduced an influential approach to bioethics research that draws on a diversity of perspectives and expertise, and it advanced the teaching of ethics in medical schools. My special thanks goes to ethicists Daniel Callahan and his wife Sidney, for tremendous contribution and development of this Center. Finally, here are most presented topic by HC in last 40 years.

1. Genetics: initiated the development of ethical standards for genetic testing and screening.

2. End of Life Care: was the first organization to publish guidelines on care and decision-making at the end of life, which made it clear that doctors may not be helping dying patients by treating them with every technology at hand.

3. AIDS: played a leading role in re-establishing trust between researchers and research participants by developing guidelines to assure privacy in AIDS research.

4. Stem Cell Research: advised two presidents, Congress, and, most recently, the head of the National Institutes of Health on guidelines for human embryonic stem cell research.

5. Disability: helped change the way health professionals think and talk about and act towards disability.

6. Imperiled Newborns: clarified the ethical foundations of care in neonatal intensive care units, providing advice that led to the lifting of intrusive federal investigations of NICUs.

7. Brain Death: helped create a definition of and criteria for brain death, which were pivotal in providing a supply of organs for transplantation.

8. Health Care Quality: showed that efforts to improve health care practices can proceed without running afoul of research ethics committees, advancing a groundbreaking study of infection control in ICUs.

9. Drugs & Sport: pioneered research on the ethical foundations of drug control in sport and, most recently, genetics and future of sport.

10. Public Policy: drew on the expertise of Hastings Center Fellows and staff to create the first Bioethics Briefing Book for policymakers, journalists, and opinion leaders.

Founded in 1969, The Hastings Center is the oldest independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit bioethics research institute in the world to address the fundamental ethical issues in the areas of health, medicine, and the environment as they affect individuals, communities, and societies. The Center promotes discussion of ethical issues in medicine and the life sciences.

The Hastings Center publishes the Hastings Center Report, a premier journal in bioethics, and IRB:Ethics & Human Research, the leading journal devoted to ethics and human subjects research, and Bioethics Forum, a free Web-based service offering weekly commentary on current bioethics issues.

The Health Care Cost Monitor is a new blog recently launched by The Hastings Center to start public conversation on the contentious national debate of curbing health care costs. Join us in the discussion today!

The Values & Health Reform Connection is an open conversation, a group blog, and a nonpartisan effort to spark a rich discourse on fundamental values in health reform. Anyone can submit a post, and a selection of posts will also appear on the Health Affairs blog, and in an upcoming volume to be released by The Hastings Center.

Source: http://www.thehastingscenter.org