Call for abstracts: An International and interdisciplinary conference on Health, Culture and the Human Body
Epidemiology, ethics and history of medicine, perspectives from Central Europe and Turkey
Mainz, Germany, 17-19 September 2010
The face of medicine is rapidly evolving: New developments in medicine, preventive and therapeutic interventions are raising novel ethical questions in societies undergoing fast demographic change at home while participating in global interactions through travel and migration. Throughout history, the perception of health and illness and the ethical assessment of medical practices have often been different between diverse value-cultures. This may affect the responses to well-established themes in medicine, such as the control of infectious diseases, attitudes towards a person’s death, or culturally specific approaches to dealing with the integrity of the human body. Consequently, these ethical considerations have given rise to complex ethical debates resulting in different legal regulations of these developments in different countries.
The international conference “Health, Culture and the Human Body” will focus on selected cases from Turkey, Germany, and other countries. These countries have been closely connected by substantial migration processes for some fifty years. Historically, these countries were linked by medical sciences and clinical practice. These interactions will be analysed jointly from historical, epidemiological, and ethical perspectives, paving the way for the implementation of an interdisciplinary “medicine studies” approach in the field of intercultural and migration medicine.
(See also: www.springer.com/philosophy/philosophy+of+sciences/journal/12376 )
The chosen thematic areas are:
§ infectious diseases (e.g., plague, leprosy, cholera, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS)
§ the end of life (e.g., patient autonomy vs. family autonomy, advance directives, active and passive euthanasia, palliative care)
§ dealing with the human body (e.g., anatomical research, organ donation, biomaterial in international studies)
§ migration and medicine
Abstracts (max. 250 words) of proposed conference papers need to be submitted by 31 January 2010,
to the attention of Ilhan Ilkilic MD PhD, E-Mail: ilkilic@uni-mainz.de (Institute for History, Philosophy and Ethics of Medicine, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany)
Phone +49-(0)-6131-39-37343, Fax +49-(0)-6131-39-36682
Publication of selected papers is envisaged.
Venue: Mainz Academy of Letters and Sciences, Mainz, Germany
Organising institutions:
* JohannesGutenberg University Mainz Medical Centre (Germany)
* IstanbulUniversity (Turkey)
Filed under: Call for Submissions, Conference | Tagged: body, culture, end of life, health, infectious disease, interdisciplinary, international, migration, organ donation | Leave a Comment »

NLN: Health Care Bill Passes House
As announced today by Kathleen A. Ream, director of Government Affairs of the National League of Nursing:
Permit me a personal note. As a boy of the tender age of 7 in early fall of 1960, I sat with my parents in the front row center of the gallery of the US Senate the night that Medicare first came up for a vote. Seated directly across from us on the floor of the Senate was Richard M. Nixon, vice president of the United States and in that capacity president of the Senate. Seated directly below us was the junior senator from Massachusetts, John F. Kennedy. Both men were candidates for the presidency.
That night, the bill that would have created Medicare went down in defeat by only a few votes. My mother’s parents, who were in declining health at the time, would be dead (my grandmother) or dying (my grandfather) by the time Medicare legislation was finally passed in 1965, their income exhausted by healthcare expenses.
It has been estimated that nearly 50,000 Americans die annually as a direct or indirect result of a lack of health insurance. If we can mobilize public support (or at least public acquiescence) for a variety of costly and unproductive endeavors, why not to save lives and improve quality of life?
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