Más allá de los Comités: hacia una cultura bioética

Abstract

Here we expose a critical vision of the work of clinical bioethics in order to improve its development. We start from the basis that what fails is not the CEA’s, nor the professionals dedicated to bioethics, but the absence of culture. And this absence can make failure may initiatives (centered-patient model, shared decisions model, etc.) due to lack of roots in a bioethical culture.

Although much has been done in and for the training in bioethics among professionals, it resents the implementation of the changes it recommends. In bioethics we have not managed to dialogue beyond the committees, we have not substantially impacted on the organization, nor on citizenship. There is a great risk that bioethics will become a kind of fungus in the middle of an indifferent context and even wasteland. We propose to broaden the look of clinical bioethics to the forging of a culture, this is unavoidable for its healthy development. Bioethics also needs power, authority and leadership. The courage to carry out bioethical changes, or to assume that it cannot be done without other support, are virtues that are not only required of professionals, but also of organizations, managers and politicians.

Specifically, we will address three difficulties that this cultural lack generates:

1) The complexity of multi and interdisciplinary dialogue (professional level). 2) The flexibility necessary to meet the precise context of a certain type of organizations and institutions (organizational level). 3) The derivative of citizen participation (civic level).