The 18th Annual American Society for Bioethics and Humanities Meeting was held October 6-9 in Washington, DC. Center faculty Libby Bogdan-Lovis, Karen Kelly-Blake, Devan Stahl, and Len Fleck presented at the conference. The post below details each researcher’s presentation in their own words.

Libby Bogdan-Lovis, MA
Assistant Director, Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences
In concert with research collaborators Karen Kelly-Blake, Nanibaa’ Garrison, (Seattle Children’s Hospital) and Faith Fletcher (University of Illinois Chicago), we presented “Medicine’s Mirror Image Agenda: Covert Costs of Racial/Ethnic Concordance in the Medical Workforce.” Our project is supported by the contributions of research assistants Brittany Ajegba (MSU College of Human Medicine student), Nichole Smith (Vanderbilt premedical undergraduate), and Morgann Brafford (MSU psychology/anthropology undergraduate).

Our team reported results of a 2000-2015 scoping literature review to examine presumed benefits of matching underrepresented minority (URM) physicians with patients sharing similar race/ethnic identities. In our analysis we considered the nature of medical workforce policy strategies. We reported that the most frequently cited rationales for increasing the URM medical workforce were service commitment and enhanced physician-patient relationship. The primary strategy for achieving this goal was pipeline programs. We argued that even though URMs provide a substantial proportion of medical care to the underserved, and quite possibly such workforce patterns reflect focused altruism to serve one’s own, parity and service rhetoric may covertly shape the professional lives of Native American, African American, and Latino underrepresented minority (URM) physicians. We questioned whether those strategies might not unevenly affect URM physicians, selectively placing service expectations not similarly placed on their non-minority physician colleagues. We concluded by explaining that social justice of the profession entails equitable sharing of responsibility to meet the needs of the underserved and that social justice in the profession demands that URM physicians deserve an unfettered future and should not be viewed as instruments to fix societal structural determinants of health.

Devan Stahl, PhD
Assistant Professor, Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences
This year at ASBH I had the opportunity to organize and lead two sessions. First, as the co-leader of the Bioethics and Christian Theology Affinity Group, I helped to organize a panel which featured Dr. Lydia Dugdale’s new book, Dying in the Twenty-First Century: Toward a New Ethical Framework for the Art of Dying Well. Dr. Dugdale’s presentation was followed by two responses by Dr. Paul Scherz and Dr. Mark Cherry. The session was well-attended and generated much conversation.

The next day, I helped to lead a workshop: “Responding to Those Who Hope for a Miracle: Conceptual Resources and Practical Responses for Clinical Ethicists” with Drs. Trevor Bibler, Myrick Shinall and Ashley Stevens. The workshop began with an overview of the theological concepts that frequently accompany the beliefs of patients and families who hope for a miracle. We then presented case studies to show four ways patients employ the term “miracle” as they struggle to understand God and strategies for responding to these four types of invocators. We lead breakout sessions to help attendees identify the types of miracle language discussed and best practices for responding to each. The session was very popular, which unfortunately meant several people could not fit in the space provided. Positively, the workshop had a lot of good discussion and participation by attendees.

Len Fleck, PhD
Professor, Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences
I presented Saturday morning at ASBH. The title of my presentation was “Last Chance Therapies: LVAD and a Heart Transplant?” The ethical issue I was addressing here is related to cardiac transplantation. Only about 2200 hearts are available for transplantation each year in the US, so this is an absolutely scarce resource. Dick Cheney, former Vice-President, after five heart attacks (starting at age 37) and every imaginable cardiac intervention to sustain his life, was diagnosed as being in late-stage heart failure in late 2010. He had surgically implanted at that time a Left Ventricular Assist Device [LVAD] to maintain marginal heart function. He almost died in surgery, spent 40 days in the ICU, and was listed for a heart transplant. He received that transplant at age 71 in 2012. Many will argue (including me) that Cheney had had his “fair innings,” and that a younger person, a bit further down on the transplant list, should have gotten that transplant. But that person died instead (the “unknown” patient, and without any monument).

Click through to continue reading about Dr. Fleck’s research