Is bioethical training useful in preparing doctors to take decisions in the emergency room?
We study the decisions taken in five real cases by 178 doctors working in hospital emergency services and compare their decisions with those proposed a reference group composed of professionals with a master’s degree in bioethics. The findings of our study point to an increased ability to take difficult decisions in critical situations involving the use of life-support measures in the emergency room. The group of professionals chosen as “gold standard”, despite lacking the training and clinical preparation of emergency doctors, made decisions that were technically very close to the most suitable. In this respect, an adequate ethical training facilitated the taking of decisions that required the involvement of personally held values, underlining the need for such training in the case of professionals who will work in hospital emergency services.
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