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The Center for Clinical Ethics and Humanities in Health Care, established at the University at Buffalo in 1994, is now the Romanell Center for Clinical Ethics and the Philosophy of Medicine. The name change honors the 2003 testimentary gift bestowed by Edna Romanell, while reflecting a focus on bioethics in today's complex health care concerns. As a multi-disciplinary center with a long tradition of coordinating academic activities, the Center is poised to expand collaborative research and experience-based learning at UB to better serve the communities of Western New York, Southern Ontario, and borders beyond our own.

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To join our ListServ, please send your name, affiliation (if any), and your email address   Jonathan Vajda, jvajda@buffalo.edu

ROMANELL FELLOWS BLOG

TOPICS:

  • Leshnar - Addiction is a Brain Disease (and it matters); and, Levy - Addiction is not a Brain Disease (and it matters).
  • Savulescu and Foddy: A Liberal Account of Addiction.
  • Mind-Brain Dualism and Its Place in Mental Health Care.
  • Institutions, Beliefs and Ethics: Eugenics as a Case Study by Allen Buchanan.
  • Human Challenge Studies to Accelerate Coronavirus Vaccine Licensure.
  • Harm as a necessary component of the concept of medical disorder.
  • The relativity of ‘placebos’: defending a modified version of Grünbaum’s definition.
  • Social value, clinical equipoise, and research in a public health emergency.
  • Equality or Priority.
  • Solidarity and Responsibility in Health Care.
  • A Defense of Compulsory Vaccination.
  • How to Allocate Scarce Health Resources.
  • The Ethics of Rationing.

Summer/Fall 2020 blog content is here.

Latest on coronavirus
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COVID-19 Hotline

The Erie County Department of Health has created a hotline for COVID-19 related calls: 716-858-2929

RELATED LINKS CONCERNING COVID-19

 

Hastings Center Ethics Resources

Journal of the American Medical Association

The New England Journal of Medicine

Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center

Mayo Clnic Coronavirus - Symptoms and Causes

World Health Organization

US Centers for Disease Control

Erie County NY Department of Health

E-Speaker Series

People

  • Catherine Nolan
    11/30/20
    Catherine Nolan is currently working on issues in the intersection of metaphysics and bioethics. She is particularly interested in applying the concepts and arguments of the Christian metaphysical tradition to contemporary problems.  Her dissertation, entitled “The Ethics and Metaphysics of Vital Organ Donation,” was a defense of the claim that death is a metaphysical event, unable to be determined purely scientifically. This makes the diagnosis of death much more uncertain. If we attempt to justify vital organ donation by claiming that the donor is dead, we are often being misleading or dishonest. Instead, she suggests that we should focus on not killing the donor, treating those who may be dead as though they are still alive. 
  • Timothy J. Madigan
    4/2/20
    Timothy J. Madigan, Ph.D, is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York, and the founder of its Irish Studies Program. Madigan’s areas of interest include Medical Ethics, Political Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion, and Popular Culture and Philosophy. He is the President of the Bertrand Russell Society and the former President of the Northeast Popular Culture Association. Madigan was the first editor of the Romanell Center’s “Bioethics Bulletin.”  
  • Harvey Berman
    7/27/17
    Harvey Berman is a pharmacologist responsible for teaching Doctors of Pharmacy (PharmD) and of Medicine (MD) in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. His teaching and research interests are in adverse drug interactions, pharmacogenomics, ethics of drug clinical trials, pain palliation and geriatric pharmacology.
  • David Hershenov, Co-Director
    4/2/20
    David Hershenov, Ph.D., is a professor of philosophy at the University at Buffalo and the co-director of the Romanell Center. His earlier research was focused upon issues at the intersection of personal identity and bioethics. His more recent research interests are in the philosophy of medicine.
  • Barry Smith
    7/27/17
    As an undergraduate, Barry Smith studied mathematics and philosophy at the University of Oxford, before earning his Ph.D. from the University of Manchester in 1976. Currently, he holds the position of Julian Park Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Adjunct Professor of Biomedical Informatics, Computer Science, and Neurology at the University of Buffalo in New York.
  • Jack Freer, Co-Director
    12/1/20
    Jack Freer M.D. is a clinical professor, emeritus, and the co-director of the Romanell Center. He was the course director of IDM 701 (the required medical students' clinical ethics course) for 30 years. DUring that time, Freer has organized the Romanell Clinical and Research Ethics Seminars, as well as many other conferences and lecture series over the course of his career.
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KEYLIGHT

KEYLIGHT.
Jack Freer, Artist

Since retiring from clinical medicine, Jack Freer has been spending more time working on pastel painting. This image depicts a scene in Florence during a 1629-31 outbreak of bubonic plague.

SPOTLIGHT

Philip Reed.
Journal of Medical Ethics publishes target article by Phil Reed

Romanell Center fellow and Professor of Philosophy at Canisius College Philip Reed recently published a target article, "Expressivism at the Beginning and End of Life," in the Journal of Medical Ethics 46 (2020): 538-544. The article addresses how certain controversial biomedical practices might send a message of disrespect to the disabled. Learn more.

Interdisciplinary Activities

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"Where the World Finds Bioethics"  bioethics.net  

JOB POSTINGS