Announcing a new web-based resource: "The Clinical Ethics Resource"

NSW Health, the Sydney Medical School and Sydney Law School have recently launched a web-based Clinical Ethics Resource for NSW health professionals.

It provides NSW health professionals, as well as legal and other professionals interested in clinical and bioethics with guidelines, tools, legislation, policy, reports, articles, books and examples of legal cases. While the focus is on the position in New South Wales, the collection of resources comes from all around Australia and overseas.

Ongoing developments in medical technology, particularly at the beginning and end of life, have been important in raising awareness of clinical ethics issues. Changing social attitudes towards and within the professions, including medicine and a growing emphasis on patient choice creates further complexities in health care delivery. Occasionally, health professionals and patients may disagree about values, or face choices that challenge their values. It is then that ethical problems arise. Clinical ethics is a practical discipline that provides a structured approach to assist health professionals in identifying, analysing and resolving ethical issues in clinical practice.

This web resource is part of a joint project between NSW Health and the University of Sydney and a larger study into the practice of clinical ethics in New South Wales, Australia. The aim of the project is to identify what resources and support processes are necessary to develop clinical ethics capacity within the New South Wales health system.

You can subscribe to the website mailing list via the home page.

You might also like to subscribe to Ethics and Health Law News for up-to-date news items and journal articles on developments in health law and ethics from Australia and around the world. This service is provided jointly by the Centre for Health Governance, Law and Ethics and the Centre for Values, Ethics and the Law in Medicine, both at the University of Sydney.

Both The Clinical Ethics Resource and Ethics and Health Law News are supported by NSW Health.

By Ian Kerridge