Exploring Bioethics - NIH Office of Science Education - National ...

About the National Institutes of HealthFounded in 1887, NIH is the federal focal point for health research in the United States. Today, NIH is one of theagencies within the Department of Health and Human Services. Its mission is science in pursuit of fundamentalknowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to extendhealthy life and reduce the burdens of illness and disability. NIH works toward meeting the mission by providingleadership, direction, and grant support to programs designed to improve the health of the nation throughresearch.NIH’s education programs contribute to ensuring the continued supply of well-trained basic research andclinical investigators, as well as the myriad professionals in the many allied disciplines who support the researchenterprise. These efforts also help educate people about scientific results so that they can make informeddecisions about their own—and the public’s—health.This curriculum supplement is one such education effort. It is a collaboration among the Department of Bioethics atthe NIH Clinical Center, the NIH Office of Science Education, and Education Development Center, Inc.For more about NIH, visit http://www.nih.gov.About the Department of BioethicsSince its establishment in 1996, the Department of Bioethics has revitalized bioethics activities at the NationalInstitutes of Health and launched a series of new educational and research initiatives. It has also continued toprovide ethics-related services to the NIH Clinical Center.A two-year fellowship program in bioethics draws promising pre- and postdoctorate scholars to NIH. The department’sconferences and courses focus on a variety of topics, from the ethics of human-subjects research to managed-careissues. Its research efforts are divided into three areas: health policy, human-subjects research, and genetics.The department participates in conferences on ethical issues sponsored by organizations outside NIH and, in aneffort to target the NIH intramural community, provides educational programs for nonbioethicists through severalinitiatives. Each fall, the Department of Bioethics offers a seven-to-eight-week program, Ethical Regulatory Aspectsof Clinical Research, to the NIH community. The course remains popular after nine years and is now requiredfor the Clinical Center Core Curriculum Certificate. In addition, four or five times a year, the department offersEthics Grand Rounds as part of the Clinical Center Grand Rounds Program. A medical staff member involved ina particular case presents the issues, and then a guest bioethicist comments briefly and presents a framework forthinking about those issues. This is followed by a Q&A discussion.The main clinical functions of the department are running the Clinical Center Ethics Consultation Service,providing ethicists to participate in various clinical rounds and to review protocols on each of the NIHInstitutional Review Boards, and participating on the Clinical Center Ethics Committee. The Ethics Committeemeets monthly, and its members also participate in ethics consults. The meetings are a forum for discussingcontroversial and new topics in human-subjects research, such as new guidelines about research with children.For more about the Department of Bioethics, visit http://www.bioethics.nih.gov.viExploring Bioethics