Center for Health Ethics, Law and History

History

History of Medicine course. The present-day History of Medicine course can be traced back to the Stephen Batory University (SBU), in Poland. In 1922, the Department of History and Philosophy of Medicine was established at the Faculty of Medicine at SBU, and Prof. Stanislaw Trzebiński (1861-1930) was appointed as its head.

In 1944, the History of Medicine course was taught in the Departments of Health Care Organisation, Hygiene, Social Hygiene and Health Care Organisation. From 1970 to 2015, the History of Medicine course was taught by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Vitalija Miežutavičiūtė and other lecturers.

On 1 May 1998, on the initiative of the medical historian Dr Aurimas Andriušis, the Centre for Medical History and Information with an integrated Museum of the History of Medicine was founded. Until 2009, the museum was headed by Dr Silvija Stakulienė, and since 2010, the museum has been headed by Irma Kušeliauskaitė

Since 2015, Aistis Žalnora has been teaching the History of Medicine course. In the intervening years, Eglė Sakalauskaitė-Juodeikienė, Monika Ramonaitė and other lecturers joined. The sphere of interest of the historians at the History of Medicine department covers a wide period from the 16^th century to the end of the Cold War. The teaching staff collaborate with Lithuanian and international colleagues, participate in the Erasmus teacher exchange, and belong to local and international organisations of medical historians.

Health Ethics. The origins of teaching health (medical) ethics in Lithuania can also be traced back to the activities of the Department of History and Philosophy in Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine at SBU. At the same time, in the 1920s and 30s, medical ethics, then known as ‘doctor’s ethics’, was not yet taught as a separate discipline at Vytautas Magnus University in Kaunas, but rather was integrated into other disciplines.

In 1993, Eugene Gefen began teaching a more modern course on medical ethics. In 2003, the newly established Department of History and Ethics of Medicine organised the 17^th International Conference of the European Society for Philosophy of Medicine and Healthcare (ESPMH) https://www.espmh.org/past-conferences/. On 13 September 2004, the UNESCO Regional Bioethics Information Centre was opened at the division’s premises. In 2005, in collaboration with the Union Graduate College in the USA, the division developed a postgraduate programme on Research Ethics in Central and Eastern Europe for central and eastern European graduates: https://grantome.com/grant/NIH/R25-TW007085-14 .

From 2006 to the present, the centre’s researchers have been actively involved in international projects such as, GenBenefit: Genomics and benefit sharing with developing countries – from biodiversity to human genomics; TISS.EU: The evaluation of legislation and related guidelines on the procurement, storage and transfer of human tissues and cells in the European Union; Disaster Bioethics: addressing ethical issues triggered by disasters; ENERI: The European Network of Research Ethics and Research Integrity; INTEGRITY: Empowering students through evidence-based, scaffolded learning of responsible Conduct in Research (RCR); EU-STANDS4PM: A European standardization framework for data integration and data-driven in silico models for personalized medicine.

For more on projects visit HERE.

Publications by Academic Staff

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