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Not Preaching to the Choir: Talking to Medical Students about Abortion from a Pro-Life Position

July 20, 2013

Audio Recording

Video Recording

This paper presentation is given from the conviction that it is important for physicians-in training to hear, understand, and engage with a pro-life perspective of the ethical issues surrounding abortion that goes deeper than that portrayed in the popular media. The presenter, a family physician, has spoken to medical students at two major medical schools about his experience as a pro-life physician in a profession that does not always share pro-life values – and been invited back. In both schools he spoke as part of a required class on medical professionalism and ethics, sharing the presentation time with an abortion provider. It is unknown if this is a unique circumstance; the literature on medical education does not describe a similar forum for either abortion education or ethics education for medical students. The presenter will summarize the elements of the presentation he gives, discuss the components of the presentation that have been important in engaging medical students, and invite discussion as to how best to thoughtfully engage future physicians on this uniquely divisive topic. Particulars covered will include the nature of medicine, the patient-physician relationship, the importance of language, the stories we tell, engaging people of opposing viewpoints without condemning them, talking about religious considerations, Hippocrates and medicine as a profession, expanding the pro-life position beyond abortion, and building bridges/finding points of contact.

Keywords:
Ethics education; Elective abortion; Narrative; Rape; Autonomy; Hippocratic Oath; Medical education; Cultural engagement; Caregiving