Modern German Doctors: A Failure of Professionalization? (original) (raw)
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The Ethical Governance of German Physicians, 1890–1939: Are There Lessons from History?
Journal of Policy History, 2011
The limitations of the traditional historiography of the ethical regulation of biomedical research are becoming increasingly well recognized. A simplistic history has been used to justify a simplistic policy, in the elaboration of regulatory instruments associated with a bureaucracy of administration and enforcement that has acquired its own material interests in self-perpetuation and jurisdictional expansion. The official history of institutionalized ethical regulation sees a clear and self-evident line of descent from the Nazi experiments of World War II to the various legal and quasi-legal instruments that now govern most scientific and, increasingly, social scientific practice. Without regulatory interventions, it is claimed, researchers will revert to barbarism. This version of the "rise of bioethics" tends to place considerable emphasis on the Nuremberg Doctors Trial, and the Nuremberg Code promulgated at its conclusion, and to use these as an "origin myth" that legitimizes its professional project. 1 As a narrative, it says little, for example, about the lengthy gap between the conclusion of the Nuremberg trial in 1948 and the development of regulatory interventions for medical research in the victor countries during the 1960s.
Springer eBooks, 2022
In discussions on Nazi medicine, it is often presumed that the Nazi physicians abandoned or ignored all forms of medical ethics. This notion is far from the truth even though it is very difficult to come to terms with. It would be more comfortable to believe that Nazi physicians were a marginal group of madmen and what transpired in medicine during that period was unique and irrelevant to modern medicine. However, today we know that the Nazi physicians not only had a very detailed ethical code in place, but also that they were the first in the world to teach medical ethics at medical schools. These ethics courses were compulsory at every medical school in Nazi Germany and were based on the use of a specially published textbook, called Medical Jurisprudence and Rules of the Medical Profession. The textbook provides a unique insight into the values and beliefs systems of the Nazi physicians, many of which were greatly influenced by the political and social culture of the time, and some that resonate with the current practice of medicine. Discourse on medical ethics during the Nazi period, as demonstrated by this manual, serves to remind physicians that we are all vulnerable to ethical transgressions and could do well by learning the lessons from this past.
Doctors in court, honour, and professional ethics: two scandals in Imperial Germany
Gesnerus, 2011
Comparing two public medical affairs which involved disciplinary proceedings and libel actions, one from Bavaria and one from Prussia, this article analyzes the dynamics behind legal conflicts over doctors' professional ethics in Imperial Germany. In both the case of Dr Maurice Hutzler, who committed suicide after conflicts with senior colleagues at the Gisela Children's Hospital and a sentence of the court of honour of the Munich Medical District Society, and the Berlin "patient trade" affair, in which the medical professors Ernst von Leyden, Hermann Senator, Karl Anton Ewald and Carl Posner were accused of having made payments to middlemen for bringing them lucrative private patients, notions of personal and professional honour played a central role. The Munich case highlighted shortcomings of the Bavarian medical court of honour system, which was less developed than its Prussian counterpart. The analysis of the two cases suggests that the ethics of medical pract...
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Minerva, 2007
After 1945, the German medical community underwent a period of self-examination. The profession's experience during the Nazi period raised profound questions concerning its ethical integrity and political allegiances. This paper considers the advent of medical nationalism, and shows how, in Berlin and in the Soviet zone of Germany, narratives were constructed to show a new and positive picture of German medicine.
A long shadow: Nazi doctors, moral vulnerability and contemporary medical culture
Journal of Medical Ethics, 2012
More than 7% of all German physicians became members of the Nazi SS during World War II, compared with less than 1% of the general population. In so doing, these doctors willingly participated in genocide, something that should have been antithetical to the values of their chosen profession. The participation of physicians in torture and murder both before and after World War II is a disturbing legacy seldom discussed in medical school, and underrecognised in contemporary medicine. Is there something inherent in being a physician that promotes a transition from healer to murderer? With this historical background in mind, the author, a medical student, defines and reflects upon moral vulnerabilities still endemic to contemporary medical culture.
Die unpolitische Profession: Deutsche Mediziner im langen 19. Jahrhundert
German History, 2013
The question of German doctors' attitude towards politics has been asked by historians for some time (e.g. by Michael Kater and Eduard Seidler), especially in view of the medical profession's notorious involvement in National Socialism. The myth of the 'apolitical doctor' has largely been dismantled, but what exactly were the prevalent views
História, Ciências, Saúde-Manguinhos
In this interview, Volker Roelcke explains and analyzes historical evidence refuting erroneous assumptions about medical atrocities committed by physicians during the Nazi era, provides insight into the implications of medicine during the Nazi period and the Holocaust for medicine and bioethics today, analyzes the history of the term “genocide,” and suggests formats for future teaching, among other topics.
AJS Review, 2005
This volume is an ambitious and wide-ranging (perhaps too wide-ranging) study of the interrelationship between medicine and German-speaking Jews throughout the ages. In essence it deals with two separate but intertwined issues: German-speaking Jews in the medical profession and the use of medical discourse to analyze and evaluate the Jewish people. The book covers a wide area both chronologically and geographically. “German Jews” is interpreted very broadly and includes a number of East European figures who either wrote in German or were trained in German universities. Although the bulk of the volume (Chaps. 4–7) deals with the period from around 1870 to the beginning of World War I, the first three chapters “begin at the beginning” (the Middle Ages) and carry the story up to the late eighteenth century.
Slippery Slopes of Nazi Medicine
Economic and political weekly
When Medicine Went Mad: Bioethics and the Holocaust edited by Arthur L Caplan; Humana Press, Totowa. New Jersey, 1992; pp 359. IN last one and half decades more has been written on the bioethical issues involved in Nazi medicine and its human experi-mentation, than in the preceding 35 years. 1 German medicine's amnesia was even greater -of 422 articles on medicine under National Socialism published worldwide between 1966 and 1979, only two originated in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the first monograph on Physicians under NationaI Socialism was printed only in 1985. The scientific community's condemnation of the Nazi medicine is well known. Only in the last lew years has. serious analyses of related bioethical issues begun. However, the profession which has a long tradition of autonomy, particularly in the western world, and has for centuries taken pride in having a well-formulated code of ethics to govern its members, hardly attempted to apply it to Nazi doctors for ...