- STUDY with us:
- Politics and International Relations
- Philosophy
- Religious Studies
Masters Degrees in Philosophy
SEARCH using keywords/tags or full text search.
MA/LLM Bioethics and Medical Law
The MA in Bioethics and Medical Law is administered by the Law School but co-taught between PPR and Law.
This Masters programme is constructed to permit students to graduate with either an MA or an LLM. Students have the option to write either a law based essay or one based on philosophy/ethics for each optional module and similarly for the dissertation. The final award will be determined depending on whether the majority of the marks are for law or philosophy.
Overall the programme is designed for those with an interest in issues to do with bioethics and medical law, including intercalating medical students and others with a first degree or relevant professional qualification and work experience. It introduces them to the fundamental analytic skills of moral philosophy and law, the principal ethical and legal issues arising within medical research and practice, and an appreciation of the major approaches - ethical and legal - to the resolution of the relevant problems.
These problems include:
- the regulation of artificial reproduction
- life and death decision-making particularly in respect of seriously ill neonates and terminally ill patients
- the obtaining of informed consent to medical procedures and to clinical research
- the appropriate use of genetic testing
- the fair distribution of health care resources
Students are required to take both of the designated Core Course Modules, depending on their previous studies or knowledge. They must take five course modules in all, plus a dissertation.
The course modules offered within this programme are listed below. In addition, students may take one (or with permission of the Director of Postgraduate Studies, two) modules, from among those offered within the School of Law’s graduate programme, or any Master's modules of comparable weight offered in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences or the University as a whole. However, for the LLM degree, a minimum of 100 credit weighting must be in law.
Compulsory Modules
PPR.454: Foundations of Bioethics
This module is a "core" module of the new MA in Bioethics and Medical Law. It aims to provide a foundational overview of the major theoretical frameworks in bioethics. This module will explore the predominant ethical theories and examine questions about the limits of applying ethical theory to practical and conceptual problems in biomedicine. More»
LLM101: Foundations in Medical Law
This module is central to the MA/LLM in bioethics and Medical Law because it contextualises medical law as discrete legal speciality. The module introduces students to legal concepts like tort and crime as they relate to medical law and to the ethical principles associated with medical law, such as paternalism and autonomy. These will be expanded upon in subsequent modules. Students will begin to develop skills in various methods of legal research, writing and presentation which are vital to the programme as a whole. Substantive topics through which these concepts and skills will be introduced include:
- The practitioner patient relationship
- Confidentiality
- Resource allocation
Optional Modules
Optional modules may not be available every year. For currently available modules, please check the course handbook.
LLM102: Life and Death
This module covers topics related to the beginning and end of life, such as when does life begin and end, assisted reproduction and assisted dying, which are of key importance in bioethics and medical law:
- Introduction: Sanctity of Life
- Definitions of Life and Death
- Personhood and humanhood - when does life begin and end?
- Abortion
- Assisted reproduction and the right to reproduce
- IVF and PGD
- Slippery slopes - killing v letting die
- Assisted dying
- Advance directives
- Euthanasia around the world
PPR.455: Children and Health
This module covers an important area of bioethical and medical legal work by analysing a range of legal and ethical issues concerning the medical treatment of children, their involvement in medical research, and the relevance of age in the distribution of health care resources. The central legal and ethical questions to be explored in this module are: who should make decisions for those under 18, and how should those decisions be made? Other issues to be explored include: the ethical and legal issues that arise with regard to children (including reproductive choice, the medical treatment of children, informed consent and proxy consent for children, and the allocation of healthcare resources to children and adults) the idea of "what children are", and how there are different conceptions of children and childhood; the idea of "children's rights" and how these relate to, and differ from, rights more generally; problems with the legal protection of children and their rights. More»
PPR.456: Autonomy, paternalism and consent
This module seeks to lay down the key conceptual issues and debates in medical ethics and law. It assesses the importance of rejecting paternalism and the elevation of individual autonomy for medical ethics and looks at how this has led, in many cases, to the adoption of informed consent as the central ethical legitimator for medical research and clinical practice. At the same time, this module seeks to explore the legal importance of "consent" and to identify how far, if at all, ethical and legal theories are in evidence in practice. This module will analyse the limitations of and problems with dominant assumptions that a bioethics, and legal regulation of medical practice, should have its foundation in considerations of individual autonomy and informed consent. More»
PPR.457 Social and Ethical Issues in Human Genetics
This module examines developments in genomics relevant to those working in medicine, health care and law or training in those areas, and looks at the ethical/social debates these developments have caused. This module will examine the ways in which bioethical debates concerning human genome analysis are constructed through the application of particular forms of ethical argument. It will also explore four main categories of issues associated with developments in human genome analysis: acquisition of genetic information (e.g. DNA sampling and databases); access to genetic information (e.g. the right to know and the right not to know); applications of genetic information (e.g. pharmacogenetics) and implications of genetic information (e.g. personal identity). This module forms the basis for analysis of current developments in genetic technology as applied to health care and the regulatory framework in UK and EU, the implications of specific genetic technologies drawing on ethical argument, legal knowledge and empirical research, the impact of developments in human genetics for the medicine, health care and legal practice. More»
LLM103 Law and The Body
This module covers topics such as ownership of the body and its parts, commodification, transplantation and surrogacy which are of key importance in bioethics and medical law.
- Introduction - key concepts
- Rights, commodification and ownership of the body and its parts
- Embryo research
- Human tissue and the Human Tissue Act 2004
- Organ donation and transplantation
- Surrogacy
- Patenting Life
- Case studies - including gender reassignment, apotemnophilia
PPR.458 Public Health
The main focus of this module will be on ethical and legal issues in the provision and maintenance of public health. It aims to familiarise students with a range of ethical issues related to public health, and to equip the student with an understanding of (and ability to evaluate) these issues. Public health is primarily concerned with the health of the entire population, and, as such, represents a distinct area of concern from the traditional domain of bioethics and medical law: the health of the individual and the physician-patient relationship; ethical and legal issues concerning justice, trust, the balance of public good and individual rights; and appropriate decision-making procedures. More»
Admissions
There are two routes into this programme, one for graduates and one for intercalating medical students. The programme will admit British and international applicants who normally hold at least an upper second class degree from an approved university or have equivalent status. Relevant degree subjects for the programme include law, philosophy or other cognate subjects, OR, for intercalating medical students, successful completion of years 1-3 of their medical degree courses.
Candidates holding other academic qualifications including relevant professional qualifications may also be considered for admission subject to interview and provided that they have substantial relevant professional experience. Individual exceptions may be considered in the normal admission process.
For applicants for whom English is not a first language, the University requires either a British Council IELTS score of 6.5 or above, a TOEFL score of 600 or above, GCSE grade C or above, or a Cambridge Certificate of Proficiency in English grade C or above.
For full details of the course's rules and regulations, please see the Law School's Prospectus and Web pages
Further Details
Please contact Eileen Jones:
Lancaster University
Law School
Lancaster
LA1 4YN
UK
Tel: +44 (0) 1524 594260 Fax: +44 (0) 1524 594238 Email: ppr@lancaster.ac.uk
Save this page:
Del.icio.us
Digg It
Reddit
Facebook
Stumble It!