https://doi.org/10.4081/mem.1998.822
For a critical-philosophical and epistemological revision of contemporary medicine
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.
Authors
The urgent bioethical questions that medicine has to deal with the increasing request for the "humanisation" of medicine are the reasons that justify a critical-philosophical revision of medicine in order to redefine its methods, essence, limits and values, through an epistemological analysis. This critical reflection has to make use of philosophical study that "goes beyond mere competence of the single science". Medicine occupies a special place in the field of empirical-experimental sciences, because it is interested in a particular object, the sick man, who can not be considered as just an object. Jaspers mentions that the figure of the physician has to have, "on one hand scientific knowledge and technical ability, and on the other hand, humanitarian ethos". Another point to consider is the physician-patient interpersonal relationship that is to be understood not only as the therapeutic acts but also as a cognitive process of the sick man and his biography, keeping a dialogue open in order to maintain a more humanitarian relationship that takes into consideration the patient's needs. The meeting between medicine and philosophy is born from the need for comprehension and from the conceptualisation omitted by science. In conclusion, the article concentrates on the advantages of a humanisation of medicine aimed to create an ethical reflection that considers another person in his holistic dimension.
How to Cite
PAGEPress has chosen to apply the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) to all manuscripts to be published.
An Open Access Publication is one that meets the following two conditions:
- the author(s) and copyright holder(s) grant(s) to all users a free, irrevocable, worldwide, perpetual right of access to, and a license to copy, use, distribute, transmit and display the work publicly and to make and distribute derivative works, in any digital medium for any responsible purpose, subject to proper attribution of authorship, as well as the right to make small numbers of printed copies for their personal use.
- a complete version of the work and all supplemental materials, including a copy of the permission as stated above, in a suitable standard electronic format is deposited immediately upon initial publication in at least one online repository that is supported by an academic institution, scholarly society, government agency, or other well-established organization that seeks to enable open access, unrestricted distribution, interoperability, and long-term archiving.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work.