The Return of Virtue to Ethical Medical Decision Making

Abstract

For the past several decades, ethical deliberation in medicine has been dominated by “principlism,” an ethical method that relies on a set of principles or rules that are variable and applied inconsistently. This approach overlooks the moral agent, separates the ethical decisions from the moral sensibilities that shaped them, isolating the decisions from the moral actor. Ethics, being a human endeavor, cannot ignore the moral agent. I propose a practical approach to the ethical dilemma that combines virtue with principles.