Idealism is not enough: designing peace into medical education
Abstract
Purpose
Physicians' uniquely privileged social status gives them influence to help prevent conflict in addition to treating its victims. Yet the peacebuilding role of physicians has received little attention in medical education. In this paper, the authors tackle both and provide some concrete guidance to medical schools interested in taking it on.
Design/methodology/approach
Using Qualitative Description, a review of literature and expert interviews in violence prevention, peacebuilding, medicine and medical education, three statements are posited: improved healthcare may enhance the prospects for peace; there are mechanisms by which healthcare may potentially enhance peacebuilding; and medical education can be designed to support these mechanisms. A “peace audit” is developed against which to evaluate the efforts of medical schools towards peacebuilding. This audit is used to assess a medical school in Nepal that is invested in peacebuilding.
Findings
Medicine has a role, both in resolving conflict, and in preventing its occurrence. The experts believe that physicians have a responsibility to go further than treating the wounded and address the root cause of conflict: the structural violence of poverty and economic disparity.
Originality/value
This paper considers the mechanisms by which medicine supports peacebuilding, and the consequences of this for medical education. The literature to date has not dealt with this issue.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Disclosure: David Dunne and Carol Ann Courneya are both members of the International Advisory Board of Patan Academy of Health Sciences (PAHS) and Carol Ann Courneya teaches in the PAHS curriculum. The authors feel that while this should be disclosed, they are not in conflict of interest because their positions are entirely voluntary (no financial remuneration whatsoever) and while they highlight examples of links between PAHS and peacebuilding they also point out that there is work yet to be done to for this school to become a model of peacebuilding. An early version of this work was presented as a slideshow at the Munk Centre for International Affairs, University of Toronto, in October 2010 The authors wish to thank Dr Arjun Karki and Dr Robert Woolard for their substantive contributions to this paper. The authors also thank Dr I. Abuelaish, Dr G. Slutkin, Dr M. Maskey, Dr H. Zucker, Ms Dhanmaya Ghaiti Magar and Mr Dhiraz Prasad Jarswal for sharing their insights into the topic of medical education and peacebuilding.
Citation
Dunne, D., Geppert, A. and Ann Courneya, C. (2013), "Idealism is not enough: designing peace into medical education", Leadership in Health Services, Vol. 26 No. 4, pp. 294-311. https://doi.org/10.1108/LHS-01-2012-0001
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2013, Emerald Group Publishing Limited