Ethics training for military medical trainees: the Brooke Army Medical Center experience

Biomedical ethics training during graduate medical education programs is required by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. Apart from this requirement, medical ethics education is an integral component of military medical practice. Although ethics education and training are required, tools to assess the effectiveness of ethics education are not well developed. Furthermore, although biomedical ethics education is mandated for new Army physician trainees, there has not been a systematic objective assessment of the effectiveness of that training. We report the concept underlying the design and implementation of a military biomedical ethics seminar for new Army physician trainees. Combining a didactic component and case analysis through small-group discussions, we emphasized providing tools to analyze ethical dilemmas both in the medical center environment and in the operational medicine environment. A total of 47 Army interns participated in the seminar. Eighty-nine percent of participants agreed or strongly agreed that the ethics orientation met expectations. Seventy-two percent agreed or strongly agreed that the information presented would affect their practice. Ninety-six percent thought that the small-group discussions were effective, and 80% thought that the presentations enhanced knowledge from medical school.