Bioethics training in Uganda: report on research and clinical ethics workshops

This essay describes and critically evaluates a co-operative educational program to train Ugandan health care workers in bioethics. It describes one "bottom-up" effort, a week-long intensive workshop in bioethics provided by the authors to health care professionals in a developing country-Uganda. We will describe the background and circumstances that led to the organization of the workshop, and review its planning, design, curriculum, and outcome. We will focus especially on measures taken to make the workshop relevant for the audience of Ugandan professionals, and describe lessons learned after two presentations of the workshop. Finally, we will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of such a format, and its potential value in raising bioethical expertise in developing countries.