Medical humanities: a vision and some cautionary notes

Stephen Pattison outlines his vision for medical humanities and then offers cautionary notes on what might go wrong with the movement. These notes are based on what he holds has already gone wrong with medical ethics, dramatically described as the "death course of a discipline". I have a great deal of sympathy both with his anxieties about the future development of medical humanities and with his critique of medical ethics. My reasons in both cases are a little different from his, and indeed part of his vision for medical humanities constitutes part of my worries about its future! I shall begin with some comments on Pattison's views on medical humanities, and then more briefly comment on his diagnosis of the ills of medical ethics.