Videos from conference of Bioethics of clinical innovation and unproven methods, Copenhagen, 9 April 2019

Arnar Pálsson, 13/11/2019

Bioethics of clinical innovation and unproven methods, Copenhagen, 9 April 2019

Conference organized by the Nordic Committee on Bioethics in collaboration with Centre for Legal Studies in Welfare and Market at the University of Copenhagen. The central questions were:

How are clinical innovations and unproven methods developed and introduced in western Nordic health-care systems?

What is the legal and regulatory environment concerning unproven methods in medicine?

What ethical principles should guide work on emerging treatments and experimentation in hospitals?

These are questions that were addressed in the NCBio-conference in Copenhagen.

You can read more about the conference here.

I had the great privilege of organizing this event with my colleagues in the Nordic Committee on Bioethics, in collaboration with the Centre for Legal Studies in Welfare and Market at the University of Copenhagen.
Venue: Alf Ross auditorium (room 9A-3-01), Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen, Karen Blixens Plads 16, 2300 Copenhagen S.
Background: Clinical innovation involves development of new techinques, methods, treatments and diagnostics for detecting, alleviating and curing diseases. By nature novel clinical methods and treatments are unproven when first developed. Through the centuries, medicine has advanced by trials and errors of physicians and researchers experimenting with treatments and methods. The failure of certain methods are inseparable from success of others, because a priori it is hard to know what works and what not. The scientific method is the preferred approach to develop cures and treatments, but many current medical practices were not developed by strict scientific testing or trials. Healthcare professionals may try unproven methods, for instance as a last resort in attempt to safe a life. Such unproven methods for clinics and health care, occur at the intersect of basic research and standard health-care and raise number of bioethical issues. Those include the following issues. Do patients have sufficient and equal access to the experimental methods? Are patients protected from harm when unproven methods are tested? Who should make decisions about when to experiment with a treatment? How can society and the health care system best simultaneously promote clinical innovation and protect patients?

The conference is open to all interested, including medical doctors, clinical researchers, health committees in parliments, civil servants and hospital administrators.

categories General biology