Ethical Issues in Rural Health Care

Craig M. Klugman is the Stewart & Marianne Reuter Professor of Medical Humanities and assistant director for ethics education at the Center for Medical Humanities and Ethics at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio. Pamela M. Dalinis is senior associate director, DIVACO Education, The Joint Commission, Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois.

• List of ContributorsPrefaceIntroductionPart I: Overview of Rurality and General Ethical IssuesChapter 1. Rural-Urban Differences in End-of-Life Care: Reflections on Social ContractsChapter 2. The Challenges of Rural Health CareChapter 3. Ethics, Errors, and Where We Go from HereChapter 4. The Ethics of Allocating Resources toward Rural Health and Health CarePart II: Practitioners' VoicesChapter 5. Reflections on Fifty Years in Rural Health CareChapter 6. Serving the Underserved: Personal, Social, and Medical ChallengesChapter 7. Ethical and Sociocultural Issues in Rural Mental Health CarePart III: Specific Ethical Issues and SolutionsChapter 8. Ethical Dimensions of the Quality of Rural Health CareChapter 9. Building Bioethics Networks in Rural States: Blessings and BarriersChapter 10. Structural Violence in the Rural Context: The Ethical implications of Welfare Reform for Rural HealthChapter 11. Rural Geristric Bioethics: A Texas PerspectiveChapter 12. Supporting the Rural Physician: Processes and ProgramsIndex

Of obvious value for those active in rural health care. It may be even more useful, however, for nonrural practitioners, ethicists, and members of ethics committees. Reading the essays in this volume is like acquiring a new set of glasses. It made me better able to perceive differences in how ethics can be considered based on culture, population, geographic challenges, and personal connections... An even bigger service may be the tools it provides to look differently at problems commonly thought to be understood. -- Myles N. Sheehan, SJ, MD JAMA An excellent scholarly examination of what rural people face in the world of health care. Midwest Book Review A welcome addition to this oft-neglected area of ethics. The collection is broad-ranging and well-designed. -- Robert Macauley Journal of Bioethical Inquiry The common thread among the essays is a bioethical perspective. Their common goal is to raise awareness among rural practitioners and other interested parties about the particular challenges that the rural environment presents. Health Affairs