Chapter 6: Molding Professional Character

This chapter argues for appreciating the distinctiveness of medical ethics. If the ethics of medicine is different from the ethics of everyday life, it follows that the character of physicians is and should be different from the character of others. Molding the character of future physicians therefore becomes an important matter for the attention of medical educators. In that light, this chapter explains the appropriate goals for such an educational program and discusses the means for teaching and inculcating the principles, attitudes, and behaviors that physicians need to embrace in order to fulfill their special social role and professional obligations.