Our bioethics programs are among the earliest in the US, and began in 1995 with the Certificate Program, a collaboration between Montefiore and Columbia University, founded by bioethics pioneers Nancy Dubler and David Rothman. The Master of Science in Bioethics started in 2010 under the direction of Tia Powell at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, in collaboration with Ed Stein and Cardozo Law.
Professor Dubler also founded and directed one of the first Bioethics Consultation Services in the country at Montefiore Medical Center (1978-2008) as a support for analysis of difficult clinical cases presenting ethical issues in the health care setting. Her book Bioethics Mediation, written with Carol Liebman, remains the definitive work in the field. She was a generous colleague, mentor and friend. We are honored to continue our work in the spirit of her dedication to compassion and excellence.
Our programs have always featured a rich academic mix of medicine, law, philosophy, and narrative. In any given class, students may read a Supreme Court decision, a clinical case and a short story. Faculty over the years include a Who’s Who of bioethics and the medical humanities in America: Rita Charon, Barron Lerner, Jeff Blustein, the late John Arras and Adrienne Asch, and many others. Among our hundreds of alumni are many leaders in healthcare ethics who credit the program with dramatically changing the direction of their career. Clinical ethics has always been a strength of the program, drawing upon the thousands of cases and faculty experience from Montefiore Medical Center.
