Abstract

Medicine is about caring for people. It is a moral enterprise, not simply a technique or a pursuit. Though modern healthcare offers an amazing array of options, it has also become a complex and sometimes utterly de-humanizing system. Now, more than ever, we need guidance to navigate through the issues surrounding our medical care. Advances in medical technology have blessed many with longer and healthier lives, but they have also provided us with interventions and procedures that call for serious ethical evaluation. The BioBasics series is committed to an uncompromising respect for human life that will serve as a compass through a maze of challenging questions.