Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
1.6 PRO
FESSIONAL STATUS OF BIOMEDICAL ENGINE
ERING
which are defined as an aggregate of people finding
identity in sharing values and skills absorbed during a common course of intensive training.
Whether individuals are professionals is determined by examining whether they have inter-
nalized certain given professional values. Furthermore, a professional is someone who has
internalized professional values and is licensed on the basis of his or her technical compe-
tence. Professionals generally accept scientific standards in their work, restrict their work
activities to areas in which they are technically competent, avoid emotional involvement,
cultivate objectivity in their work, and put their clients' interests before their own.
The concept of a profession that is involved in the design, development, and management
of medical technology encompasses three primary occupational models: science, business,
and profession. Consider initially the contrast between science and profession.
Biomedical engineers are
professionals,
is seen
as the pursuit of knowledge, its value hinging on providing evidence and communicating
with colleagues.
Science
, on the other hand, is viewed as providing a service to clients
who have problems they cannot handle themselves. Scientists and professionals have in com-
mon the exercise of some knowledge, skill, or expertise. However, while scientists practice
their skills and report their results to knowledgeable colleagues, professionals, such as law-
yers, physicians, and engineers, serve lay clients. To protect both the professional and the cli-
ent from the consequences of the layperson's lack of knowledge, the practice of the profession
is often regulated through such formal institutions as state licensing. Both professionals and
scientists must persuade their clients to accept their findings. Professionals endorse and
follow a specific code of ethics to serve society. On the other hand, scientists move their
colleagues to accept their findings through persuasion.
Consider, for example, the medical profession. Its members are trained in caring for
the sick, with the primary goal of healing them. These professionals not only have a respon-
sibility for the creation, development, and implementation of that tradition, but they are
also expected to provide a service to the public, within limits, without regard to self-
interest. To ensure proper service, the profession closely monitors the licensing and certifi-
cation process. Thus, medical professionals themselves may be regarded as a mechanism of
social control. However, this does not mean that other facets of society are not involved in
exercising oversight and control of physicians in their practice of medicine.
A final attribute of professionals is that of integrity. Physicians tend to be both permis-
sive and supportive in relationships with patients and yet are often confronted with moral
dilemmas involving the desires of their patients and social interest. For example, how to
honor the wishes of terminally ill patients while not facilitating the patients' deaths is a
moral question that health professionals are forced to confront. A detailed discussion of
the moral issues posed by medical technology is presented in Chapter 2.
One can determine the status of professionalization by noting the occurrence of six crucial
events: the first training school, the first university school, the first local professional associa-
tion, the first national professional association, the first state license law, and the first formal
code of ethics. The early appearances of the training school and the university affiliation
underscore the importance of the cultivation of a knowledge base. The strategic innovative
role of the universities and early teachers lies in linking knowledge to practice and creating
Profession
