Certificate in Ethics and Palliative Care

Course Overview

This Postgraduate Certificate (PG Cert) is designed for hospice, palliative health and social care professionals to gain an advanced understanding of the ethical problems in palliative care, without having to undertake a full Masters degree.

Course structure

How the course is taught

Successful completion of the two taught modules (60 credits) leads to the award of a Postgraduate Certificate in Ethics in Palliative Care.

The Postgraduate Certificate (PG Cert) in Ethics and Palliative Care is taught at Keele University by a unique combination of ethicists, legal academics, and clinical specialists.

Teaching for the taught modules is delivered in short intense blocks, enabling those to fit it around the demands of their work wherever they are based. You will be assigned a personal tutor from the outset, who you can contact for help or advice at any time during the course.

We regard high levels of participation in discussion as particularly important for teaching and learning in this area, and employ teaching techniques which encourage this wherever possible. Students come from a wide range of backgrounds and report that meeting and exchanging ideas with others who work in different parts of the country is one of the major benefits of the course.
From time to time, experts from outside Keele may be invited to speak on the course; this provides an insight into academic work in end of life care ethics taking place in other institutions and professional perspectives. In addition, Keele's Centre for Law, Ethics and Society hosts a wide range of seminars, workshops and lectures, which students are welcome to attend.

Core Taught Modules

Moral Theory and Medical Ethics (30 credits)

This module will equipt you with a knowledge of key ethical theories, frameworks and principles that inform academic debates in medical and healthcare ethics, and enables them to use these tools to analyse practical moral problems in medicine and healthcare. It will also provides you with a practical understanding of the norms and conventions of academic argument and writing in applied ethics.

Topics covered typically include:

● consequentialism
● deontology
● virtue ethics
● ethics of care
● principlism
● autonomy and paternalism
● the ethical foundations of consent
● liberty and toleration
● evaluating and constructing ethical arguments
● introduction to the library and electronic resources
● how to write essays in ethics

Ethical Issues in Care of the Dying (30 credits)

This module focuses on end-of-life issues and care for the dying. It includes topics on the significance of death, the sanctity and value of life, the idea of 'quality of life', withdrawing and withholding life-prolonging treatment, and ethical and legal issues in enthanasia. The practical aspects of care for the dying are also addressed through a focus on the Liverpool Care Pathway.