While most doctors participate in a medical school oath ceremony, few believe that this rite of passage has strongly shaped their sense of professionalism, according to an article published in Archives of Internal Medicine. Almost 80% of 1,032 practising doctors surveyed in 2009 said they took part in a medical school oath ceremony using the original or modified version of the Hippocratic Oath, the Osteopathic Oath, the Prayer of Maimonides or the Declaration of Geneva. Only 26%, however, said the oath they took had a significant influence on their practice of medicine or provided guidance in their medical careers.
“These data suggest that for most physicians, the taking of the oath is not a pivotal, meaningful, signal event, but just something that happens,” said Farr A. Curlin, MD, co-author of the article. “Some people take it really seriously, and are looking to take it seriously. Others just see it as one more ritual that doesn't have much more significance than other things they do.” Doctors who said religion is important were more likely to say that their medical school oath was influential than less-religious doctors were.
When asked to list influential sources of medical ethical
guidance, more than 90% of the surveyed physicians said their “personal sense of wrong and right” helps guide their practice. Over a third of doctors referred to “great moral teachers”, 28% cited their religious faith and 16% referred to the American Medical Association Code of Medical Ethics. Dr. Curlin, co-director of the University of Chicago’s Program on Medicine and Religion, said medical schools should encourage students to investigate how their religious faith should guide their practice.
“Within these broad moral traditions that exist in our culture, there are ways for people in those communities to challenge each other to practice medicine to a higher standard than just how much money you can make and how much you can get out of it for yourself," Dr. Curlin said. "Medicine doesn't have a shared moral resource to remind people of that. It kind of casts about and mixes in all sorts of stuff. Students obviously are turning a great deal of stuff over in their own minds.” ~ American Medical News, Apr 1