Report

Dual loyalties exist in many medical fields, from occupational health to public health. Military health professionals, as all health professionals, are ethically responsible for their patients’ well-being. In some situations, however, military health professionals can face unique ethical tensions between responsibilities to individual patients and responsibilities to military operations. This report summarizes the one-day workshop, Military and Medical Ethics: Issues Regarding Dual Loyalties, which brought together academic, military, human rights, and health professionals to discuss these ethical challenges. The workshop examined two case studies: decisions regarding returning a servicemember to duty after a closed head injury, and decisions on actions by health professionals regarding a hunger strike by detainees. The workshop also addressed the need for improvements in medical ethics training and outlined steps for organizations to take in supporting better ethical awareness and use of ethical standards.