Abstract
Case studies are essential to medical ethics classes in medical and healthcare schools. While lectures on general theories of medical ethics including moral principles and some topical overviews encapsulating ethical problems of abortion, genetic manipulation or euthanasia are no less important, case studies which have necessarily pragmatic character and are always concrete and contextual, are suitable for simulated training in preparation for actual encounter with ethical problems in clinical settings. However, case studies have certain methodological constraints and shortcomings. Some authors criticize that case studies will seldom reach into the hearts and minds of the people involved and that such cases are written in such a fashion that one can easily substitute one person for another, provided that they have the same illness. Furthermore it is plausible that case studies stimulate the students' analytic scrutiny, rather than imagination, so that cases are trivialized and reduced to mere abstract stories. To avoid such problems and to enrich case studies, we are developing a 'case-construction method.' This method imposes making up an original fictive case on each small group unit of students. In this paper we show the fundamental character of this method and the actual steps of our trials over two academic years and students' responses. This new method is burdensome but effective for medical students. It is recommended that after a sufficient number of exercises using traditional case studies, our new original case studies would be introduced.
