Patient-Centered Bedside Education and Traditional Jewish Law and Ethics

BACKGROUND: Bedside rounds have long been a time-honored component of medical education. Recently, there have been various recommendations that residency-training programs further incorporate bedside teaching into clinical curricula. OBJECTIVES: To compare these current attitudes regarding bedside education with the position of traditional Jewish law and ethics. METHODS: Relevant medical journal articles and traditional Jewish sources were reviewed. RESULTS: Halacha (the corpus of traditional Jewish law and ethics) gives greater focus to a patient-centered rather than student-centered bedside education experience. CONCLUSION: Residency training programs should give greater consideration to the importance of a patient-centered bedside education experience.