The Trent Center for Bioethics, Humanities & History of Medicine is founded on the principle that the practice of medicine involves academic disciplines beyond the pure and applied sciences. Good medical care and research require a deep understanding of the moral and ethical principles on which decisions are made. Combining this understanding with a greater awareness of history, clinicians, researchers, and students can be more knowledgeable, insightful, humane, and effective. In addition, the Center understands that research and clinical care take place in a particular social and cultural context and for this reason medicine can also be informed by current scholarship in the humanities. To meet these interdisciplinary objectives, the Trent Center brings together scholars who use the Center as a home for research and service in ethics, medical humanities, and the history of medicine.
Through its core faculty and its network of associates, the Trent Center helps to connect the larger community of scholars at Duke University interested in issues pertaining to medicine and its role in society. By fostering interactions among scholars, the Trent Center serves as a catalyst both for individual academic research and for collaborations, especially in research and teaching. Faculty teach health professional students in areas including clinical and research ethics, humanities in health care, and history of medicine. The Trent Center also supports the Duke Hospital Clinical Ethics Service through clinical ethics case conferences and bioethics faculty colloquia.
Lectures by distinguished speakers held throughout the year on a wide variety of topics are open to the broad Duke community and the public.