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Bioethics and Medical Law Intercalation


Intercalating in Bioethics and Medical Law is a fantastic opportunity to explore lots of different areas in your own way. If you’re used to doing sciences as most medics are and fancy some time to study something completely different then I’d recommend it. The law component is really interesting and the bioethics component gives you the space to study different theories and use these to examine ethical issues of your own choice. While there is not much teaching (about 5 lectures/seminars per week in the first 1 and a 1/2 terms and then only 2 per week the rest of the year) there are regular essays and presentations to keep you busy but as it is all topics of your own choice, this is often less tedious than expected.

Forget the Ethics course in the first year – intercalating in Bioethics is a million times better! The course comprises three parts:

  • Bioethics – taught at the Centre for Ethics in Medicine (approx 58% of final mark)
  • Intro to Med Law – taught in Centre for Ethics in Medicine (approx 8%) and Medical Law – taught in Law Department in Wills (approx 17%)
  • Ethics – taught in the Philosophy Department (approx 17%)

Some of the best things about the course:

  • You are taught in a small group (maximum of 10), so you have very interactive, very personal teaching.
  • You get to choose over 50% of your course, so you can choose what you want to write about. This puts you in the strange position of actually wanting to work! For most of the rest of the course you get to pick what essays you write from a choice of titles given.
  • You learn loads of new skills including essay writing, debating and presentation. Having done science subjects all my life, I was quite worried beforehand, but took to the new subject easily. You get good feedback on the first few essays.
  • All the teachers are really nice people and always keen to help.
  • The timetable is pretty easy going.
  • You get to know your course mates really well.
  • Only 1 exam at the end in Philosophy.
  • The subject is fascinating, and really, really enjoyable!

Some of the worst things:

  • Reading – lots of it!
  • Dissertation is very, very long!
  • Onus is all on you to do work – you have to be able to motivate yourself.
  • You have to sit through ‘Journal Club’ for 1 hour each week – which is usually a big waste of time.
  • As it is such a small group, it is very difficult to miss any teaching if you can’t be bothered to get out of bed!

Overall Bioethics is great subject to intercalate in, and I strongly recommend everyone who is interested in ethics to apply!

The Ethics BSc consists of 3 main elements: Ethics (surprisingly!), Medical Law and Philosophy. For the ethics component all the teaching is within your BSc group and the assessment is in the form of an essay and a dissertation, both of which (within reason) can be on a topic of your choice. For the Medical Law, you will have an intro course with your BSc group but then you will join the second year lawyers for their Medical Law unit! The teaching consists of lectures and tutorials and you are assessed with 4 pieces of coursework. Finally, for the Philosophy element, you also join the second year philosophers so all your teaching will be in lectures and seminars. This is the only part of the course for which you will have to take a proper exam!!!

The course is completely different to most of the ethics that you covered in the first year, so don’t make any assumptions based on that! The best bits have been: making brilliant friends within the BSc group (which will consist of a maximum of 10 people), getting to know the Ethics department (who are all lovely!), learning about different ethical theories, learning about our legal system, lots of discussion, intense debates and a much more relaxed timetable (we’re talking 3 or 4 day weekends here!). The not so great bits have been: huge amounts of reading and lots of essay writing which can come as a bit of a shock!

Overall I would definitely recommend this course, providing you are willing to put the work in to make it worth it. If you want to know anything more, the best person to get in touch with is the course organiser, Richard Huxtable – R.Huxtable@bristol.ac.uk.