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Ethics for Radiation Medicine Professionals
Ethics» Ethical Thought»
Medical Ethics
» Practical Ethics
Background -
The
Tuskegee syphilis experiment
was a clinical
study conducted between 1932 and 1972 in Tuskegee, Alabama, by
the U.S. Public Health Service.
Purpose
-
To learn whether syphilis had a different pathological
course in black men than in white men.
Noble Beginnings
- When the study began in
1932
, standard medical
treatments for syphilis were toxic, dangerous, and of questionable
effectiveness. Part of the study goal was to determine if patients were
better off not being treated with such toxic remedies.
Study Design -
Investigators recruited 623 impoverished African-
American subjects with and without syphilis. They would be
followed throughout their lives and autopsied at death to determine
how the disease had progressed.
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The Belmont Report