Journal
SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING ETHICS
Volume 26, Issue 3, Pages 1159-1183Publisher
SPRINGER
DOI: 10.1007/s11948-019-00115-1
Keywords
Empowerment; Digital health technologies; Digital companions; Medical paternalism; mHealth; NHS
Ask authors/readers for more resources
This article highlights the limitations of the tendency to frame health- and wellbeing-related digital tools (mHealth technologies) asempowering devices, especially as they play an increasingly important role in the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. It argues that mHealth technologies should instead be framed asdigital companions. This shift from empowerment to companionship is advocated by showing the conceptual, ethical, and methodological issues challenging the narrative of empowerment, and by arguing that such challenges, as well as the risk of medical paternalism, can be overcome by focusing on the potential for mHealth tools to mediate the relationship between recipients of clinical advice and givers of clinical advice, in ways that allow for contextual flexibility in the balance between patiency and agency. The article concludes by stressing that reframing the narrative cannot be the only means for avoiding harm caused to the NHS as a healthcare system by the introduction of mHealth tools. Future discussion will be needed on the overarching role of responsible design.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available