MacLean Center research has always been on the cutting edge of both medicine and ethics, with clinical research proceeding in tandem with medical advances. As an example, the MacLean Center was involved in the introduction of pediatric live-donor liver transplantation in 1989. This new procedure raised complex ethical questions about medical innovation, risk/benefit balancing, informed consent, and the protection of living organ donors. The MacLean Center worked for two years with transplant experts at the University of Chicago to review the ethical issues, publish protocols, and encourage professional discussion of the procedure before it was first performed on a patient. The MacLean Center’s transplant work is but one example of the wide-range of ethics-related research projects undertaken by our faculty. The MacLean Center faculty publishes prolifically on subjects such as research ethics, end of life care, surgical ethics, pediatric outcomes, health policy, health disparities, genetics, and transplantation ethics. Current and former MacLean Center faculty and fellows have published more than 210 books in the field of medical ethics.

• Our faculty and their individual research interests.
• Overview of general MacLean Center research interests.