Approaches to the elements or parts of the human body in bioethics and dentistry | ADES

The objective of this axis is to contribute to a better understanding of the norms that govern the use of elements or parts of the human body, notably teeth, blood, and cells, in the context of care, research, or expertise. At the interface between biological knowledge and human and social sciences, this axis will question the status of human remains for medico-legal purposes or for the management of bone remains in a framework of expertise reshaped by the digital revolution and AI.

In the upcoming contract, it is not only the body but also the elements or parts of the body (teeth, blood, genes, gametes, human remains...) that will mobilize the multidisciplinary competences of the researchers of the "Body, Norms, Health" team. Particular attention will be paid to the status of the donor-body and the recipient-body in the context of blood transfusion, which will be the subject of a transversal axis.

Projets

The painful body in dentistry

Research in dentistry will continue through the work of young researchers already begun in the past year, and which will continue around the painful body in a qualitative and ethical perspective.

Genetics and information to relatives

The ethics researchers intend to continue their research on the observation of the diversity of procedures for informing relatives in Europe, in the field of rare diseases.

The body as medicine: a bio-cultural approach

This inter-team project will focus on a specific case where the patient's body is treated using the resources of another's body. In this case, the body is no longer simply the receptacle of treatments but becomes itself a means of treatment available to patients in a life-threatening situation (leukemia, sickle cell disease, etc.).

Ethics, age estimation, body identification, management of bone remains

In the event of death, other social norms unfold because respect for the body does not disappear with death. The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has given an insight into the cultural invariants in the respect due to the body of the deceased. The duty of decency that the living recognize towards the cadaveric body is imposed even when the person has donated his or her body to science, within a recently reinforced normative framework. During the next contract, the removal of elements from the cadaveric body at the request of the judicial authorities will be the subject of a renewed deontological approach through the digitization of forensic resources.