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Byline: Zbigniew Zalewski (1) Keywords: biomedical paradigm; educational patterns; ideals of healthcare professionals; paradigm functions; role of philosophy Abstract: The presence of philosophy, amidst other humanities,within the body of medical education seems to raiseno doubt nowadays. There are, however, somequestions of a general nature to be discussedregarding the aforementioned fact. Three of them areof the greatest importance: (1) What image ofmedicine prevails in modern Western societies? (2)What ideals of medical professionals are commonlyshared in these societies? (3) What is theintellectual background of the students ofmedico-related faculties? The real purposes andgoals ascribed to philosophy as a part of medicalcurricula, as well as methods of teaching philosophydepend on the answers given to these questions. An option to be presented here is influenced by theexperience of teaching philosophy to students ofmedical faculties at the Jagiellonian University inKrakow. This approach is deliberately posedagainst mainstream medical education that is usuallybased on an unquestioned belief in the power ofbiomedical sciences. Such a model cannot, however,pretend to be a universal one to be implemented allover the world. In any case, it is the only thing aphilosopher can do to improve the quality of aphysician-patient encounter in facing a disease. Author Affiliation: (1) Department of Philosophy and Bioethics, Medical College of the Jagiellonian University, Rynek GAowny 34, 31-010, Krakow, Poland Article History: Registration Date: 08/10/2004

Byline: Zbigniew Zalewski (1) Author Affiliation: (1) Poland Article History: Registration Date: 04/10/2004 Article note: This revised version was published online in October 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.