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The article profiles Edward Parrish, pioneer pharmaceutical ethicist. He was born on May 31, 182 in Philadelphia and graduated from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy in 1842. He purchased a pharmacy next to the University of Pennsylvania that resulted in close contact with medical students. He contributed to the establishment of the first chair in Theoretical and Practical Pharmacy at the university. He participated in the organizational meeting of the The article profiles Edward Parrish, pioneer ethicist. He was born on May 31, 182 in Philadelphia and attended the Friends' School and graduated from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy in 1842. He purchased a pharmacy next to the University of Pennsylvania that resulted in close contact with medical students. He contributed to the establishment of the first chair in Theoretical and Practical Pharmacy at the university. He participated in the organizational meeting of the American Pharmaceutical Association in October 1852.

This paper describes the first three-year experience of the Consortium Ethics Program (CEP-1) of the University of Pittsburgh Center for Medical Ethics, and also outlines plans for the second three-year phase (CEP-2) of this experiment in continuing ethics education. In existence since 1990, the CEP has the primary goal of creating a cost-effective, permanent ethics resource network, by utilizing the educational resources of a university bioethics center and the practical expertise of a regional hospital council. The CEP's conception and specific components stem from recognition of the need to make each hospital a major focus of educational efforts, and to provide academic support for the in-house activities of the representatives from each institution.

In the mid 1980s it was apparent that the need for organ donors exceeded those willing to donate. Some University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) physicians initiated discussion of possible new organ donor categories including individuals pronounced dead by traditional cardiac criteria. However, they reached no conclusion and dropped the discussion. In the late 1980s and the early 1990s, four cases arose in which dying patients or their families requested organ donation following the elective removal of mechanical ventilation. Controversy surrounding these cases precipitated open discussion of the use of organ donors pronounced dead on the basis of cardiac criteria. Prolonged deliberations by many committees in the absence of precedent ultimately resulted in what is, to our knowledge, the country's first policy for organ donation following elective removal of life support. The policy is intricate and conservative. Care was taken to include as many interested parties as possible in an effort to achieve representative and broad based support. This paper describes the development of the UPMC policy on non-heart-beating organ donation.