Editorial Editorial: What do we know about dignity in care?

During a recent conference on Dignity in Health and Social Care in London, I claimed that we already know a good deal about dignity in care. I was rightly challenged by colleagues from Scandinavia. They suggested that the relationship between philosophical and empirical work in dignity is not at all clear. Their intervention has caused me to reflect on their question and to have it as a theme for this editorial. So what can we say we know about dignity in care? It seems likely that we will agree on the following: that dignity is a contested concept; that philosophical work suggests a wide range of perspectives; that empirical research suggests common themes and subjective elements of dignity in care; that we are, as suggested above, perplexed by the relationship between philoso-phical and empirical work in dignity; that attempts to measure dignity will not be straightforward; that dignity matters in healthcare for patients, families and professionals; and that we have to understand what contributes to and remedies dignity deficits in care. Writing in the Journal ofMedical Ethics in 2003, American bioethicist Ruth Macklin, described dignity as ‘a useless concept ’ arguing that autonomy was the more useful and necessary value.1 In 2008, Steven Pinker argued that ‘the problem is that ‘‘dignity’ ’ is a squishy, subjective notion hardly up to the heavyweight moral demands assigned to it’.2 Despite criticism and scepticism about the value and usefulness of dignity, the con