Aristotle, Hume and the goals of medicine.

Whilst medicine is now an immense global industry clinicians often appear unclear as to its goals. This paper uses two philosophical steps to clarify our conceptualization of health and thus our goals for healthcare. Firstly, clinicians need to understand the significance of Hume's fact / value distinction in medicine, for medicine relies on both facts and values. Secondly clinicians need a better specified definition of 'health' to use as a goal for healthcare. Aristotle's model of human flourishing is used as the starting point for a new conceptualization of health.