Ralf J. Jox

Ralf J. Jox, MD, PhD, born on 9 July 1974, is a bioethicist, neurologist and palliative care specialist working as Associate Professor at Lausanne University Hospital, Switzerland, with affiliations at the Institute of Humanities in Medicine, the Clinical Ethics Unit and the Chair of Geriatric Palliative Care.

He studied medicine at the universities of Freiburg and Munich, Germany, and at the Harvard Medical School in Boston, USA. He is also a trained philosopher from the School of Philosophy in Munich, completed a Master in Medical Ethics and Law at King’s College London, UK, and did a PhD in Medical and Health Ethics at the University of Basel, Switzerland. He holds board certificates in neurology and palliative medicine.

His research activities focus on end-of-life ethics, advance care planning, clinical ethics, and neuroethics. Dr. Jox pursues clinical studies, quantitative and qualitative socio-empirical studies as well as conceptual work. He has obtained several third-party funds in Germany (DFG, BMBF), Switzerland (SAMS) and on the international level (ERA-NET Neuron).  

Dr. Jox has published extensively in peer-review journals, including leading journals in palliative care, geriatric medicine, and medical ethics, such as The Lancet Oncol, The Lancet Neurol, Palliat Med,  J Am Geriatr Soc, and J Med Ethics. He has published several books on bioethics and palliative care in German and English and is the author of a well-cited lay book on end-of-life decisions in Germany (“Sterben lassen”, Rowohlt: Hamburg 2012). Among the multiple awards he received is the Young Investigator Awards of the European Association for Palliative Care (2011) and the German Academy of Ethics in Medicine (2004). In 2012, he was awarded a Caroline Miles Visiting Fellowship at the Ethox Centre, University of Oxford.

Dr. Jox organized and chaired international conferences, among them the International Conference on Clinical Ethics Consultation 2013 in Munich, two conferences at the Brocher Foundation in Geneva and several conferences on palliative care in Lausanne. He contributes to several professional bodies, as a member of the National Advisory Committee on Biomedical Ethics of Switzerland, member of the Health Council in the Canton of Vaud and member of the Advisory Committee of Palliative Vaud, among others.