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View submission: How has utilitarianism become the dominant ethic in western medicine?
It's not. Medical practice, in the west at least, is strongly driven by respect for autonomy (hence the practice of informed consent) and justice (hence the emphasis on treating the most in need, even if it expends significant resources).
In the 70s and 80s, utilitarianism was more dominant, at least in the form of not caring about what the patient wants. But that has mostly changed, even to the point of providing non-medically indicated care just because a patient requests it.
There are still some areas where we function on something closer to a utility calculus, arguably at least. For instance, triage situations change or treatment priorities to preserve resources and save as many as possible, rather than treating the most in need. Similarly, only in the past 6 months had the US finally decided to put a stop to unconsented pelvic exams during procedures where the patient is under. That has been going on forever supposedly to train students. As a utilitarian, I don't think it is actually sorted, but one could naively claim that.
There's nothing here!