Chapter 13: Organizational Ethics in Health Care: Proactively Caring Employees

Organizational ethics is an emerging field concerned with the study and practice of the ethical behavior of organizations. In health care, there is a strong understanding of the role of ethics in the provision of care (Silverman, 2000). Health care organizations increasingly find themselves facing a new set of business-oriented ethical issues due to changes in the delivery and financing of healthcare (Gilmartin & Freeman, 2002).

Recent organizational restructuring in health care has been driven by increasing attention to the administrative aspects of system functioning and has brought with it many questions about whether the “right” approach has been taken in responding to the stressors on today’s system. The ethics must permeate the entire health organization in order to rebuild trust among the organizational members, including physicians (Wall, 2007).