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Ethics Service

The PHSA Ethics Service is a free and confidential service that is easily accessible with no referral required. We support people seeking and accessing care, their families, healthcare providers, professionals and workers, administrators, and leaders.

Our goals are to: 

  • Foster a culture of ethics across PHSA
  • Ensure values are at the centre of healthcare decisions
  • Support Indigenous cultural safety and humility
  • Support justice, equity, diversity and inclusion
  • Provide confidential support to individuals and their loved ones
  • Enhance care and its outcomes through open, transparent and fair decision-making processes
  • Provide education and resources to support ethical practice
About Ethics

About Ethics

You may have an ethical issue if you are asking:
  • What is the right thing to do or the most justifiable option/course of action in this situation? 
  • What are the underlying values that are most important in this situation and how should these values be balanced?
  • How do we determine the best way forward when there is disagreement? 
  • How do I make healthcare decisions for myself or my loved ones that best align with my values?
  • Who should make this healthcare decision and/or be involved in making this healthcare decision?

Services

Services

The PHSA Ethics Service is committed to equity, diversity and inclusion. We provide the following services through an equity and trauma-informed lens:

Clinical ethics consults: We help people seeking care and their families, healthcare providers, workers and professionals, administrators and leaders work through ethical issues focused on care delivered to individuals and families across PHSA. 

Organizational ethics consults: We guide ethical practices at the organizational level by, for example, supporting administrators and leaders in resource allocation and addressing bias in healthcare.

Public health ethics consults: We support public health-interest holders in developing ethical approaches and strategies to addressing challenges in public health.

Policy development and review: We partner with teams to develop and review policies and guidelines that shape clinical practice, public health services and organizational operations.

Ethics education: We build ethics capacity within PHSA through collaborative practices, ethical practice tools and both in-person and online education. We provide ongoing educational opportunities tailored to the needs of the organization and teams.

Moral distress sessions: We support individuals, teams and leaders in strategy-building to prevent, mitigate and address moral distress.

In an ethics consult, we can: 

  • Facilitate respectful and inclusive discussions to identify ethical issues and work through ethical decision-making processes
  • Help people think through, identify and share the values that are most important to them with their care teams
  • Support people to reach decisions that are right for them and their loved ones
  • Ensure information shared is kept confidential
  • Help engage with relevant communities, interested parties and partners
  • Support open, transparent and inclusive decision-making processes
  • Ensure the ethical resolution process is fair
For questions and concerns around the quality of care provided to patients and clients, please contact the Patient Care Quality Office

For questions around research ethics, please see Research Ethics Approval
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