The new ‘focus’ on ethics, though, is due to the identification of it in 2003 as an issue across the board from the organizations it serves, including home care, health services, and long-term care, to name a few.

"There’s more of an action requirement to it (ethics) now," says Lisa Nowlan, team leader of communications for CCHSA in Ottawa. "We’ve done a great deal more education with our surveyors on that."

In the fall of last year the CCHSA beefed up its education training sessions, says Nowlan, given the support for it at the grassroots level.

On the CCHSA website, leaders in health care organizations can access workshop information on ethics at various times throughout the year. Workshops promise to " introduce participants to the practical issues of planning, creating and maintaining an ethical health care organization, where the climate allows for ethical issues to be identified, acknowledged and discussed..."

The workshops also offer "support for ethical decision-making at all levels of the organization, and where organizational values, standards and processes are clearly articulated and implemented."

According to the CCHSA, ethical issues arise in all aspects of health care and service, from the bedside to the boardroom. From end-of-life issues, scarcity of resources, policies and resource allocation and personnel, ethics is an organization-wide issue.

"The feedback has been very positive," says Nowlan of the workshops and stronger focus on ethics. "It’s an area where there’s not a lot of information, so it’s being really well received.

Nowlan says the CCHSA will continually be modifying its ethics programming to reflect the needs of its clients’ services.