Ethical Leadership Toolkit - National Center for Ethics in Health ...

Ethical Leadership Toolkit – Communications Materials
Introduction
IntegratedEthics: Improving Ethics Quality in Health Care (Tab 1) provides a
comprehensive overview of IntegratedEthics and is one of your primary tools for
communicating about the initiative.
The additional communications tools in this collection use a variety of formats to
describe the essential features of and rationale for the IntegratedEthics initiative.
They provide a brief orientation to IntegratedEthics, introduce the key concepts, and
equip you with ready and consistent aids for communicating about IntegratedEthics to
others. The materials may be used individually or together, physically or electronically
distributed to mail-groups, handed out at meetings, or posted on display boards. The
kit contains:
• Improving Ethics Quality: Looking Beneath the Surface – Depicting ethics
quality as an iceberg, this image shines a bright light on all the components of
ethical health care practice, not just the decisions and actions that are readily
observed. The iceberg is a useful visual metaphor to start discussion about
the importance of underlying systems and processes and environment and
culture, as well as the interdependence of all the levels of ethics quality.
• IntegratedEthics: Closing the Ethics Quality Gap – This feature story
discusses the IntegratedEthics initiative in the context of VA’s focus on quality
improvement and performance measurement. It quotes various external
experts regarding the need for fundamental change in the traditional ethics
committee model and the benefits of a more comprehensive and systematic
approach.
• The Business Case for Ethics – This document summarizes the kind of
bottom-line benefits a strong ethics program can bring to an organization –
including improved customer satisfaction and employee morale, and reduced
risk. For busy executives (and skeptics), this tool explains the potential of
IntegratedEthics and will help you champion the transition at your facility.
• Brochure – This tri-fold brochure provides a quick overview of the
IntegratedEthics initiative. It presents the basic concepts in a Q-A format,
focusing on the basic concepts and highlighting what’s new about the
IntegratedEthics paradigm. It includes endorsements from several senior VHA
leaders and will be a handy reference for employees at all levels. (Your facility
received a supply; the brochure is also available on the IntegratedEthics
website.)
• Slides – The slide set highlights the key concepts and advantages of
implementing an IntegratedEthics program, and will be especially useful for
providing an overview to new audiences. (Available on the IntegratedEthics
website only.)
Electronic copies of all items are available at vaww.ethics.va.gov/IntegratedEthics
or www.ethics.va.gov/IntegratedEthics.
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