Why is an ethical and integrated audit accreditation process required for romanian hospitals?

Abstract

Nowadays, a third generation of ethics has come to the fore, whereby ethical issues are approached in an integrated manner, emphasising the management of ethics, which entails a cause-effect relation. One of its evaluation instruments is the ethical audit. This paper presents the findings of research focused on 47 executives involved in the management of quality in Romanian hospitals. The research concerns, in particular, the relevance and the opportunity for an ethical audit and the assessment of its possible effects. The data were gathered using a questionnaire. The research shows that Romanian managers consider the introduction of the ethical audit within the accreditation process as being relevant and pertinent. They believe that ethical monitoring is beneficial for the activity of healthcare institutions, but also that these institutions are as yet not sufficiently prepared to implement ethical audits. This study might be useful for sounding an alarm bell or for suggesting a direction for the qualitative and quantitative improvement of accreditation criteria and for the management of change in healthcare institutions worldwide.