This discussion argues that whereas ethically questionable practices have been identified in many industries, the moral consequences of many hospital management decisions make this industry particularly worthy of ethics studies. Because health care, the hospital's product, typically represents more immediate, intimate, and possibly irreversible benefit or harm to its customer, the patient, than does the typical product of general industry, hospital executives should be held to higher ethical standards in their decision making. Yet little is known about the ethical thinking of hospital managers. Kohlberg's moral reasoning development theory and Rest's Defining Issues Test offer the theoretical base and the means to compare the ethical reasoning of hospital executives to that of their nonhospital counterparts in general industry. This research agenda can offer important clues regarding the need to emphasize ethics in health care industry educational programs.
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