The fourth annual Catholic Healthcare
Innovation in Ethics Forum (CHIEF) was
hosted by OSF HealthCare in September
2022. Based on feedback from the previous
year and ongoing concerns due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, CHIEF was again
held completely virtually. The CHIEF
planning committee — made up of ethicists
from Ascension, CHRISTUS Health,
CommonSpirit Health, Hospital Sisters
Health System, Mercy, OSF HealthCare, and
Providence Health & Services — affirmed
the goals of CHIEF: to provide a venue for
ethicists working in Catholic health care to
present innovative ideas or projects, receive
critical feedback, and contribute to evolving
the way Catholic health care thinks about and
implements ethics.
In years past, we solicited talks on specific
focal areas. For CHIEF 2022 we welcomed all
proposal topics and encouraged submission in:
- Diversity, equity, and inclusion
- Organizational ethics
- Data ethics
As in previous years the two-day conference
primarily relied on lightning talks for the
presentations. Each presenter was limited to seven minutes and three slides (plus a title
slide). Presenters were grouped by subject
area, and each group was followed by a
45-minute panel discussion and Q&A with
the presenters from that session. Over the two
days, there were 21 presentations from 17
ethicists on topics ranging from “Ethics on TV:
Connecting ‘Armchair Ethics’ to the Bedside”
to “Organizational Interbeing: Bioethics,
Strategic Planning and Climate Change.”
Following the success of workshop sessions
at CHIEF 2021, we solicited proposals for a
workshop session at CHIEF 2022. We had one
workshop session led by Dr. Alexandria Lescher,
Manager of Clinical Ethics at Ascension
Wisconsin, and Jessica Ullrich, Manager of
Clinical Ethics at Ascension Oklahoma. Their
workshop was titled: “Sharing the Practice:
Five Reflections to Challenge Bias in Fertility
Awareness Based Medicine.”
We were once again blessed this year with a
keynote presentation from a leader in the field,
Ron Hamel, PhD. Dr. Hamel preserved the
tradition of CHIEF keynote presentations
offering more of a retreat-like engagement, his
being “’What Are You Doing Here?’ Musings
on a Journey.” Throughout the keynote, Dr.
Hamel allowed for moments of reflection on
key passages from 1 Kings 19:9-13 and we
utilized break out rooms to discuss in small
groups.
Evaluation data indicates that CHIEF 2022
was again a success. While CHIEF 2021 saw
higher registration numbers (79), CHIEF
2022 had very similar participation across
all sessions (around 50 participants) with
lower total registrations (64). We received 26
survey responses after CHIEF. Over 73% of
participants thought the event had a “high”
or “higher quality” when compared to other
professional events attended. Over 60% of
survey respondents indicated that they would
“likely” or “very likely” make changes to the
ethics services at their respective organizations
as a result of attending CHIEF. Such changes
include but are not limited to increase time
and space for personal reflection and silence,
incorporation of person-first language in
EMR documentation, increased conversation
about Fertility Awareness Based Medicine,
and more intentional integration of ethics
into organizational workflows. Nearly 90% of
survey respondents rated the format of CHIEF
as “higher value” and “much higher value”
compared to other professional conferences.
New to CHIEF 2022 was a $50 registration
fee, which was waived for students. All survey
respondents found a registration fee appropriate
for CHIEF and 92% of respondents indicated
that a $50 registration fee was appropriate.
Finally, it appears from the collected data that
regardless of whether we proceed in-person
or virtual, CHIEF will continue to be well
received as over 50% of survey respondents said,
“CHIEF was great no matter the format.”
We remain grateful to the Catholic Health
Association for their offer to publish summaries
of presentations in Health Care Ethics USA
for presenters who wished to submit. We
look forward to CHIEF 2023 again this fall,
preserving its well-received format.
ENDNOTES
- You can find more information about CHIEF 2022 here:
https://www.missiononline.net/chief-2022-0920/.
- Rachelle Barina, Ph.D., SVP, Chief Mission Officer,
Hospital Sisters Health System; Becket Gremmels, Ph.D.,
VP, Theology and Ethics, CommonSpirit Health; Russell
Keithline, MBA, System Director, Mission Innovation,
CommonSpirit Health; Nick Kockler, Ph.D., VP, System
Ethics Services, Providence Health & Services;
Christopher Ostertag, MA, Ph.D.(c), Director of Mission
Services OSF HealthCare; Jenna Speckart, MA, DBe, VP,
Mission and Ethics, Mercy; Steven Squires, Ph.D., VP,
Ethics, CHRISTUS Health; Birgitta Sujdak Mackiewicz,
MA, Ph.D., Central Region, Director of Ethics, OSF
HealthCare; Jessica Ullrich, MS, DBe, Manager of Clinical
Ethics, St. John Ascension