Ethics and Professionalism
What you must know
The Code of Ethics for the Health Education Profession expresses obligations to the public, to the profession, to employers, and to the delivery of quality health education, including responsibilities in research and evaluation and in professional preparation. Understand the governing principles: autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, justice, veracity, and fidelity. Apply them to informed consent, confidentiality and privacy (including HIPAA and FERPA contexts), conflicts of interest, competence boundaries and appropriate referral, cultural humility and non-discrimination, data integrity and accurate reporting, and avoiding plagiarism. Know the certification obligations: continuing education contact hours (75 CECHs per five-year recertification cycle for CHES) and practice within your scope. Recognize recurring ethical dilemmas - employer pressure to suppress unfavorable findings, pressure to overstate program effects, resource allocation between competing communities, and mandated reporting - and be able to describe a structured ethical decision-making process: identify the issue and stakeholders, consult the code, weigh principles and consequences, choose the least harmful course, act, document, and evaluate.
Traps questions set
- Treating the code as a law that carries legal penalties; it is professionally enforced and aspirational in tone.
- Confusing beneficence (do good) with nonmaleficence (do no harm).
- Assuming confidentiality covers privacy, or vice versa.
- Prioritizing employer loyalty when it conflicts with public welfare.
- Reporting only favorable evaluation results.
Rule of thumb
When obligations collide, the public's health and welfare outrank employer preference and personal interest. Identify the affected parties first, then weigh principles.
Worked example: A funder asks that negative outcome data be removed. The ethical response is to retain accurate findings, present limitations transparently, and negotiate framing - not deletion.