Institutional Diversity of Ethical Decision-making in Healthcare

The healthcare sector is subject to institutional changes in recent years. The introduction of a care market by the Dutch government is responsible for different institutional logics between medical and non-medical hospital members. This shift from healthcare issues to more ‘market'' and business issues could be influencing decision-making in the healthcare sector. This research explores the differences between medical professionals and Business Administrators in their orientation towards ethical decision-making. The institutional theory and the neoinstitutional theories of logics and attention theory in specific, are used as a perspective to study these differences. A theoretical and two empirical studies are conducted to research the following question; "What are the differences in orientation towards ethical decision-making by healthcare administrators and medical professionals in hospitals?"