Ethics and professional conduct
The four principles applied to consent and capacity, confidentiality and truth-telling, resource allocation and conflicts of interest, with six ethical scenarios
Physicians, nurses and other regulated health professionals in Canada, including those responding to a complaint or fitness-to-practise concern.
Structured learning and a written reflection to show insight after a complaint, an investigation or a college inquiry.
Focused learning on a core standard of practice, with a certificate and reflection for your portfolio.
This course explores medical ethics as it is practised in Canadian healthcare. It defines medical ethics, explains why it matters, and introduces the four principles of autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence and justice, showing how they often point the same way and what to do when they conflict. It places them in the Canadian regulatory context of provincial colleges, national codes and law.
It then works through the areas where ethical questions arise most often: informed consent, capacity, substitute decision-making and shared decision-making; confidentiality, privacy and truth-telling, and how to balance them when they conflict; resource allocation, fairness versus equality and stewardship under the Canada Health Act; and conflicts of interest and professional integrity in decision-making.
Six case studies on refusal of treatment, the duty to warn, limited resources, conflict of interest, a difficult diagnosis and cultural differences in consent help you practise ethical reasoning. The final section covers reflection, insight and remediation, making the course suitable for physicians, nurses and other regulated professionals, including those responding to a concern.
9 sections · 36 lessons · 2 hours (estimated) · 10-question final assessment
Final assessment
10scenario-based questions
Certificate of completion
A certificate of completion for your learning portfolio.
The course includes a structured reflective account template: guided prompts to record what you learned, how you will apply it and how the change will show in your practice. It gives you written evidence of insight after a concern, and a ready record for your CPD portfolio.
Write it in your own words and leave out anything that could identify a patient, a colleague or a case. If you have an open complaint or case, talk to your adviser before reflecting on it in writing.
The physician course is built around the CMA Code, CanMEDS and medical college standards for doctors. This course is a principles-based introduction to medical ethics for physicians, nurses and other regulated professionals, organized around the four principles and the dilemmas where they meet.
Six: a refusal of treatment (autonomy), confidentiality versus public safety (duty to warn), limited resources (justice), a conflict of interest (integrity), truth-telling in a difficult diagnosis, and consent across cultural differences (cultural safety).
Capacity is the ability to understand information relevant to a decision and appreciate its reasonably foreseeable consequences. In Canada it is decision-specific and time-specific, adults are presumed capable, and minors are generally assessed under the capacity-based mature minor doctrine.
Confidentiality is not absolute. Section 4.4 explains that it can be overridden to prevent serious harm, as the Supreme Court of Canada recognized in Smith v. Jones, for mandatory reporting or where the law requires it, disclosing only what is necessary. The duty-to-warn case study applies this in practice.
Yes. Section 5 covers everyday and scarcity-driven allocation, fairness versus equality, stewardship, and how the Canada Health Act's principles of universal, publicly funded coverage for medically necessary services shape fairness in Canada.
Yes. Section 8 covers reflection on ethical dilemmas, insight into impact and responsibility, and remediation through education, changed habits, supervision or system improvements, presented as a continuous cycle.
There are knowledge checks in each section, a final assessment of 10 multiple-choice questions with an 80% pass mark, a reflective account and a certificate of completion. It takes about 2 hours online and costs CA$95. Your college decides what it accepts.
Every legal and regulatory point comes from primary sources: provincial and territorial health professions statutes, the regulatory colleges' standards and codes, and federal and provincial privacy law. Anything we cannot confirm is left out.
Lessons, scenarios and assessment questions are written by us for each edition separately, then checked for accuracy, teaching quality and fair assessment before publication.
When a code, standard or law changes, the affected courses are reviewed and updated. Reported errors in legal or regulatory facts are corrected first.
A practical grounding in healthcare ethics for any regulated profession: principles, college standards, consent, candour, MAID and remediation.
Ethics for physicians under the CMA Code, CanMEDS and college standards: honesty and billing, consent, confidentiality, conflicts and dilemmas.
Valid consent, substitute decision-makers, adolescent consent, chaperones for intimate examinations and patient privacy, grounded in provincial law and college policy.
