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Assignment questions
Healthcare administrationCase studyHealthcare marketing

ACHE and AHIMA codes of ethics in marketing

Compare the ACHE and AHIMA codes of ethics, review a brief case from Healthcare Marketing: A Case Study involving ethical decision-making, and discuss the role of the healthcare marketer in relation to ethical behaviour and conduct.

Editorial process

Last reviewed · August 13, 2026

01

Different professions, different exposures

The comparison is easy to do badly, because both codes contain professionalism, integrity and confidentiality provisions, and a paper that lists those similarities has said very little. The interesting differences follow from what each profession is actually exposed to. The American College of Healthcare Executives writes for people with positional authority over an organisation, so its code emphasises responsibilities to patients, to the community and to the profession, conflicts of interest, and the duty to create an ethical organisational climate. The American Health Information Management Association writes for people who are custodians of the health record, so its code concentrates on data integrity, privacy, accurate coding and refusing to participate in falsification. Structure the comparison around those different exposures rather than around the virtues the two documents share, and the case analysis in the second part will then have somewhere specific to go rather than restating that both professions value integrity.

That framing is what makes the third part answerable. Marketing sits precisely where the two codes' concerns overlap, because a marketer works with patient data and with public claims at the same time. The recurring ethical problems are therefore concrete: using clinical information for outreach that the patient did not expect to be used that way, publishing outcome statistics selected to flatter, testimonials that imply typical results, service-line promotion that drives demand for procedures with weak indications, and targeting by inferred health status. Analyse the assigned case against both codes explicitly, citing the provision each concern maps to, rather than reasoning from general ethical intuition. Then answer the role question in terms of duties rather than aspirations: what the marketer owes the patient, what they owe the organisation, what they owe the public, and where exactly those duties come into conflict with the commercial objective they were employed to pursue in the first place.

Likely learning objectives

Inferred from the brief — check these against your own rubric.

  • 01
    Compare two professional codes by the exposures they were written to address.
  • 02
    Cite specific code provisions rather than general ethical principles.
  • 03
    Apply a professional code to a marketing decision.
  • 04
    Identify where commercial objectives conflict with professional duties.
  • 05
    Articulate the healthcare marketer's obligations to patients and the public.
Assignment instructionsQuoted verbatim

Read the full question

Review every instruction before using the planning guidance that follows.

For this task you will first compare the ACHE and AHIMA code of ethics, and then review a brief case from Healthcare Marketing: A Case Study that involves ethical decision-making. Then, you will discuss the role of the healthcare marketer in relation to ethical behavior and conduct. To complete this assignment, review the Module Three Worksheet Guidelines and Rubric document. This is assignment needs to be due by Sunday. Rubric is attached & case study exercise. Following reference should be used as well: Cellucci, L. W., Wiggins, C., & Farnsworth, T. J. (2014). Healthcare marketing: a case study approach. Chicago, IL: Health Administration Press. ISBN: 978-1-56793-605-6
Course-wide instructions that accompany this question

You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes. Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages. Decision-Making In Healthcare Marketing Essay Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor. The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument. ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS Discussion Questions (DQ) Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words. Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source. One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words. I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses. Weekly Participation Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately. In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies. Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work). Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week. APA Format and Writing Quality Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required). Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation. I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition. Use of Direct Quotes I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly. As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content. It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source. LopesWrite Policy For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me. Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes. Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own? Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score. Late Policy The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies. Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances. If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect. I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension. As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading. Communication Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me: Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class. Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours. Decision-Making In Healthcare Marketing Essay

02

Turn the brief into deliverables

  1. 01
    A comparison of the ACHE and AHIMA codes of ethics.
  2. 02
    A review and analysis of the assigned case involving ethical decision-making.
  3. 03
    A discussion of the healthcare marketer's role in relation to ethical behaviour and conduct.
  4. 04
    Citations to the specific code provisions relied on, and to the case study text.
03

Compare, apply, generalise

01

What each code is for

The profession behind each code and the exposures it was written to govern.

02

Where they converge

Shared commitments to integrity, confidentiality and the public interest.

03

Where they diverge

Organisational leadership duties against record custodianship and data integrity.

04

The case

The ethical decision in the assigned case, analysed against provisions from both codes.

05

The marketer's role

Duties to patient, organisation and public, and the commercial conflicts they create.

04

The codes themselves, by provision

Recommended databases

  • ACHE
  • AHIMA
  • The assigned case study text
  • PubMed
  • Health administration journals

Search sequence

  1. 1.
    Read both codes in full and note the sections with no counterpart in the other.
  2. 2.
    Read the assigned case and list the decisions actually made in it.
  3. 3.
    Map each decision to a provision in each code.
  4. 4.
    Search for published discussion of ethics in healthcare marketing or service-line promotion.
  5. 5.
    Check privacy rules governing the use of patient information for outreach.
05

Reference shortlist

These are authoritative starting points, not a ready-made bibliography. A qualified reviewer must confirm that each source fits the assignment and supports the claim beside which it is cited.

Nothing here is cleared for citation until you have read it.

  1. 01

    Code of Ethics | American College of Healthcare Executives

    American College of Healthcare Executives · 2023

    The executive code itself, cited by provision for the comparison and the case analysis.

  2. 02

    AHIMA Home

    American Health Information Management Association · 2024

    The health information profession's ethical commitments around data integrity and privacy.

  3. 03

    Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Compliance

    StatPearls, NCBI Bookshelf · 2023

    The legal boundary on using patient information for marketing, alongside the ethical one.

  4. 04

    CMS' Value-Based Programs

    Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services · 2024

    Where published performance data comes from, for the question of selective outcome claims.

06

Review before submission

Common mistakes

  • Comparing the codes only on the virtues they share.
  • Describing each code separately without ever comparing them.
  • Analysing the case from general ethical intuition instead of the codes.
  • Ignoring data privacy, which is where marketing most often goes wrong.
  • Treating the marketer as outside professional ethics because they are not clinical.
  • Omitting the assigned textbook from the references when the prompt names it.

Submission checklist

  • Both codes are compared, not merely summarised in turn.
  • The comparison explains differences by reference to each profession's role.
  • Specific provisions are cited by name or number.
  • The case is analysed against both codes.
  • The marketer's role is stated as duties, including where they conflict with commercial aims.
  • The assigned case study text is cited.

Use this guide to plan and review your own work. Follow your institution's rules and read our academic-integrity policy.

Written by

Aaron Bishop

MA, Education

assignment interpretation and research-methods coaching across disciplines

Aaron leads the EssayCrackers editorial desk. He works on how assignment briefs are read — what a rubric is actually asking for, and where students most often answer a different question than the one set.

Reviewed by

Dr. Nathan Cole

PhD, Rhetoric & Composition

Argumentation and thesis development

Nathan teaches first-year composition and directs a university writing center. He reviews EssayCrackers guides for argumentative soundness and citation accuracy.

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