Health Science Specialist - Healthcare Ethicist

The position serves as Healthcare Ethicist for the Veterans Health Administration's (VHA) National Center for Ethics in Health Care (NCEHC). NCEHC is responsible for addressing the complex ethics issues that arise in healthcare across the VHA, including those ethics issues relating to clinical ethics, organizational ethics, organizational policy, and research ethics.

Order of Referral: This announcement will close on 11/3/2026. Only the applications received up to 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on the day that 75 applications is reached will be considered. Applications that are submitted after the initial cut-off number has been reached will not receive consideration unless otherwise requested by management.

The duties of the Healthcare Ethicist include, but are not limited to:

• Leading the resolution of highly complex ethical issues that have an impact upon the health care delivery system, the consumer within the organization, or the community.
• Establishing program precedents resulting in standards, policies, and guides in the ethical provision of VA health care.
• Providing accurate and insightful analyses and technical guidance on health care ethics problems to customers within and beyond VA to develop, extend, and improve health care and research ethics programs, systems, strategies, and services. Customers include VHACO programs, VISNs, VAMCs, Veterans' Service Organizations, other government agencies, Congressional staff, and the medical, research, and health care ethics communities outside of VHA.
• Providing guidance to others regarding long-standing ethical issues in health care and/or research and identifies emerging issues and related information needs through analysis of a variety of data sources including the All Employee Survey and IEWeb (VHA's repository of ethics activities).
• Leading the development and successful delivery of effective health care and/or research ethics education products and forums. Establishes processes to present and share clinical, service/program wide and/or organizational research and evidence-based performance activities.
• Disseminating ethically strong practices to expand understanding within the agency of the role of health care and research ethics; explains the mission, vision, goals, priorities of NCEHC's role in ethics consultation; builds awareness of NCEHC as a national resource within VHA; and
  assists VHA staff at local, VISN and national levels in their work.
• Composing, reviewing, editing, and summarizing written ethics-related reports, white papers, and executive analyses of major program areas, such as task forces. This includes reviewing pertinent data and evaluates trends from which to develop issue papers outlining health policy options.
• Ensuring that information about NCEHC programs, policies, and analyses reach the appropriate audiences.

Work Schedule: Monday - Friday, various tours available
Compressed/Flexible: Available at discretion of the Supervisor
Telework: This position may be authorized for telework. Telework eligibility will be discussed during the interview process.
Virtual: This position may be authorized for Virtual Work. Virtual Work eligibility is for current VA employees that are already subject to the return to in person work mandate and highly qualified candidates with assigned space to work in-person from an agency worksite.
Definition of Virtual Work: Employee works outside of original hiring duty station at a VA-owned or leased space.
Return to Office (RTO): RTO mandates are in effect and selectees will be required to report to in-person work unless they are approved for an exception or an exemption. Any approval for an RTO exception, exemption, or extension will happen after a tentative job offer, but before a final job offer.
Position Description/PD#: Health Science Specialist - Healthcare Ethicist/PD03551A
Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized
Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not Approved
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized

To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 11/03/2026.

Time-In-Grade Requirement: Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-13 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-12. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade. Note: Time-In-Grade requirements also apply to former Federal employees applying for reinstatement as well as current employees applying for Veterans Employment Opportunities Act of 1998 (VEOA) appointment.

SELECTIVE PLACEMENT FACTOR: This position includes a Selective Placement Factor (skill, knowledge, ability or other worker characteristic basic to and essential for satisfactory performance of the job). Selective Placement Factors are a prerequisite to appointment and represent minimum requirements for a position. Applicants who do not meet the are ineligible for further consideration. The Selective Placement Factor for this position is:

• Experience working as a Health Care or Research Ethicist and have obtained experience in the core domains of health care ethics consultation (assessment, analysis, process, and evaluation/quality improvement) by providing clinical ethics consultation in a hospital setting and/or providing research/innovation ethics consultation in a health care setting.

BASIC REQUIREMENTS: This occupational series has an Individual Occupational Requirement (IOR). Individual Occupational Requirements (IORs) are requirements e.g., experience or education, for particular occupational series or positions within a series and are used in conjunction with a group coverage (generic) standard. This position's IOR is:

• Education: Bachelor's or graduate/higher level degree: major study in an academic field related to the medical field, health sciences or allied sciences appropriate to the work of the position. This degree must be from an educational program from an accrediting body recognized by the U.S. Department of Education at the time the degree was obtained.

You may qualify based on your experience as described below:

• Specialized Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-12 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: (1) providing ethics consultation on complex clinical, organizational, and/or research-related ethical issues within a healthcare facility or system, applying core competencies such as ethical principles and concepts, moral reasoning, applied and clinical ethics, and relevant professional codes of ethics; (2) interpreting healthcare policy, regulation, and law, or federal human subjects protection and biomedical research regulations, to resolve ethical dilemmas affecting patients, staff, research participants, or the organization; and (3) developing or recommending ethics-related guidance or procedures informed by the cultural, religious, and professional values that influence healthcare and/or biomedical research decision-making, which may include ethical issues arising from biomedical research involving human subjects or animals.

For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

There is no educational substitution at this grade level.

A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education.

Note: Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for Federal employment. You can verify your education here: http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education. For further information, visit: https://sites.ed.gov/international/recognition-of-foreign-qualifications/.

• You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job
• To be considered for this position, you must complete all required steps in the process. In addition to the application and questionnaire, this position requires an online assessment. The online assessment measures critical general competencies required to perform the job.
• Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959
• Physical Requirements: The work required does not inherently include any physical requirements essential for successful job performance that could not otherwise be performed with accommodation or workplace adjustment. A pre-placement physical examination is not required.
• Subject to background/security investigation
• Selected applicants will be required to complete an online onboarding process. Acceptable form(s) of identification will be required to complete pre-employment requirements (https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/form-i-9-acceptable-documents). Effective May 7, 2025, driver's licenses or state-issued identification cards that are not REAL ID compliant cannot be utilized as an acceptable form of identification for employment.
• Participation in the seasonal influenza vaccination program is a requirement for all Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel (HCP)

As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1-year probationary period or 2-year trial period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public interest. In determining if your employment advances the public interest, we may consider:

• your performance and conduct;
• the needs and interests of the agency;
• whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and
• whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service.

Upon completion of your probationary period, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.