Yes, but while ethics and the law are different, laws are largely justified by ethical principles.

/Rick

This is a very subjective area of study. I do agree that health care ethic is different from law. I also believe that medical staff bend etihical principles and use law to advantage at time ignoring ethical principle.
One example of this would be a patient who has a living will stating they do not want life support or feeding tubes place to substain life. The doctor then overrides the request of the patient because they do not want the patient to die. At this time the patient is being kept alive by artificial means against the patients will. I believe that doctors need to uphold legal living wills and respect patients wishes.
I have also seen this with family members. The patient has very detailed wishes ,yet the doctor does not respect the patients wishes because a family member is not in agreement with the patients wishes and the patient is not able to speak for themselves accept thru their living will.
In the position I hold as a manager and while sitting on the hospital ethics committee in a small community I have now noticed another aspect of ethics. I am catholic, yet most of the community I work in is not. My beliefs are sometime very differant than other members on the committee due to our religious backgrounds. It is much differant than when I was a member on an ethics committee in a catholic hospital. I now look at ethical issues differantly than I did at that time in my career.