**2. Methodology**

A literature review was used, as full articles were consulted in databases such as PubMed, Web of Science, SciELO, Scopus, and Google Scholar. To search, the following health descriptors were used in Spanish: "Hospital Ethics Committees," "Institutional Ethics Committees," "Clinical Ethics Committees," "Knowledge," "Objectives," "Development," "Functions," "Benefits," and "Challenges."

Articles were selected from the last 5 years, published in English or Spanish, that addressed general aspects of the HCECs for analysis. Fifty-one articles were thoroughly evaluated, 39 were discarded, and 21 papers containing the main aspects were chosen for reflective analysis of the HCECs.
