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Accountability In The Nursing Profession

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Define the concept of nursing accountability as it relates to nursing as a profession. Accountability within the nursing profession can be defined as the moral, ethical, and legal responsibility associated with the actions or lack of action when providing patient care. Nurses are held accountable for correctly administering medication, providing accurate health assessments, and quality documentation. Nurses are held to superior standards when providing patient care. The 2016 Gallup poll (as cited in Nurses Rank # 1, 2017) found that nurses have been deemed as the most trusted profession (p.17). Trust is a vital characteristic in the nursing practice, as patients entrust their lives to the nurses that care for them. According to Ulrich (2014), RNs must clearly understand his or her ethical responsibility and accountability as an RN, which includes the nurse-patient relationship, be skilled in the delegation, and fully understand the scope of practice for both RNs and other healthcare providers (p. 241). Descriptively adapt from Framework for Accountability into your own practice; how will this model improve your professional practice. The Framework for Accountability (as cited in Oyetunde & Brown, 2012), proposes there are four different views on accountability within the nursing profession, which include professional, societal, legal, and employment (p. 111). Professional accountability is achieved by following the nursing scope of practice as detailed by the nurse's state of licensure. For example, I follow orders that are provided by the physician. It is not within my scope of practice to write orders without the approval of the physician. Additionally, it would fall out of my scope of practice to delegate a particular task to a nursing assistant that did not fall within their scope of practice. Society, in general, has a view of what the accountability of a nurse should be. For instance, my patients and their family members entrust I will provide excellent patient care. Nurses are faced with ethical decisions on a daily basis. A nurse must abide by their patient's wishes even if they personally disagree with them. An example would be if I had a patient whose religion prevented them from

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