Nursing Ethical Issues

Ethical issues have always affected the role of the professional nurse. Efforts to enact this standard may cause conflict in health care settings in which the traditional roles of the nurse are delineated within a bureaucratic structure. Nurses have more direct contact with patients than one can even imagine, which plays a huge role in protecting the patients’ rights, and creating ethical issues for the nurses caring for the various patients they are assigned to. In this paper I will discuss some of the ethical and legal issues that nurses are faced with each and every day.

Humans often struggle to find the right answers in life. Knowing the difference between right and wrong is not always easy and one can be overwhelmed with the problems and ethical issues surrounding them. As a future healthcare professional, it is imperative to understand the role that ethics plays in nursing and how ethical dilemmas impact individuals. There are countless complex ethical issues that confront nurses during their careers and it is crucial they understand where their own values and beliefs lie. Euthanasia, DNR’s, end of life care, privacy, stem cell research and restraints are all great examples of some common ethical issues. “While there are many challenges facing nurses in the work environment (nursing short-age, mandated

#1. According to Nursing Leadership and management ATI ethics is defined as an expected behavior of a certain group in relation to what is considered right or wrong. (Henery, McMichael, Johnson, DiStasi, Ball, & Holman, 2016) There are six ethical principles they are autonomy which is the ability of the client to make personal decisions, even when those decisions might not be in the client’s own best interest. The second principle is beneficence which is care in the best interest of the client. Third is fidelity which is keeping ones promise to the client about care that was offered. The next principle is justice which is fair treatment in matters related to physical and psychological care and use of resources. Then there is non-maleficence which is the nurse’s obligation to avoid causing harm to the client. The last principle is veracity which is the nurse’s duty to tell the truth. (Henery, McMichael, Johnson, DiStasi, Ball, & Holman, 2016)

Cost of the end of life medical care is too expensive to continue at the rate it is going. The fiscal year 2016 saw 672.1 billion dollars spent on Medicare participants with just 5% using 49% of those monies ("NHE Fact Sheet," n.d., p. 1). The ANA provides a code of ethics that nurses should use to help guide them in clinical practice decision making. There are four fundamental responsibilities for nurses to adhere too they are: promote health, prevent illness, restore health and alleviate suffering. Ethical Principals for nurses are; respect & autonomy, beneficence, justice, veracity, and fidelity ("Code of Ethics for Nurses," 2012). Attempting to keep ethical responsibilities and principals in mind, while conducting a cost-benefit analysis to determine resource allocation for an aging population and end of life care causes many ethical dilemmas.

It is important to understand that when counselors practices in any setting with clients as they interact on regularly bases with other professional’s workers should always conduct themselves in an ethically and legally appropriate manner (Remley & Herlihy, 2014, p.317). Chapter 12 discuses counselors who are in training for private practice and the type of roles those counselors have with other mental health professionals that are supported in their community.

This case is purely about the legal and ethical implications of nurse T.C and her nursing manager of telemetry unit, nurse F.J. This nurse T.C has worked in a highly stressful environment before but her behavior has only recently deteriorated and become emotional with the occasional outbursts and uncontrollable crying. Her behavior put the legal issue of non-maleficence at risk for her patients as it would cause emotional stress on them. However, the legal issue that really matters is her case is that of defamation of her character as well as disclosure of her private and confidential mental state information by F.J to other nurse managers not in the unit she worked and to even the subordinates.

Nurses face ethical decisions frequently when giving patient care. These dilemmas can result from deciding how to allocate resources such as time or materials. Caring for patients from diverse backgrounds complicates decision-making when faced with dilemmas, because organizations that depend on standards of patient care that may not by culturally congruent. In these situations, the nurse must consider the patient’s beliefs and values along with the organization’s care expectations and bridge the gap between the two (Andrews and Boyle, 2016-a). In this post, I will describe ethical dilemmas with the current state of population health and health disparities, discuss the pros and cons of the Affordable Care Act, and explain how social justice

Ethical, Bioethical, and Legal Issues in Nursing Chio Thung Arizona State University  Ethical, Bioethical, and Legal Issues in Nursing Ethical, bioethical, and legal issues are all concerns that affect professional nursing practice. Nurses should be aware about why and how these issues affect their profession. A case scenario that questions these boundaries is a homeless person without any health care insurance being provided substandard care by a medical team (Maville & Huerta, 2008). There are many components that affect nursing such as ethical principles, bioethical dilemmas, moral values, and statutes, which I will discuss how they would influence my actions in this case scenario.

Time, cost, and efficiency. Those three barriers are the challenges within Bellin’s current refill team covering six clinics. Beginning with medications not being filled at office visits. Patient’s changing pharmacy’s. Refills remain that the pharmacy and patients reading their medication bottles that state Refills remaining:0 and that is only due to the last older script being pulled from the pharmacy file. A new script has been often sent in but doesn’t register when a patient picks up a new script bringing the patient to call the clinic for a refill. When really a new script is on hand at the pharmacy already. So, then I research and verify with the pharmacy. Then there is the common scenario of the patient calling the clinic requesting

Evan and the other patients have a right to confidentiality; therefore, legally his HIV status cannot be disclosed to the other patients (HIV/Psychiatric manual, 1997). In assessing Evan's rights and the duties of the nurse, Evan has a right to confidentiality, trust, informed treatment decisions and quality care. An Bord Analtrais "Code of Professional Conduct" (2000) states that the nurse is obliged to dutifully undertake these rules. However, Claire's health and that of the former partner are at stake. The nurse will break the confidentiality and trust rules by telling Claire of Evan's illness. The nurse has a responsibility towards other professionals therefore informed decisions and quality care will not be carried out until information of Evan's HIV status is divulged. The last aspect of "Defining the Problem", is to recognise the main ethical problem to be addressed which is whether or not to dismiss patient-nurse confidentiality and trust in order to get adequate healthcare for Claire and Evan's other partner.

Ethical issues in nursing will always be an ongoing learning process. Nurses are taught in nursing school what should be done and how. Scenarios are given on tests with one right answer. However, there are situations that nurses may encounter that may have multiple answers and it is hard to choose one. “Ethical directives are not always clearly evident and people sometimes disagree about what is right and wrong” (Butts & Rich, 2016). When an ethical decision is made by a nurse, there must be a logical justification and not just emotions.

Every professional nurse makes a commitment to society to follow an ethical-based approach that provides key principles to follow such as autonomy, veracity, beneficence, justice, confidentiality, and fidelity. Nurses must demonstrate a manner that’s truthful, respects the rights and privacy of patients, does not cause any harm, and treats others equally. Although this may sound simple, nurses may face ethical conflicts with the unsafe practice of healthcare colleagues.

Among other legal and ethical duties, nurses have a professional responsibility to respect and protect client confidentiality (CRNBC, 2012; CNA, 2008, 2003; McGowan, 2012). This responsibility has been ingrained in the nursing

Nurses are subject to a plethora of legal, ethical, and professional duties which can be very challenging on a day to day basis. Some of these duties include respecting a patient 's confidentiality and autonomy, and to recognize the duty of care that is owed to all patients. As nurses our duties are always professional; however there are legal implications if these duties are breached. We also must consider when it is okay as nurses to breach these duties and therefore ethical issues arise. As nurses one of our main priorities is to advocate for our patients, without our own personal feelings on the matter taking over.

Picture your loved one in an independent senior residence, where they can do mostly everything on their own. This sounds great until they have an emergency medical issues and the nurses that are on staff refuse to help based on their interpretation of the company policy. As a nurse, they should be trained how to handle emergencies, but in this instance the person lost their life because the nurse did not take any action. This happened to 87-year-old Lorraine Bayless, who stopped breathing and the nurse at Brookdale Senior Living Center refused to do anything or allow anyone else to do anything based on what she read in the company policy. Since state or federal departments of health license or regulate independent or assisted living centers it can