Patient Consent In Health Care

There are a number of legal and ethical duties expected of nurses. Most of these involve care for patient’s autonomy and confidentiality despite the medical care. Failure to act regarding these can give rise to liability. One aspect of Patient’s autonomy involves giving or withholding his consent about treatment. This paper takes into account ‘consent’ as the aspect of law regarding nursing.

Confidentiality in the Healthcare arena can be simply defined as the moral and ethical duty of the Practitioner to keep all the patient’s bio-data under lock and key, and offer a disclosure of those facts that the patient is legally mandated to disclose or deems fit to enhance their positive health outcome. According to the Segen’s Medical Dictionary, “Confidentiality is the ethical principle that a physician may not reveal any information disclosed in the course of medical care, unless the patient who disclosed that information poses a threat to him, herself or others’’

The proper tort for complete failure of consent is called battery. Battery is intentional unpermitted touching. It boils down to is the healthcare professional needs to discuss with patient and get consent.

Consent is the informed agreement to an action and/or decision. Permission for something to happen or agreement to do something.

Treatment without consent - Charlotte, the nurse on duty, had forced James into getting the injections therefore causing him emotional distress. Treating a competent patient who has validly refused treatment could constitute an assault or battery. The legal provisions supporting a competent patients’ right to refuse treatment in Australia can be found in both legislation throughout all the States and common law. The Australian Charter of Healthcare Rights is also a helpful source of guidance as it reinforces the common law position that is based upon the principle of patient autonomy. The High Court of Australia first articulated the principle or refusal of treatment in Marion’s case, stating that a legally competent person has a right “to choose what occurs with respect to his or her own person.” Under the NSW Health Patient Charter, consent in regard to an operation, procedure or treatment is both a specific legal requirement and an accepted part of good medical practice. Medical practitioners are also expected to clearly explain proposed treatment, and adequately inform their patients on significant risks and alternatives associated with the treatment.Failure to do this could result in legal action for assault and battery against a practitioner who performs the procedure. Charlotte made no effort to explain or gain a consent from James.

Consent means to provide approval for something to happen or an arrangement to do something.

Medical treatment without consent is considered battery as it is not respecting patient autonomy. The doctor has a duty to explain the treatment or procedure to the patient and any risks or side effects that can occur. It is the nurse's role to act as an advocate to the patient and ensure hat they fully understand what the doctor has told them. As the nurse usually has the most contact with the patient they are usually in the best position to assess the capacity of the patient to understand the information given to them. For consent to be valid the patient must have the capacity to make decisions, they must be informed of the nature, benefits and risks of the treatment and the doctor or nurse must not put pressure on them to make a certain choice. Some patients may decide to refuse treatment and this is their right even though it may seem strange to do so. If they have the mental capacity to understand their decision and they are an

Confidentiality is one of the main duties of health care providers. They are required to keep information about patient’s health private unless the patient give permission to release his/her health information (De Bord et al, 2013). Dilemmas in patient’s confidentiality may arise when there is disagreement between confidentiality and other ethical principles such as avoiding harm to the patient or others.

If a service user refuses to give consent in a work setting as a healthcare assistant I must document the refusal first and foremost in the careplan and also inform the manager next I would gently explain to the service user that they are full within their rights to refuse consent but I would like to also inform them of the risks,benefits and potential life threatening consequences that may follow their decision as a result. I would fully ensure that they have clearly understood the decision they have made and that they have also understood what I have explained and documented inluding all the reasons of how,when and why the care is provided for them specifically and what the medication is for also. Finally I would kindly ask if the service

Dimond (2009) and NHS choices (2016) explained consent as the process involving a person giving their approval to accept or refuse a treatment or interventions, after receiving detailed information from a health care professional about the risk or benefits of the procedure. In order for consent to be deemed valid, it needs to be given voluntarily without any influence or pressure from either a family member or clinician. In addition, the capacity of the person is important when giving consent and the ability to process the given information and make a decision. Tingle &Cribb (2014) agree, emphasizing that the autonomy of the person giving

Confidentiality is a concept of vast importance for professionals in the medical field. It is a professional obligation in this field and is considered to be an ethical concept that falls in line with integrity, compassion, veracity, charity, and fidelity as explained in both the International Council of Nurses Code for Nurses (1973) and the American Nurses Association Code of Ethics (1985). However, in today’s ever growing world of technology and demand for information, challenges continue to arise that force doctors and nurses to reexamine virtues such as confidentiality.

The third Legal aspect is consent which is the leading body of defence to an action for trespass (Dimond, 2015). In law, in association to consent, there are two major actions, to trespass the person or inaction in negligence for a breach of the duty of care to inform the patient (Dimond, 2015). Unlawful touching of an individual, for illustration, may violate civil and criminal law and this mustn’t be overlooked in nursing (Mckay, 2010). The Law requires that valid consent must be obtained before proceeding and that there are two kinds of consent; implied or informed. Informed meaning the patient must obtain adequate knowledge to enable them to arrive at an informed decision which can be written or verbal (RCN, 2015). Jamie’s consent to the student nurse is

Consent can be quite tricky, a legal minefield for healthcare teams, this is due to the patients who will give or refuse to give private information about themselves who is legally competent but

Privacy and confidentiality are basic rights in our society. Safeguarding those rights, with respect to an individual’s personal health information, is our ethical and legal obligation as health care providers. Doing so in today’s health care environment is increasingly challenging (OJIN, 2005).

The elements of the principles of confidentiality can be broken down into four separate categories: (1) Information provided by the patient is kept confidential unless consent from the patient has otherwise been given—unless it has direct legal implications or endangers the general public. (2) Informed Consent: is given freely, because the correct information has been supplied and the patient has sufficient information on the impacts involved. Information is otherwise given out on a need to know basis. (3) Duty of Care: Information is given out in order to protect the safety and health of others and the patient. Legal and general public health fall under this category. (4) Documenting Decisions: Consultations and actions that lead to