The most common legal and ethical challenges facing the nursing profession include:
- The appropriate use of social media in relationship to their workplace’
- Balancing the need to provide care for patients with pressure to be more efficient in the use of time and resources
- Dealing with conflict in the workplace
- Coping with staffing shortages
| Ethical and Patient Care Issue | Frequency | Degree of Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Frequently or Daily (%) | None or Low (%) | |
| Autonomy and informed consent to treatment | 61.3 | 73.4 |
| Breaches of patient confidentiality or right to privacy | 23.2 | 64.6 |
| Unethical practices of health professionals | 6.8 | 59.2 |
What are the most common ethical issues in nursing?
The most common legal and ethical challenges facing the nursing profession include:
- The appropriate use of social media in relationship to their workplace’
- Balancing the need to provide care for patients with pressure to be more efficient in the use of time and resources
- Dealing with conflict in the workplace
- Coping with staffing shortages
What is the difference between legal and ethical nursing?
• Ethical is more subjective than legal that is objective in nature. • Ethical is social responsibility whereas legal is not a responsibility but a deterrent. • Something unethical for someone may be ethical for others, whereas everyone has to follow what is legal.
What are some ethical dilemma topics in nursing?
•Most nurses find themselves in ethical dilemmas when working with minors. All patients are afforded a certain amount of privacy by law, but some information about minors must be shared with parents. A nurse might have difficulty dealing with a minor patient that has a medical problem they do not want their parents to know about.
What are the ethical considerations in nursing?
Ethical considerations in nursing, though challenging, represent a true integration of the art of patient care. Nurses have a responsibility to themselves, their profession, and their patients to maintain the highest ethical principals. Many organizations have ethics boards in place to review ethical concerns.
What are some examples of ethical issues in nursing?
The 5 Current Ethical Issues in NursingInformed Consent.Protecting Patient Privacy and Confidentiality.Shared Patient Decision-Making.Addressing Advanced Care Planning.Inadequate resources and staffing.
What are some legal and ethical issues in healthcare?
5 Ethical Issues in HealthcareDo-Not-Resuscitate Orders. ... Doctor and Patient Confidentiality. ... Malpractice and Negligence. ... Access to Care. ... Physician-Assisted Suicide.
What are examples of legal and ethical issues?
Some issues that have both ethical and legal components include:Access to medical care.Informed consent.Confidentiality and exceptions to confidentiality.Mandatory reporting.Mandatory drug testing.Privileged communication with healthcare providers.Advance directives.Reproductive rights/abortion.More items...
What is ethical and legal in nursing?
The ethical principles that nurses must adhere to are the principles of justice, beneficence, nonmaleficence, accountability, fidelity, autonomy, and veracity. Justice is fairness. Nurses must be fair when they distribute care, for example, among the patients in the group of patients that they are taking care of.
What are examples of legal issues in healthcare?
7 Current Legal Issues in HealthcareTelehealth law. ... HIPAA compliance and PHI. ... Healthcare employers liability & ensuring safe work conditions. ... Long-term care and nursing homes. ... False Claims Act. ... Patient safety and healthcare inequity. ... General access to healthcare.
What are the top 5 ethical issues in healthcare?
Five Top Ethical Issues in HealthcareBalancing Care Quality and Efficiency. ... Improving Access to Care. ... Building and Sustaining the Healthcare Workforce of the Future. ... Addressing End-of Life Issues. ... Allocating Limited Medications and Donor Organs.
What are the 5 ethical issues?
5 Common Ethical Issues in the WorkplaceUnethical Leadership.Toxic Workplace Culture.Discrimination and Harassment.Unrealistic and Conflicting Goals.Questionable Use of Company Technology.
Why are legal and ethical issues important in healthcare?
Everybody hopes their doctors are aware of current laws and ethical concerns in healthcare. After all, without these guidelines, medical malpractice would go unpunished, and more importantly, lives would be lost.
What is the difference between legal and ethical issues in healthcare?
Ethical standards are based on the human principles of right and wrong. The differences between them are these: Legal standards are based on written law, while ethical standards are based on human rights and wrongs. Something can be legal but not ethical.
Why are legal issues important in nursing?
All nurses owe a legal duty of care to their patients, and have a higher duty of care than someone who has limited or no medical knowledge. If nurses fail in their duty of care, and harm is experienced as a result, it is right that patients can expect redress for that harm.
What are the legal factors in nursing?
The nurse has a responsibility to be aware of certain legal principles, specifically in relation to:• Contracts.• Standards of care.• Negligence.• Defamation.• False imprisonment.• Assault and battery.• Informed consent.• Confidentiality.More items...•
What are the legal aspects in nursing?
Nurses are legally liable or responsible/accountable to render care to the assigned patient . The person is made legally responsible for his or actions. 10. Legal liability involves four elements to establish proof of harming patient: the duty of care ,breach of duty , causation and damages.
What are the 8 ethical issues related to healthcare?
The major 10 ethical issues, as perceived by the participants in order of their importance, were: (1) Patients' Rights, (2) Equity of resources, (3) Confidentiality of the patients, (4) Patient Safety, (5) Conflict of Interests, (6) Ethics of privatization, (7) Informed Consent, (8) Dealing with the opposite sex, (9) ...
What is the difference between legal and ethical issues in healthcare?
Ethical standards are based on the human principles of right and wrong. The differences between them are these: Legal standards are based on written law, while ethical standards are based on human rights and wrongs. Something can be legal but not ethical.
Why are legal and ethical issues important in healthcare?
Everybody hopes their doctors are aware of current laws and ethical concerns in healthcare. After all, without these guidelines, medical malpractice would go unpunished, and more importantly, lives would be lost.
What are some examples of ethical issues?
Types of Ethical Issues in BusinessDiscrimination. One of the biggest ethical issues affecting the business world in 2020 is discrimination. ... Harassment. ... Unethical Accounting. ... Health and Safety. ... Abuse of Leadership Authority. ... Nepotism and Favoritism. ... Privacy. ... Corporate Espionage.
What is the ethical issue in nursing?
Another ethical issue in nursing pertains to patient privacy. Nurses and nurse managers have access to a patient’s records and medical history and cannot ethically or legally release that information to anyone besides the patient. Nurses should have the best interest of patients in mind, understanding that they need to protect their privacy and medical data.
Why are nurses susceptible to ethical issues?
Nurse managers, in particular, are susceptible to ethical issues in nursing and moral distress because of their leadership and mentoring roles.
What are some examples of ethical dilemmas?
One example of a common ethical dilemma nurses deal with is establishing boundaries with patients. Nurses and nurse managers devote their careers to helping patients receive the care they need, so it can often be difficult to establish professional boundaries. Patients should not rely on nurses beyond their professional capacity and should not develop romantic relationships with them or offer them gifts. Nurse managers can intervene in situations where ethical and professional boundaries are crossed by either patients or nurses.
Why is it important for a nurse manager to maintain ethical fortitude?
Daily, nurse managers face a barrage of decisions and must maintain ethical fortitude to ensure the health, safety and well-being of their patients and staff. They actively work toward resolving ethical issues in nursing that they find in their workplace.
What is the ANA code of ethics?
The ANA Code of Ethics provides a standard by which nurse managers can assess ethical issues in nursing. However, the way it addresses ethical dilemmas can vary in different situations. One ethical dilemma that can occur in healthcare facilities is when nurses themselves are not properly equipped to complete their duties. Nurses who notice their coworker’s lack of knowledge face an ethical dilemma of whether they should bring the issue to their nurse manager. To help curb this ethical dilemma, nurse managers can work hard to educate their nurses regarding the Code of Ethics as well as educate them regarding the Code of Ethics for their specific medical facility. Nurse managers can also provide regular trainings for their nurses regarding recurring issues.
What is ethical decision making in nursing?
For nurse managers, ethical decision-making stems from the American Nurses Association Code of Ethics, which was developed as a guideline for nursing responsibilities “in a manner consistent with quality in nursing care and the ethical obligations of the profession.”. Nurse managers help solve ethical issues in nursing through using their ...
Why are nurses managers ethical?
Nurse managers, in particular, are susceptible to ethical issues in nursing and moral distress because of their leadership and mentoring roles. Nurses and other medical staff look to nurse managers for appropriate and ethical decisions. Before stepping into a role as a nurse manager, registered nurses ...
What is nursing ethics?
The nursing ethics foundation centres on the fundamental components of nursing care. Some of the basic elements concerned to the nursing profession are discussed below by our experts providing help in legal and ethical issues in nursing. Attentiveness: Nurses should be ethically responsible to attend to their patients as well as the needs ...
Why are nurses required to practice ethically?
Just like other medical professionals, nurses are required to practice as per the complex web of state and federal statutes – while they take proper decisions ethically. Because of rapid advancements in the field of medical technologies and healthcare practices, nurses and other professionals often encounter challenges in taking appropriate decisions where law courts and lawmakers have developed laws for new practices and procedures. As a result, nurses are required to be attentiveness while making decisions in order to minimise legal liability risks. Moreover, nurses are also required to take into account the ethical applying of decisions to make sure their actions.
What is the ANA code of ethics?
The ANA Code of Ethics: The Essential Guide for Ethical Decision-Making. The ANA collects, compiles, and announces the ethical nursing practice guidelines in the United States of America. The American Nurses Association Code of Ethics is generally said as a living document which alters as a profession in advance.
Why are nurses required to be attentive?
As a result, nurses are required to be attentiveness while making decisions in order to minimise legal liability risks. Moreover, nurses are also required to take into account the ethical applying of decisions to make sure their actions.
Why are nurses required to make decisions?
Due to such changes, nurses are required to make decisions in which their opinions of experts are different and judgments are uncertain. Some of the legal and ethical challenges in nursing are discussed below by a team of professional providing legal and ethical issues in health care.
What is the responsibility of a nurse?
Responsibility: Many nurses make decisions on a regular interval which has a direct effect on the lives of people.
What is patient responsiveness?
Patient Responsiveness: Being engaged in multi-disciplinary treatments, nurses are generally said to be professionals who regularly contact with the patient to take care of patient's responses so that they can effectively take part in patient's intervention and treatment and conveying information effectively to other team members.
What are the ethical principles of nursing?
Even when laws and medical practices change, the fundamental ethical principles of the nursing profession stand firm. The foundation of nursing ethics centers on the basic elements of nursing care. The basic elements of caring related to the nursing profession include the following: 1 Attentiveness: Nurses are ethically obligated to attend not only to their patients, but also to the needs of their colleagues, employer, and community. 2 Responsibility: Most nurses make decisions on a daily basis that have a direct impact on people’s lives. As such, they have an obligation to consider all possible consequences of their actions as they pertain to their patient’s health and well-being. 3 Competence: The practice of nursing requires a high degree of knowledge and numerous complex skills. Since medicine constantly evolves, nurses have an obligation to stay up to date on the latest developments and best practice of their profession. 4 Patient Responsiveness: As part of a multi-disciplinary treatment team, nurses are typically the professionals that have the most amount of regular contact with the patient. Nurses have the ethical responsibility to monitor the patient’s responses to treatment and intervention and to communicate the information to other professionals on the treatment team. Additionally, nurses have the obligation to address the patient’s concerns about treatment.
What are the basic elements of nursing ethics?
The basic elements of caring related to the nursing profession include the following: Attentiveness : Nurses are ethically obligated to attend not only to their patients, but also to the needs of their colleagues, employer, and community.
What is the American Nurses Association?
The American Nurses Association compiles and publishes the accepted guidelines for ethical nursing practice in the United States. The ANA Code of Ethics is a living document that changes as the profession advances. The ANA also publishes separate ethics guides for different specialties and controversial areas, such as the ethics involved in end ...
What are the challenges nurses face?
One of the challenges nurses encounter is that they find their beliefs differ from those of their patients, especially when it deals with pro-life versus pro-choice issues and end of life issues. Nursing professionals are obligated to respect the decisions made by their patients, even if the choice the patient makes differs from what the nurse would make in a similar situation. For example, if a patient has elected to have a do not resuscitate order in his or her chart, the nurse needs to respect the patient’s wishes, even if it is contrary to his or her personal beliefs.
What are ethical decisions related to justice?
Ethical decisions related to justice often involve allocation of scare resources. An example of an ethical dilemma that nurses faced involving resource allocation occurred in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when hospital staff have limited access to medication and lifesaving equipment. Doctors and nurses faced the ethical challenge of choosing which patients would receive treatment and which patients they would merely make comfortable.
Why do nurses have to withhold information from patients?
While this mandate appears at first glance to be straightforward, families often request that nurses withhold information from their patient because of their concern that knowledge of particular aspects of the patient’s condition might have a negative impact on their recovery.
What is the responsibility of a nurse?
Responsibility: Most nurses make decisions on a daily basis that have a direct impact on people’s lives. As such, they have an obligation to consider all possible consequences of their actions as they pertain to their patient’s health and well-being.
What is the ethical and legal issue in nursing?
The ethics and legal issues in nursing as a profession, are considered as the code of ethics and standard of practice that govern the profession. Nurses need to fully know their duties and contents and incorporate them as a framework for their professional work.
Why do nurses need ethics?
Ethics refers to the standards of professional conduct and moral judgment. Ethics are put in place to foster high standards of work.
Why is it unethical to deny a patient's request to go home?
The nurse denied Mavis her request to go home because she thought that Mavis had received medication that resulted in the portrayed behavior. By doing this the nurse violated one provision of one of the codes. According to the ( "Nursing world, "2010), a nurse is accountable and will be responsible for his/her nursing practice, and the appropriate delegation of duties that are in conjunction with the nurse's obligation will be determined to ensure the provision of optimum care to the patient.
Why is communication important in nursing?
Communication is essential in promoting good relationships between the nurse and the patient. In this case, the nurse should have communicated well with the patient to ensure she understands what the patient was going through and why she wanted to go home. This would help to prevent the confrontation and the frustration of Mavis, who wished the nurse to leave. The principle of ethics is shown not by the words but usually b the actions of the nurses. By examining the rationale behind the potential unethical decisions one can start putting their own moral values within the context of
Why is it important to know the dilemmas nurses face?
Knowledge of the dilemmas nurses face and how to successfully overcome them is important. Nurses should also know what malpractice is and how they should protect themselves from the lawsuit. A nurse is therefore expected to make eth ical decisions, and this will be systematically based on the moral and legal principles.
What happens when the nurse returns to the room Mavis is no longer there?
When the nurse returns to the room Mavis is no longer there, efforts to find her locate her in the visitor's room.
What is the role of ethics in nursing?
Ethics refers to the standards of professional conduct and moral judgment. Ethics are put in place to foster high standards of work . Nurses have several duties to their patients which include nonmaleficence which refers to not harm the patient. Other responsibilities include fidelity, veracity, beneficence, and justice.
What happens if nurses don't deal with ethical issues?
If nurses do not adequately deal with ethical issues, the result could be a decline in patient care, tense clinical relationships, and moral distress. Nurse Managers face the most considerable stress regarding ethical issues as they are whom their nurses look up to for their leadership and mentorship during these trying times. Hospital executives need to work together to make sure all appropriate and ethical decisions are made with their patient's best interests in mind while respecting their patients' wishes.
What are ethical dilemmas for nurses?
Sometimes these issues come from a patient's discomfort with treatment, refusal of treatments based on cultural or personal ideologies, or when patients and their families must make life or death decisions on their health status. Nurses in these cases not only have to provide quality care, but they also must adhere to the formal Code of Ethics for Nurses.
Why is it important to surround yourself with a tenured nurse?
Dealing with ethical issues can be difficult, which is why it is best to surround oneself with well-experienced, tenured nurses who can help through these situations. While working with international nurses such as those recruited from Avant Healthcare Professionals, hospital staff will experience different backgrounds and cultures, which can help better understand the range of emotions patients express while in the hospital. They can significantly help when patients are reluctant due to their cultural backgrounds, as their experiences may be similar. Also, having a diverse group of nurses allows an environment where conversations on ethical issues occur within their units. These open dialogues will benefit the patients as they feel more welcomed and recognized by their hospital staff. Nurses will find new ways to approach ethical challenges based on the experiences of their international nurses.
Why do nurses have to make hard decisions?
Hard decisions may also need to be made when facilities are faced with inadequate staffing levels. When there is not enough staff for patients, nurses do not have the time to do everything needed for each patient. Patient needs can include recovery times or even addressing the patient's emotional and physical needs. A nurses' moral obligations to patients are compromised due to work restraints and stress overload. They are left with mental struggles trying to decipher where they should focus their priorities.
Why is ethics important in nursing?
Ethics are essential to the integrity of the nursing profession as it helps ensure better patient care. Nursing is a highly fast-paced job with new challenges arising daily and nurse managers across the country all dealing with similar ethical dilemmas. Many of these situations are rooted in protecting patients' rights, adequate staffing, advanced decision-making, and quality patient care. Unfortunately, with the large number of inexperienced nurses entering the profession, many of them are unfamiliar with dealing with ethical issues in nursing. Therefore, well-experienced nurse managers and CNOs are highly critical in healthcare staff to address these concerns.
How difficult is it for nurses to communicate with patients?
Without a relationship, it will be extremely difficult for nurses and healthcare professionals to get patients to communicate and cooperate properly. When patients are actively involved in decision-making, they are more likely to be satisfied with their care and trust the doctor's treatment plans. Healthcare professionals should be aware of the importance of educating their patients even if the information shared with them is complex. If a patient fails to understand the treatment, disputes among the patient and staff can occur.
What is patient privacy and confidentiality?
Patient privacy and confidentiality are significant ethical issues faced by nurses. If not done correctly, this can have legal ramifications and result in severe consequences for healthcare professionals. With patients' medical information protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPA), there are definite boundaries and guidelines for protecting patients' privacy.
Introduction
- Patients are the core of professional and ethical nursing practice. Practicing and using the professional nursing values in the clinical setting can help create a professional, ethical and legal issues to the nurses. In some instances, practicing within an ethical environment is challenging. Nurses are required to make an ethical decision that might raise ethical dilemmas. Nurses mak…
Ethical Aspects
- Ethics is the branch of philosophy that focuses on the moral life. Ethics are generally the basis of right and wrong which help in formulating the law. Also, gives emphasize whether the actions and decision making are right or wrong (Kangasniemi, Korhonen, & Pakkanen 2015). Nurses' ethics comes from medical ethics which is equally as important as medical ethics. Although ethics are …
Autonomy
- This principle involves one's legal ability and the right to making a decision. Every individual has own morals and values. Respecting the patient’s decision is one important ethical principle, nurse Mavis refused for the care by the nurse. Ethically, this is the patient's decision and nurses must respect but being a registered nurse, it is a respo...
Beneficence
- In nursing ethics, beneficence simply means taking an action that benefits patients. There is various nursing action that can be taken under this principle. Providing benefits to patients means facilitating in their well-being, provide safe and quality care (Ellis, 2017). Reflecting on the scenario, Ms. Mavis could have provided care based on patients’ priorities. Because her behavio…
Non-Maleficence
- In the case of such patients, nurses need to realize the importance of their decision in delivering care causing no harm or injury. In Mavis's case, she didn't receive proper post-operative care which is negligence already. Secondly, she did not pass urine for 9 hours, yet no intervention or action was taken to manage it. Additionally, while reporting the situation to the co-ordinator nurs…
Justice
- This principle allows nurses to treat the patient fairly. In Mavis's case, it is seen that she did not receive care fairly. She did not receive proper care during her first day of post-op. Also, justice refers to the fair distribution of resources. Based on her behavior Mavis required more than one RN but she was looked by only one RN which would risk harm and injuries to the patient. It also …
Fidelity
- Nurses should be faithful and keep their promises and responsibilities in providing safe and quality care. To apply this principle RN should successfully apply the four major principles, which were not applied in the situation above. The nurse failed to deliver quality care to the patient and also did not maintain the standard of care as she was expected to (Chadwick, Tadd, & Gallagher…
Veracity
- Nurses should be truthful to the patient and develop a trust relationship with the patient. In the scenario, RN did not maintain the communication with the patient where she did not explain the post-op care. Veracity is related to the principle of Autonomy (Doody & Noonam, 2016). As RN did not build rapport with the patient and considering the patient's health condition, the principle of …
Confidentiality
- This principle is about maintaining the patient's privacy. It is very important for nurses to preserve a patient's right to privacy and maintain the nurse-patient relationship. Nurses must follow ethical guidelines to apply the principle of confidentiality in nursing practice (Airth-Kindree & Kirkhorn, 2016). Relating to the case, RN, however, managed to maintain the patient's privacy by closing th…
Legal Aspects
- The legal implication of nursing practice is held by licensure, law, policy, the scope of practice and expectation of nursing practice at a high professional standard. Nurse's level of knowledge, skill, registration license and nursing standard provide the framework for the nurse to practice as expected (Epstein & Turner, 2015). When a nurse does not practice as an expected standard of c…