Question

Search for an article online that is no more than 10 years old where there was a legal or ethical issue involding a nurse. In a few sentences tell me what you thought about the incident.

Answer 1

A self administered survey was sent in 2014 to 1000 nurses in four states in different sensus regions of United States of America. The adjusted reponse rate was 52%. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics, cross tabulations.

Result:

A total of 422 questionnaires were used in the analysis. The five most frequently-occurring and most stressful ethical and patient care issues were protecting patients' rights; autonomy and informed consent to treatment; staffing patterns; advanced care planning; and surrogate decision-making. Other common occurrences were unethical practices of healthcare professionals; breaches of patient confidentiality or right to privacy; and end-of-life decision-making. Younger nurses and those with fewer years of experience encountered ethical issues more frequently and reported higher levels of stress. Nurses from different religions also experienced specific types of ethical problems more commonly.

My conclusion :

Nurses face daily ethical challenges in providing quality health care. To retain nurses targeted ethical interventions that address caring for an increasingly complex patient population are needed.

Nurses play an important role in health care system. This is why they have been refered as heart of healthcare system. Still some issues lead to decresed standerdization like patient care issues, management and employment issues. Issues need common deliberations and consensus. They need to be reviewed periodically. Issues which seem non feasible, ideal may become practice with the change of time.