1. Discuss/ describe an ethical dilemma you have faced either in current nursing
ID: 408750 • Letter: 1
Question
1. Discuss/ describe an ethical dilemma you have faced either in current nursing practice, during a clinical rotation or in a current work situation. Identify which ethical principle(s) were being violated and how. Describe the outcome of the dilemma and what your role was in ethical decision making. If you were not directly involved with the ethical dilemma, you may describe the situation, the principles, what the outcome was and what you would have done differently if anything.
2. Describe how you have been an advocate (patient, subordinate or professional). Discuss how important you feel advocacy is in the health care profession and why.
3. Explain how increased consumer awareness of patients' rights has affected the actions of the health care team. Discuss both positive and negative implications if any.
Explanation / Answer
Answer :-
The ethical dilemmas faced by nurses include everything from speaking up about how a staffing shortage impacts quality of care to deciding how to allocate scarce resources like donor organs or blood. They encompass birth complications and end-of-life issues and just about everything in between. The matter becomes even more complicated when you factor in that each nurse has his or her own personal set of ethics shaped by upbringing, personal history, religion, race, and so on. The unifying elements, according to the American Nurses Association's Martha Turner, are that either the nurse is unclear about the right thing to do, or the nurse can see what should be done but cannot do it (because, for example, hospital policy forbids it).
While ethics impacts every health care worker, experts say nurses face unique challenges. They often spend more time with patients, so they are more likely to understand what the patient wants and how the family feels. Nurses are the ones who most often see patients and family members struggling to make crucial, sometimes excruciating decisions. They're often the ones who know that the patient or the family is not comfortable with current treatment. "The difference for nurses is we have prolonged engagement with patients and families," explains Jennifer Wenzel, an associate professor in the School of Nursing with joint appointments in the School of Medicine and the Kimmel Cancer Center. "We experience with them the frustrations. We're very closely connected experientially, and that's different. It puts nurses in the thick of things, ethically. And then when you add in that we all have our own ethics and beliefs that may collide with the patient's or the organization's or other caregivers' set of ethics, it's complex and it's messy."
An ethical organization operates honestly and with fairness. Some characteristics of an ethical company include the following:
Nursing advocacy is a relatively modern idea, its initial conception dating from the patient advocate movement of the 1970’s. Its importance and prominence is reflected by its inclusion by various nursing bodies into their codes of ethics. Despite this, opinion is polarised as to the nature and extent of nursing advocacy. Nurses have reported “frustration” and “anger” as a result of them having to advocate on behalf of a patient (Hanks 2008, 470). Research involving British nurses in senior positions has revealed beliefs that the practice is subject to contradictions and paradoxes and can cause inter-professional conflict within the health care system (Mallik 1998, 1001).
The purpose of this research is to investigate and elucidate the practical difficulties, barriers and problems that nurses encounter when advocating for their patients. The aim is to publish the results of the research onto the Hoito Netti webpages in order to provide material which nurses may find useful when advocating for their patients.
Patient satisfaction is an attitude. Though it does not ensure that the patient will remain loyal to the doctor or the hospital, it is still a strong motivating factor. Patient satisfaction is only an indirect or a proxy indicator of the quality of doctor or hospital performance.Delivery of patient-focussed care requires that we provide care in a particular way, not just sometimes or usually, but always. It must be every patient every time.
It is an ironic fact - the better you are, the better you must become. Quality does not stand still. It should be linear and always ascending. One should strive to provide better care and soar above each and every patient's expectations.
The feedback given by the patient helps to improve the work of the physician, place, and also the system. Despite the advantages of self-assessment, dermatologists rarely have a system to analyze and evaluate quality of care rendered in the practice. Patient feedback can be obtained by patient questionnaires, follow-up phone calls, suggestion box, referral physician's survey, etc .Patient satisfaction survey designed to respond to the needs of dermatologists by providing data to individual dermatologists to help them improve the quality of patient perceptions of physician quality. The data can be used to design effective strategies to improve efficiency of care given to the patients.
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