Personal Ethical Dilemma

Advocating for diverse patients is important. In this paper I will be discuss a personal ethical dilemma in which I have encountered. I will give an objective interpretation of both my side as well as my patient’s side of the dilemma. Then I will describe the conflicting values and beliefs that I and the patient had. Then I will give the information I was lacking concerning the patient’s culture. Lastly, I will define culturally congruent care.

Describe an Ethical Dilemma

Once I took care of a Jehovah’s Witness patient that had hemorrhaged after having a vaginal birth. She had an estimated blood loss of 1200ml. The patient’s hemoglobin results reflected a decrease from 8.0 hemoglobin level to a 6.7 hemoglobin level. The patient’s pulse was

At the time, I was unable to mentally get past the fact that she was refusing blood products to potentially save her life. This was information that I did not know the answer to. I immediately called the doctor to see if there was we could do to help her. The doctor discussed with the patient if she was willing to receive intravenous iron. Intravenous iron has been shown to be helpful for patients in restoring red blood cell and hemoglobin levels. However, the effects are not immediate (Posluszny & Napolitano, 2014). I continued to do more research and found that by educating this patient on her diet as well as safety precautions to take when ambulating were other ways in which I could help this patient recover.

Define Culturally Congruent Care

Culturally congruent care has several components. The components of culturally congruent care include being caring, competent and culturally sensitive (Andrews & Boyle, 2012). Positive outcomes have been associated with competent and culturally sensitive care (Long, 2012). In this ethical dilemma, I could have been better prepared to advocate for alternative treatments had I been educated on Jehovah’s Witness. This would have let me be more caring to this patient, competent, and culturally sensitive.

In

This patient had hemorrhaged and due to her religious beliefs would not take blood products despite it being medically indicated. I do not share this belief in not receiving blood products, which led to the dilemma. I felt she should take the blood products to improve her health, decrease the risk of a low milk supply, and to alleviate her symptoms. The patient asked for other treatments that could help her, and ultimately she agreed to take intravenous iron. This was not against her religious beliefs. Nutrition and safety precautions with activity were also part of the patients plan. I then gave the definition of culturally congruent care and related it to the dilemma I had with this patient. Ultimately, all nurses have an obligation to be culturally competent. If they are caring for a culture that is unfamiliar, research should be done to understand the culture and to be able to meet their