HS540 The Legal and Ethical issues in Nursing Care
In this essay the author will discuss both the legal and ethical issues concerned with gaining consent and the barriers that may affect gaining consent within a nursing environment. The author will also examine the physical, emotional and psychosocial issues around obtaining consent within this essay.
What is consent?
Originating for the Nuremberg trials 1947 consent is defined by the Minidictionary for nurses (2008) simply as an ‘agreement to undergo medical treatment or to participate in medical research.’ However the NHS (2012) gives a deeper meaning to it and states that ‘Consent to treatment is the principle that a person must give their permission before they receive any type of medical treatment.’ Therefore the authors’ understanding is that consent within a caring environment is an agreement with a practitioner and patient for treatment to be given. According to White (2004) consent can be obtained in three ways: Verbally, implied or written. Verbal consent is obtained by asking the patients permission and them replying verbally before commencing with any treatment. For example when taking a patient’s blood pressure the practitioner would ask the patient if it was ok for them to do so and the patient should reply with a yes or no response. Implied consent is similar to verbal however instead of the patient replying verbally for the treatment to proceed, they confirm or reject to the treatment via a gesture or shaking their head. For example after the individual has received all the required information they hold out their finger for their blood glucose to be taken. Obtaining consent in a written form may require the individual to sign a written record confirming their agr...
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...eoples language and communication needs.” Therefore translators and other means of communication must be used by a practitioner to ensure the information has been fully understood by the patient. Voluntariness is next and this means that a patient must not be manipulated or persuaded into giving their consent for treatment by another individual. The NMC (2012) states that a practitioner must ‘Accurately record all discussions and decisions relating to obtaining consent’ this is to ensure that coercion is not occurring and the individual decision hasn’t been influenced by others. The combination of all of the above elements will lead to the consent gained being valid or invalid because if the elements are done correctly the consent will be valid because the patient would have understood the information given to them and their decision would not have been influenced.
Ethical judgements limit the methods available in the production of knowledge in both the arts and the natural sciences. Discuss.
In nursing practice any adult consenting to any treatment or procedure must be believed to be mentally capable of making a decision. Consent must be given i...
In this essay the author will rationalize the relevance of professional, ethical and legal regulations in the practice of nursing. The author will discuss and analyze the chosen scenario and critically review the action taken in the expense of the patient and the care workers. In addition, the author will also evaluates the strength and limitations of the scenario in a broader issue with reasonable judgement supported by theories and principles of ethical and legal standards.
Consent is an issue of concern for all healthcare professional when coming in contact with patients either in a care environment or at their home. Consent must be given voluntary or freely, informed and the individual has the capacity to give or make decisions without fear or fraud (Mental Capacity Act, 2005 cited in NHS choice, 2010). The Mental Capacity Act perceives every adult competent unless proven otherwise as in the case of Freeman V Home Office, a prisoner who was injected by a doctor without consent because of behavioural disorder (Dimond, 2011). Consent serves as an agreement between the nurse and the patient, and allows any examination or treatment to be administered. Nevertheless, consent must be obtained in every occurrence of care as in the case of Mohr V William 1905 (Griffith and Tengrah, 2011), where a surgeon obtain consent to perform a procedure on a patient right ear. The surgeon found defect in the left ear of the patient and repaired it assuming he had obtained consent for both ear. The patient sued him and the court found the surgeon guilty of trespassing. Although there is no legal requirement that states how consent should be given, however, there are various ways a person in care of a nurse may give consent. This could be formal (written) form of consent or implied (oral or gesture) consent. An implied consent may be sufficient for taking observation or examination of patient, while written is more suitable for invasive procedure such as surgical operation (Dimond, 2011).
It is defined as a process in which the medical professional provides appropriate and accurate information to the patient, allowing them to ask any relevant questions and come to a rationalised and deliberated decision. The crucial factors in obtaining valid consent are that the patient is considered competent with the ability to understand and retain information before communicating their decision21. The consent to undergo or refuse treatment in the majority of cases should be up to the patient only without coercion from family, friends or carers21. The patient should be fully informed with accurate and concise information, including appropriate alternatives and the consequences of refusing treatment, and given appropriate time to reflect upon this and ask relevant questions or request further information21. If after everything has been addressed fully to the protocol and the competent patient were to refuse treatment, it is important as a healthcare professional to respect their decision even if it does not agree with your personal
An ethical dilemma is defined as a mental state when the nurse has to make a choice between the options and choices that he or she has at her disposal. The choice is a crucial task as the opting of the step will subsequently determine the health status of the concerned patient, hence it requires a great deal of wisdom along with proper medical and health training before any such step is opted as it is a matter of life and death. Strong emphasis should therefore be on the acquisition of proper knowledge and skills so that nurses do posses the autonomy to interact with patients regarding ethical issues involved in health care affairs and address them efficiently. It is normally argued that nurses are not provided sufficient authority to consult and address their patients on a more communicative or interactive level as a result of which they are often trapped in predicaments where their treatments of action and their personal beliefs create a conflict with the health interests of the patient. (Timby, 2008)
Autonomy is a concept found in moral, political, and bioethical reasoning. Inside these connections, it is the limit of a sound individual to make an educated, unpressured decision. Patient autonomy can conflict with clinician autonomy and, in such a clash of values, it is not obvious which should prevail. (Lantos, Matlock & Wendler, 2011). In order to gain informed consent, a patient
Confidentiality will always be an important component in medical discussions, but confidentiality on the other hand is not a right and has to be stable against counter claims (Chalmers, 2003). Some arguments and facts that were used in the article were how are health care providers supposed to be able to correct the stability? Should overt content always be required from clients for any use of their health care information separately from the direct clinical care? The proof suggests that where the informed consent is needed completeness of health information hurts and unfinished health ...
Ethics is a branch of philosophy that deals with the moral principles and values that govern our behavior as human beings. It is important in the human experience that we are able to grasp the idea of our own ethical code in order to become the most sensible human beings. But in that process, can ethics be taught to us? Or later in a person’s life, can he or she teach ethics the way they learned it? It is a unique and challenging concept because it is difficult to attempt to answer that question objectively because everybody has his or her own sense of morality. And at the same time, another person could have a completely different set of morals. Depending on the state of the person’s life and how they have morally developed vary from one human
... event arises and it was due to lack of assessment of genuine comprehension. I think the best system of obtain consent would incorporate a regulated system that accommodated each institution and their requirements, but also equally weighed the importance of true understanding of facts and realization of the patient’s capacity to make decisions. But even if this was established as standard practice, there would still be the issue of how the assessment is made and how accurate it is due to other influences i.e. current injury status or medications needed for full psychological and or conceptual functioning. There could also be an issue of how to regulate such a subjective issue; each physician is going to have different ethical views and this will inevitably influence how he/she assess the patient and their ability to make the best decisions concerning their health.
Ethics are basically the procedures of personal acts that are based on ideas or a person, about what is ethically good or bad and they are range of statistics that involves these statistics. So basically, ethics are rules a person sets for himself or herself about what is ethically right or wrong. They involve legal issues and if something is illegal, it does not always mean that it is unethical, consequently if something is ethical, it does not mean it is legal.
In the past, consent was never needed to perform a treatment on a person. However, as medicine and science began to advance at a rapid rate, along came hundreds of new machines/procedures that are incorporated into treatments, and the patients must be well informed of what’s going to happen to them before they undergo any type of procedure. Furthermore, the patients have the ability to become more informed on what is occurring to them if they know what kind of condition/disease is affecting them, so they become more biased in the types of treatment that they’ll receive. Sometimes they will feel uncomfortable with some types of procedures and since the patient’s permission to perform any type of treatment is crucial in this day and age, the
Although traditionally applied to business ethics, the ethical decision-making process is of vital importance in law enforcement as well. Research recognizes several ethical decision-making models and factors believed to influence the process of decision-making. A history of ethical decision-making, including various theories, models and influential factors demonstrates the importance of the ethical decision-making process and how it can be applied to law enforcement.
Should the aim of law be primarily focused on the protection of individual liberty or, instead, the normative goals aimed at the good of the society? The question of law and morality is difficult mainly because it needs to be addressed with current social conditions that exist, the morals and values that the particular society has. In general, the laws in any society should not only be focused on regulations, but it should also protect individual’s liberty. Devlin debate was based on deciding whether law should enforce morality. He debated about what the law ought to be and whether morality should be enforced by law to form a good society. Furthermore, John Stewart Mill did not write specifically on law and morality. His argument constituted mainly on the anti-enforcers side of law and morality because he believed in individual liberty. John Stuart Mill's assertion that the only justification for limiting one person's liberty is to prevent harm to another