Moral Dilemmas in Patient Care: Know Through Nursing Assignment
Do you know what are the moral dilemmas in patient care? Why are they important to learn in nursing assignment? Give this article a read to know it all in detail.
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Moral problems are a big part of nursing. Nurses often have to make hard choices that can challenge their values and duties. Nurses are supposed to make major decisions, such as upholding patients' autonomy, making end-of-life decisions, and protecting patients regarding their information safety and health. Such decisions are significant as they may impact a patient's mood, trust in doctors, and even treatment outcomes.
Nurses need to think carefully to help patients with kindness and fairness. Learning about these challenges helps nursing students think through tough decisions. This article will show nurses how to make good choices to take care of patients in the best way. If students need help with these complex topics, nursing assignment help can give them helpful advice and support.
5 Most Common Moral Problems Nurses Face
This article will discuss common moral problems nurses face when caring for patients and explain how nurses can handle these problems while doing the right thing.
1. Autonomy vs. Beneficence
What's usually meant by autonomy is self-determination: the right of any person to make choices regarding their own person. In patients' terminology, saying yes to no in treatment can be detrimental; that is where nurses must respectfully address a patient's decision despite it going against better wisdom.
Beneficence refers to the act of doing good for the patient. Nurses may be obligated to a course of treatment that they feel is conflicted by a patient who refuses lifesaving treatment. In these cases, nurses still want to help the patient but must also respect their choices. To balance autonomy and beneficence, nurses have to talk carefully with patients.
They explain the good and bad things about the treatments and make sure the patient understands. Sometimes, other doctors and nurses may help with advice so the patient can make a wise decision. Nurses need to find a way to respect the patient's choices without hurting their health. If you want to know the statistics of these cases, you can get statistics assignment help from experts.
2. Confidentiality vs. Duty to Protect
Confidentiality requires that nurses allow patients their privacy, except in those instances where a patient or another individual may be in imminent danger. Sometimes, a nurse will find themselves between a rock and a hard place: keeping information secret versus maintaining safety for all. A good example is a situation where the patient informs the nurse of their intent to harm themselves or others.
Even though the nurse should keep things private, helping the patient or others stay safe is more important. In these situations, nurses may need to tell other doctors or helpers to make sure everyone is safe. This choice is not always easy to make. Nurses may feel uncertain about what to do. Rules and laws help nurses know what is the right thing to do.
Some laws say the nurse must share certain information, even if the patient doesn't want them to. In the end, nurses have to think carefully about what will keep people safe and follow the rules with the help of the healthcare team.
3. Truth-Telling vs. Deception
Truthfulness is a big part of nursing; however, sometimes, telling the patient the truth may hurt feelings. Sometimes, nurses have hard choices when a patient is seriously ill. Such a case is when patients ask about their condition, which may make the patient sad when told in total truthfulness.
It is up to the nurse to determine whether to be honest or not to protect the patient's feelings. In these situations, nurses need to consider how to impart the information in a caring manner. They have to tell enough for the patient to understand but also be cautious about how it might make them feel.
This would also include discussion with other doctors, nurses, and family members to help the patient make the best choices. The nurse should be honest in a manner that maintains respect for the patient and makes them feel supported, yet preserves trust in the healthcare team.
4. Cultural Sensitivity vs. Clinical Guidelines
Cultural beliefs can affect how patients see and make choices about their healthcare. Nurses have to be aware of such beliefs and respect them, especially if they are in conflict with their medical judgment. For example, suppose a patient's religion forbids them to accept blood transfusions. In that case, it is up to the nurse to determine how to respect that while still providing appropriate care for the patient.
In such cases, nurses should look for other ways of helping that correspond to the patient's values. This may mean the nurse talking with the patient and the family to better understand what they need. The nurse can help balance the doctor's advice with the patient's beliefs.
Nurses must learn their clients' cultures to provide appropriate care and follow rules that keep patients safe. By working with the healthcare team and cultural helpers, nurses can find ways to respect the patients' beliefs and still provide good treatment.
Sometimes, there are not enough medical resources for everyone to receive some type of needed intervention. These situations can be quite vast in size: pandemic, natural disaster, or other event that pushes resources beyond capacity. This requires the nurse to make tough choices of who gets what ventilator, a bed, or a drug, for example, absolutely needs it most. They might consider how ill the person is, their chances of recovery, and what is fair to all.
These usually are based on special rules to aid in making such decisions. This often makes the nurses indecisive since they have to make very difficult choices. They may discuss with other doctors, nurses and other experts for the best decision. They treat everyone fairly but at times, some patients may need more help compared to others. Nurses use clear rules and careful thinking to make sure their choices are fair and follow the hospital's guidelines.
Final Thoughts
In conclusion, nurses often face tough choices when caring for patients. They need to think carefully about what is right and how to help patients best. Nurses need to be kind, understand what is best for patients, and know the rules about what is fair.
By thinking through these hard situations, nurses can make better decisions and care for patients in a kind and fair way. Nursing students can also get nursing assignment help with learning how to handle these tough choices. This helps them make good decisions when they become nurses and give the best care to patients.
