Health Care Ethics Course

Health Care Ethics

• Definition: a branch of ethics that deals with the application of ethico-moral concepts and principles affecting care of individuals, families, population groups, and communities.

Course Objectives

• Apply knowledge of physical, social, natural, and health sciences in the practice of ethics in health care.
• Provide safe, appropriate, humanistic, and holistic care to clients utilizing nursing process guided by ethico-moral principles.
• Apply guidelines and principles of evidence-based practice in health care settings.

Ethics

• A branch of philosophy that seeks to determine how human actions may be judged right or wrong.
• Originated from the Greek word Ēthika, which is an adjective that derives from ēthos, the Greek word for character.
• Concerned with the study of human conduct and values.

Morality

• Refers to human conduct and values.
• May be perceived as prescriptions or rules to guide our actions and behavior.
• Relates to character or conduct considered as good or evil.

Bioethics

• A multidisciplinary field of study that seeks to examine the moral, social, and political problems that arise from biology and the life sciences.
• Emerged between the 1960s and 1970s.
• Coined by oncologist Van Potter in 1970.

Hippocratic Oath

• A pledge taken by physicians to uphold the principles of medical ethics.
• Contains tenets such as maintaining confidentiality, respecting the patient-physician relationship, and applying medical knowledge to benefit humanity.

Value Transmission

• Values are learned through observation, experience, and sociocultural environment.
• Influenced by societal traditions, culture, ethnic and religious groups, and family and peers.

Clarifying Values

• A process that helps individuals identify, examine, and develop their own values.
• Promotes personal growth by fostering awareness, empathy, and insight.

Professional Values

• Values acquired during socialization into nursing, from code of ethics, nursing experiences, teachers, and peers.
• Fundamental professional nursing values include human dignity, equality, and prevention of suffering.

Ethical Theories/Frameworks

• Consequence-based theories (e.g., utilitarianism)
• Principles-based theories (e.g., deontology, Kant's theory)
• Relationship-based theories (e.g., caring theories, contractarian ethics)
• Virtue ethics (focuses on character and moral virtues)

Virtue Ethics in Nursing

• Concerned with the character of individual nurses and seeks ways to enable nurses to develop character traits appropriate for actions that enhance wellbeing.