Nursing Ethics and Principles Quiz

Ethics in Communication and Nurse-Patient Relationships

• Ethics in healthcare focuses on determining what's valuable for individuals and society.
• The American Nurses Association (ANA) code of ethics establishes a foundation for professional nursing, with core values including accountability, responsibility, advocacy, and confidentiality.

Basic Terms in Health Ethics

• Autonomy: Respecting patients' rights to make decisions about their care. Includes reviewing surgical procedures, with necessary risks and benefits. Consent documents respect for autonomy.
• Beneficence: Taking positive actions to help others; a fundamental principle in nursing and medicine.
• Non-maleficence: The commitment to do no harm while balancing risks and benefits of care. Health professionals try to minimize harm.
• Justice: Fairness in access to healthcare resources, including discussions on insurance, hospital locations, and organ transplants.
• Fidelity (Sadakat): Keeping promises and following through on actions and interventions.

Professional Nursing Code of Ethics

• A code of ethics is a set of guiding principles all members of a profession should follow.
• Codes guide professional groups when ethical questions arise regarding correct practices and behaviors.
• The ANA establishes and reviews the code regularly to reflect changes in practice.
• Advocates for patient needs.
• Demonstrates responsibility in clinical practice, such as administering medications correctly.
• Maintains accountability. Nurses take responsibility for actions and errors.
• Upholds confidentiality by maintaining patient privacy.

Values

• Values reflect cultural and social influences.
• Values evolve and change over time among individuals.
• Ethical dilemmas frequently result when values conflict.
• Clarifying one’s own, patients', and co-workers' values is essential for ethical discourse.

Nursing Point of View

• Nurses often have extended interactions with patients, including conversations about family life and coping strategies. Sharing personal fears also often unfolds during these interactions.
• Nurses must be mindful and respectful of patients' differing views, experiences, and values.

Processing an Ethical Dilemma

• Ethical dilemmas often cause distress for patients and caregivers.
• Ethical dilemmas are resolved through critical assessment, considering all perspectives, and clarifying values.
• Working through ethical dilemmas involves a similar approach as the nursing process itself.

Issues in Health Care Ethics

• Quality of Life: Researchers develop measures for defining quality of life in care, an essential element in decisions about futile care, cancer therapy, assisted suicide, and DNR discussions.
• Genetic Screening: Genetic testing can reveal future conditions. This sometimes precedes legal abortion windows, causing ethical dilemmas.
• Care at the End of Life: Futile care, interventions unlikely to benefit patients, is an ethical issue in end-of-life decisions. Issues of access to quality care also exist.

Key Points

• A set of values helps individuals determine what's good.
• Professional nursing promotes accountability, responsibility, advocacy, and confidentiality.
• Key ethical principles are autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, justice, and fidelity.
• Clarifying values helps resolve ethical conflicts.
• Nurses' perspectives are unique in resolving ethical issues.

Key Steps in Resolving Ethical Dilemmas

• Identify an ethical dilemma's existence by clarifying the dilemma and ensuring there is not already a solution.
• Gather essential information from multiple perspectives, including patients, families, and other professionals.
• Understand the values within the case.
• Express and clarify the issue's essence.
• Assess potential courses of action.
• Negotiate a suitable solution.
• Evaluate the plan's effectiveness in response to changes, over time.

Ethical Dilemma Simulation

• Students discuss ethical dilemmas in healthcare through simulated scenarios.
• Students apply ethical frameworks and develop solutions within the framework of ethical rules.
• Solutions are presented to and discussed with the overall class.

Communication and Nursing Practice

• Communication with patients and families is an essential part of patient-centered care. This includes gathering information, providing education, and working toward mutually beneficial goals.
• Effective communication is needed among healthcare team members for optimal patient safety when caring for a patient, whether from one caregiver to another.
• Communication breakdowns often result in errors and issues of credibility for the healthcare provider or professional.
• Team communication and collaboration is essential for patient safety and quality care.

Developing Communication Skills

• Individuals develop perceptions through senses.
• Individual's cultures and education influence perception styles.
• Effective communication techniques can be learned but are hard to use consistently and apply correctly. Different communication situations, like dealing with cancer or an end-of-life case, present special challenges.

Levels of Communication

• Interpersonal: One-on-one interactions directly between individuals. Critical in nursing practice.
• Small-group: Communication between a small number of people with a goal in mind. Includes patient support groups, committees, or research teams.
• Public: Communication with a larger audience such as consumers or other professionals; includes presentations and classroom discussions.

Basic Elements of the Communication Process

• Referent: Initial motivator or stimulus for the start of the communication process from one individual to another. This can include sounds, smells, or physical objects, as well as perceptions.
• Sender: Individual initiating the communication.
• Receiver: Individual interpreting message.
• Channel: Mode of message transfer, which can be visual, auditory or tactile.
• Message: Content and emotional tone of the communication.
• Feedback: Receiver's response; determining if the sender's message was conveyed correctly.
• Environment: The physical and emotional context of the communication exchange.

Forms of Communication—Verbal

• Vocabulary: Specific language used in various medical contexts; can be hard for patients to understand if unfamiliar.
• Denotative and Connotative meaning: Shared meanings of words can vary among individuals who are communicating; use context to ensure messages aren't lost in translation.
• Pacing: Effective communication flows at a suitable pace and uses proper tonal variations.
• Clarity and Brevity: Clear, concise communication minimizes confusion and enhances understanding. Timing and Relevance: Timing is essential; important topics or issues should be addressed appropriately, such avoiding patient distress, for example.

Forms of Communication—Nonverbal

• Nonverbal communication includes non-verbal cues to convey messages, such as the appearance of individuals, facial expressions, eye contact, or personal space in an environment.
• A variety of senses or cues are included in conveying communication.
• Factors like personal appearance, facial expressions, eye contact all play an important part in interpreting information.
• Personal space and awareness of one's environment also impact communication.

Nurse-Health Care Team Relationships

• Effective communication among healthcare team members improves patient safety and the work environment.
• Standard communication tools aid in consistency. (e.g., SBAR)
• Lateral violence is unacceptable and should not be tolerated among healthcare professionals.

Elements of Professional Communication

• Courtesy and Kindness: Common courtesy enhances professional communication; knocking on doors, greeting patients, thanking staff.
• Name Usage: Using names conveys respect; calling patients by name, and avoiding labels.

Test your understanding of key ethical principles in nursing, including autonomy, justice, and non-maleficence. This quiz covers essential concepts related to ethical decision-making and communication in healthcare settings. Ideal for nursing students and professionals seeking to enhance their ethical knowledge.