Question

Describe how personal specific ethics/communication styles or methods relate to healthcare (provide examples

Answer 1

Ethical values in health care science:-Ethical values are essential for any healthcare provider. Ethics comes from the Greek word “ethos,” meaning character. Ethical values are universal rules of conduct that provide a practical basis for identifying what kinds of actions, intentions, and motives are valued.

[1] Ethics are moral principles that govern how the person or a group will behave or conduct themselves. The focus pertains to the right and wrong of actions and encompasses the decision-making process of determining the ultimate consequences of those actions.

[2] Each person has their own set of personal ethics and morals. Ethics within healthcare are important because workers must recognize healthcare dilemmas, make good judgments and decisions based on their values while keeping within the laws that govern them. To practice competently with integrity, nurses, like all healthcare professionals, must have regulation and guidance within the profession.

[3] The American Nurses Association (ANA) has developed the Code of Ethics for this purpose.

The Code of Ethics for Nurses is divided into nine provisions to guide the nurse. The following is a summary of the American Nurses Association Code of Ethics for Nurses:

Provision 1. The nurse practices with compassion and respect for the inherent dignity, worth, and unique attributes of every person.

The nurse must have a high level of respect for all individuals, and allow dignity in regards to dealings in care and communication. It's important that patient's families are also treated with respect for their relationship to the patient. Nurses must understand the professional guidelines in communications and work with colleagues and patient families. It's important to understand the proper professional relationship that should be maintained with families and patients. All individuals, whether patients or co-workers have the right to decide on their participation in care and work.

Provision 2. The nurse’s primary commitment is to the patient, whether an individual, family, group, community, or population.

The patient should always be a first and primary concern. The nurse must recognize the need for the patient to include their individual thought into care practices. Any conflict of interest, whether belonging to external organizations, or the nurse's habits or ideals that conflict with the act of being a nurse, should be shared and addressed to not impact patient care. Collaboration with internal and external teams to foster best patient care is a necessity. Understanding professional boundaries and how they relate to patient care outcomes is important.

Provision 3. The nurse promotes, advocates for, and protects the rights, health, and safety of the patient.

Provision 4. The nurse has authority, accountability, and responsibility for nursing practice; makes decisions; and takes action consistent with the obligation to provide optimal patient care.

Provision 5. The nurse owes the same duties to self as to others, including the responsibility to promote health and safety, preserve wholeness of character and integrity, maintain competence, and continue personal and professional growth.

Provision 6. The nurse, through individual and collective effort, establishes, maintains, and improves the ethical environment of the work setting and conditions of employment that are conducive to safe, quality health care.

Provision 7. The nurse, in all roles and settings, advances the profession through research and scholarly inquiry, professional standards development, and the generation of both nursing and health policy.

Provision 8. The nurse collaborates with other health professionals and the public to protect human rights, promote health diplomacy, and reduce health disparities.

Provision 9. The profession of nursing, collectively through its professional organization, must articulate nursing values, maintain the integrity of the profession, and integrate principles of social justice into nursing and health policy.

Nurses have a responsibility to themselves, their profession, and their patients to maintain the highest ethical principals. Many organizations have ethics boards in place to review ethical concerns. Nurses at all levels of practice should be involved in ethics review in their targeted specialty area. It is important to advocate for patient care, patient rights, and ethical consideration of practice.

Role of communication skills in nursing profession:- Communication between health officials-in this case nurses-and patient is a process that begins with the first contact of the two and lasts as long as the therapeutic relationship. The nurse, who wants to create the right relationship with the patient, must win him/her from the first moment. This will happen if the conversation is held in appropriate conditions. Even though it seems obvious, it should be noted that courtesy and kindness on part of the nurse is required.

Essentiality of communication in nursing:-Good communication between nurses and patients is essential for the successful outcome of individualized nursing care of each patient. To achieve this, however, nurses must understand and help their patients, demonstrating courtesy, kindness and sincerity. Also they should devote time to the patient to communicate with the necessary confidentiality, and must not forget that this communication includes persons who surround the sick person, which is why the language of communication should be understood by all those involved in it. Good communication also is not only based on the physical abilities of nurses, but also on education and experience.

Principal of communication:-Communication can be defined as a transaction and message creation. The entire process occurs in a context consisting of physical space, cultural and social values and psychological conditions . Communication assists in the performance of accurate, consistent and easy nursing work, ensuring both the satisfaction of the patient and the protection of the health professional. When health professionals are not trained in communication skills, they face more difficulties separating work from their personal life, tending to transfer problems from one side to the other .

Case Study:-

Mrs Jones is an 89-year-old woman who has come into the intensive care unit with an acute stroke.

She is the proud mother of five children, all of whom are married, and a grandmother of ten. Some of these grandchildren are old enough to have spouses of their own.

Unfortunately, Mrs Jones’ husband died four years ago and her care has been transferred to her eldest daughter, Lisa. The relationship between Lisa and her siblings is complicated, and all of them have insisted on obtaining the security code for themselves. Lisa, not wanting to start an argument, has given it to her brothers and sisters, who in turn, gave it to a few grandchildren.

Every day on the unit, the nurse assigned to Mrs Jones receives at least five phone calls about their family member’s status. Although the nurse tries to be concise, often these conversations can take up to twenty minutes. After a few days of this, the day nurse brings the family together and explains the difficulties in handling so many calls when their mother’s care is so critical.

It is decided that all information will flow through Lisa, although this does not make everyone happy. The plan is agreed to, however, and now the nurse need only field one update call per shift and continue to communicate with her elderly patient, Mrs Jones.

Case Study 2:-

Daniel was a two-year-old heart patient who was preparing for his second open-heart surgery. He didn’t understand what was to happen to him, and the atmosphere of the hospital room made him scared. Already, starting the IV line had been a traumatic event. Then one of the nurses from the OR came into the room the night before the operation with a bag of items. She got down on her knees with Daniel and showed him the hairnet he would wear, the tubes that would come out of him, and the mask that would be placed over his face.

Instead of being afraid, Daniel was fascinated with the new toys in front of him and played with them all. During this time, the nurse took the time to talk to the parents about their concerns. She helped them to understand what would happen, explaining the procedure, the heart-lung machine, and the estimated time of the surgery. When the nurse prepared to leave after half an hour of talking, both Daniel and his parents were much more at ease. Although all of them were still afraid of the surgery, it helped to know a little bit about what would happen so not everything would come as a shock.