Ethical, Moral, and Legal Leadership. Ethical Dilemma

Ethical, Moral and Legal Leadership
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Ethical, Moral and Legal Leadership
Ethical, moral and legal issues are prevalent within the healthcare sector. Ethics are of great importance to nursing. Every nurse must protect patients’ rights, maintain patients’ dignity, and respect their patients. Nursing staffs have to create an environment of mutual respect and trust between healthcare workers and patients (Cerit & Dinз, 2013). Furthermore, nurses must respect the main principles of medical ethics, which include justice, beneficence, non-maleficence, and autonomy. The purpose of this paper is to describe a legal, moral or ethical dilemma which I have previously faced in my workplace, and to analyze the legal, ethical, and moral implications used in the situation. Also, my role as a moral agent for this issue is explained. Lastly, the paper describes whether my leadership styles act as facilitation or barrier to this dilemma.
Ethical Dilemma
An ethical dilemma that I have experienced in my work environment was one in which I was faced with a situation in which I had to choose between patient independence and patient safety. I was working in an acute care setting, caring for elderly patients who had disabilities that might place them at risk for self-harm. Part of my job at the hospital was to provide supervision to these elderly patients to prevent them from falling and potentially suffering injuries. One day, an 86-year-old Nancy Wang, who was one of my patients at the institution, expressed her desires of wanting to walk around without my supervision.
This patient had dementia, and she sometimes forgot to put her shoes on or use her walking frame. She did not want me to supervise her anymore as she walked through the corridor, or moving from one part of the facility to another. The corridor in the hospital sometimes had wet floor, and such a patient could easily slip on the floor and fall onto her hip, suffering an injury. It is worth mentioning that as a nurse, I truly desire to promote patient independence. Even so, promoting this independence comes with the risk of patient injury as a result of falls, and this risk is great. In this particular situation, the ethical dilemma was how I should balance the different issues. I wondered what is more important: patient safety or patient independence.
The ethical and legal implication in this situation is that an unobserved fall would result in a threat to the patient’s well-being and safety. If the patient falls and suffers serious injury, she may bring a lawsuit against the hospital for nurse negligence. Without supervision or observation, a nurse may not be able to respond quickly or appropriately in case the patient falls (Sari et al., 2018). Patient independence and autonomy are widely regarded as vital goals for the elderly patients. Independence is an important attribute that an individual can have and nurses have to do whatever they can to promote the independence of older adults in their care. Promoting independence implies encouraging the patient to do as much as he/she can for himself/herself (Ganz, Wagner & Toren, 2015). Encouraging the independence of the geriatric patient in ...