Medical Ethics

Ethics
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Patients are endowed with the right to receive or refuse life-prolonging treatment and it is the treatment teams’ legal and ethical obligation not only to acknowledge, but also honor the choices and give advice on treatment options that are reasonable. When the patient has been provided with sufficient advice and understands the consequences inherent with the choice of withdrawing from life-sustaining treatment such as dialysis is a medically, legally, and ethically acceptable choice (O’Shaughnessy, 2008).
Dialysis treatment is a multidisciplinary undertaking with each professional playing a critical role in both treatment and withdrawal from such treatment. Nurses have several key roles which include providing counseling for the patient (Espinosa & Haile, 2010). The nurse ensures that the young patient has all the relevant information regarding the consequences of withdrawing and if the patient decides to go ahead, it is the role of the nurse to help in coping with the condition. By providing sup...