Healthcare ethics are moral principles that govern healthcare professionals’ behaviours such as doing the right or wrong things and doing the good or bad things (Oxford Dictionaries & Wong, 2014).
Complying with ethical principles can help to establish a mutual trust professional-patient relationship that allows a smooth treatment process. For example, if healthcare professionals obey confidentiality such as keeping patients’ medical histories with accordance to the guideline and discussing patients’ affairs only with the respective medical team (Code of Practice of The Radiographers Board Hong Kong, 1998), the incidents of losing patients database can be prevented and privacy of patients can be protected. This can increase the reliability of healthcare professionals. Patients will be assertive and corporative when they are accessing healthcare services.
Besides, patients can receive adequate and appropriate treatments if healthcare professionals adhere to the ethical principles. All healthcare professionals should maintain the highest standard of competence and update their professional knowledge continually (Supplementary Medical Professions Council, n.d.). For example, if a physiotherapist does not comply with this principle, he may not know that there is a new treatment called Bobath Concept (Au-Yeung,
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Supplementary Medical Professions Council (n.d.) stated that all healthcare professionals should respect and cooperate with related professions if necessary. Under a healthcare system, all professionals need to corporate for the benefit of the patients. For example, orthopedic doctors may need to refer some patients to physiotherapists and occupational therapists for treatment if the waiting list is too long. Cooperation among professions can be enhanced and patients can receive suitable treatment if every profession follows the ethics
Why is it so important that healthcare executives adhere to a professional code of ethics?
“Public health is controversial because, depending upon how it is defined, it may challenge people’s values and demand sacrifices” (Schnieder 2017: 23). Although the overall goal is to create a policy that is inclusive of every group, this is almost impossible. It is impossible because there are too many conflicting views between each group. Public policy may also have a positive or a negative impact on the economy. One of the major conflict with public health policy is that it may be guided by religious beliefs. For example, issues such as AIDS, other sexual transmitted disease, teenage pregnancy, and low birth rates (20) are some of the major issues that end up being controversial when it comes to religion.
The clinical standards state, “All decisions made and actions taken on behalf of the patient adhere to ethical standards” (“Scope of Practice,” n.d.). I think that adhering to a professional code of ethics helps healthcare providers establish important decision making skills. Having a Code of Ethics is a vital guideline to have in the work place so we have a grasp on what is expected of a professional healthcare provider. It is crucial for the best quality of care being given to patients with equal care provided for all. The clinical standards also state, “All patients expect and deserve optimal care” (“Scope of Practice,” n.d.). Quality of care is important so that patients are given safe, respectable care. The overall objective is to achieve a high degree of patient satisfaction. By providing patients with more information and instruction, minimalized wait times, affordable costs, properly trained staff, maintained equipment, and compassionate attitudes we can give them the quality care they deserve. I think it is important to provide an excellent quality of care so that your patients want to keep coming back to the
The four major ethical principles in health care are: Autonomy – to honor the patient’s right to make their own decision (the opposite is paternalism - the health care provider knows best for the patient), Beneficence – to help the patient advance his/her own good, Nonmaleficence – to do no harm (many bioethical controversies involves this principle), and Justice – to be fair and treat like cases alike. All 4 principles are considered to be in effect at all times. In theory, each is of equal weight or importance. Ethical responsibilities in a given situation depend in part on the nature of the decision and in part on the roles everyone involved play.
There are questions about transplant allocation in regards to the four major ethical principles in medical ethics: beneficence, autonomy, nonmaleficence and justice. Beneficence is the “obligation of healthcare providers to help people” that are in need, autonomy is the “right of patients to make choices” in regards to their healthcare, nonmaleficence, is the “duty of the healthcare providers to do no harm”, and justice is the “concept of treating everyone in a fair manner” ("Medical Ethics & the Rationing of Health Care: Introduction", n.d., p. 1).
Ethical principals are extremely important to understand in the healthcare field. Ethical responsibilities in any situation depend on the role of the healthcare worker and the nature of the decision being made. Healthcare administrators and professionals must make ethical decisions that can be an everyday or controversial situation. When making such decisions, it is imperative to consider the four major principles of ethics: autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and distributive. By using these four principles, ethical decisions can effectively be made. For the purpose of this paper, examined will be the example of the treatment of an uninsured homeless patient. Poor health care be a cause and a result of homelessness.
Each person has a basic human right to be given proper medical care. Likewise, it is a social and legal duty for any health care staff and professional to appropriately provide medical services that strictly adhere to the sound practice standards as established by the medical community.
Ethical principles in healthcare are significant to the building blocks of mortality. The principles are beneficence, autonomy, justice, and nonmaleficence. Although these principles can be certainly followed they can also be disregarded. Beneficence is a theory that assures each procedure given is entirely beneficial to that patient to help them advance within their own good. For example, There was a young girl, the age of 17. She had been being treated at a small private practice since she was born. She was recently diagnosed with lymphoma and was only given a few more years to live. Her doctors at the private practice who had been seeing her for years were very attached to her and wanted to grant this dying girl her every wish. They promised
Health care ethics is at its most basic definition is a set of moral principles, beliefs and values that guide the Physician Assistant in making choices about medical care for their patients. The central belief of health care ethics is the sense of right and wrong and the principles about what rights we possess, along with the duties as Physician Assistants we owe our patients. (Opacic, D. A. 2003) One must consider carefully all aspects of health care decisions as it helps us make choices that are just.
Ethics in the medical field are very important and should be taken seriously. As a medical professional you will tested daily on making the best choices, using good judgment and being morally responsible for your actions. There are nine principles in the Code of Medical Ethics that in general make up the primary code. As a medical professional you must always consider what is in the best interest of the patient. Code of medical ethics of the American Medical Association, (2012). When determining the proper “Patient-Physician Relationship, the relationship between the patient and physician is based on trust and gives rise to the physicians’ ethical obligations to place a patients’ welfare above their own self-interest” Code of medical ethics of the American Medical Association, (2012).
Physical Therapist (PT), are skilled health care practitioners that aim to improve movement, reduce pain and increase patient enjoyment of life. All while providing moral, legal and ethical care to patients. However, each of these requirements of practice are dictated by different entities. Meaning, that the requirements sometimes may or may not correlate with one another. Legally, therapist must abide by both state and national laws that are put in place for all health care professionals, in addition to those specific to the field of Physical Therapy. Whereas, ethical responsibilities may be dictated by the professional organizations and society norms. While morals vary according to different cultures and subcultures, making them specific
Ethics is another boundary of professional practice, unlike law which is more concretization, ethics is more abstract, different people have different judgement criteria, but most of the criteria is based on human rights and morals. The health professional works interact with different peoples, and the relationship between profession and clients need to keep at an appropriate distance. If professional practitioner keeps some distance with patients, the patient would feel alienation, and it will affect communication between the practitioner and the client. But if the relationship is too close, professional may disrespect client and easily cross the boundary of ethics. According to the statistics, unlike only a few people are well acquainted with the law, most physicians and nurse have the knowledge of ethics, and they acquire this knowledge during training and experience in working (Hariharan, Jonnalagadda, Walrond, & Moseley, 2006). Also, compare the research done by Roy Morgan (2015), health professions are mostly ethical. These all information indicate that in the healthcare system, medical staff, nurse or other practitioners were aware that the importance of the ethical problem in the practice. As a podiatrist, practice in the urban area or rural area can face the different challenge of ethical problems. For example, there is an ethical dilemma due to the moral distress
There are weaknesses in professional guidelines and rules because they are unable to provide the directives for moral reasoning and action is health care situations. Many people state that biomedical ethics provides a framework and emphasis on the person rather than the professional code and legal policy (Beauchamp and Childress, 2001). On the other hand they serve a purpose to provide some direction for professionals however codes of practise do not dismiss.
The codes of ethics are established to help, protect, and provide guidance to each individual professional on how to act in their respective profession and create an environment where ethical behavior is practiced and observed by everyone in the profession. By observing the code of ethics every member ensures that they are held to a higher standard when it comes to quality patient care and at the same time help eliminate bad actors in the profession. For example, every physician is held to a code of “do no harm” when it comes to patient care and every physician or medical student are required to follow this
Patient confidentiality is one of the foundations to the medical practice. Patients arrive at hospitals seeking treatment believing that all personal information will remain between themselves and the medical staff. In order to assure patients privacy, confidentiality policies were established. However, a confidentiality policy may be broken only in the case the medical staff believes that the patient is a danger to themselves or to others in society. Thesis Statement: The ethics underlying patient confidentiality is periodically questioned in our society due to circumstances that abruptly occur leaving health professionals to decide between right and wrong.