Verified Document

Ethical Issues In Nursing Over The Last Essay

Ethical Issues in Nursing Over the last ten years, the demand for long-term care services has been facing increasing amounts of pressure. Part of the reason for this is because of the large portion of the population that is becoming older (the Baby Boomers). As they have the potential to cause the overall amounts of demand to increase dramatically. Evidence of this can be seen with information compiled by the Government Accounting Office. Where, they found that the total number of people requiring long-term care services will double by the year 2050. As the costs for this care will increase to $379 billion, this is above the total amount spent in 2000 of $179 billion. (Walker, 2002) This is significant, because it shows how long-term care is going become a major part of all health care expenditures in the future. As a result, there are number of unique ethical challenges that are facing the industry. To fully understand the overall scope of these concerns as well how they can be addressed requires: identifying specific ethical issues and leadership strategies that can be used to tackle these problems. This will be accomplished through: examining key strategies that are pertinent to these ethical challenges, analyzing of the evidence and understanding its importance to Nursing. Together, these different elements will provide the greatest insights, as to the underlying challenges and solutions in addressing the different issues facing long-term care.

Key Strategies Pertinent to Ethical Issues

There are a number of different ethical issues that are affecting long-term care services these include: living arrangements / family obligations, financial costs and possible abuse / isolation. The living arrangements / family obligations is when there is challenges for the other family members (such as the children), who are forced to determine what to do with an elderly relative. On one hand, they want to support these individuals, yet they may have other family obligations in their lives. Where, these people may be unable to spend the time necessary with an elderly relative. The financial costs are the total monetary impact...

In some cases, they may not be able to stop working, due to economic and family issues. ("Long-Term Care Ethics," 2011) The possible isolation / abuse are when an elderly relative is facing various forms of neglect from a caregiver in: a nursing home or assisted living facility. ("Ethical and Legal Issues of Long-Term Care," 2008) These different elements are important, because they are highlighting a host of ethical issues that must be wrestled with when sending a relative to a long-term care facility. This is troubling, due to the fact that these challenges can add to overall burdens that family members are wrestling with.
Leadership Strategies to Address the Issues

To effectively address these different issues leadership strategies must include a number of different elements. This is designed to help tackle the ethical issues that are being faced and provide workable solutions (which can be augmented to various situations). As a result, there are number of factors that must be embraced to achieve these objectives to include: having a deep sense of compassion / setting the example, improving communication and understanding how different regulations can be used to address these issues. Having a deep sense of compassion / setting the example is when the individual will have a genuine concern about what happens to a particular person. At the same time, they must be setting the example for how these ethical challenges will be tackled. These different factors are important, because they will determine the overall quality of care that is being provided to the patient. Where, the trained health care professional, can use the underlying amounts of compassion and follow up to set the tone for the organization itself. Once this takes place, it means that the family members can feel a sense of relief, by knowing that the individuals will address these ethical concerns (based upon their underlying amounts of compassion and professionalism). (Sullivan, 2006, pp. 907 -- 914)

Improving communication is when the health care professional is discussing the…

Sources used in this document:
Bibliography

Ethical and Legal Issues of Long-Term Care. (2008). Avanza Education. Retrieved from: http://www.avanzaedu.org/legal-ethical-issues.asp

Long-Term Care Ethics. (2011). JRank. Retrieved from: http://medicine.jrank.org/pages/1063/Long-Term-Care-Ethics.html

Bono, J. (2000). Ethical Issues in Health Care on the Frontiers of the 21st Century. Norwell, MA: Kluwer.

Kane, R. (2000). Long-Term Care and a Good Quality of Life. The Gerontologist, 41 (3), 293 -- 304.
Walker, D. (2002). Long-Term Care. GAO. Retrieved from: http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02544t.pdf
Cite this Document:
Copy Bibliography Citation

Related Documents

Ethical Issue of Assisted Suicide
Words: 1305 Length: 4 Document Type: Research Paper

Ethical Issue of Assisted Suicide The American Society of Registered Nurses [ASRN] ( 2010) defines "physician-assisted suicide" as the facility to a patient by a medical health professional of the means of ending his or her own life. Assisted suicide is an issue of great importance to nurses. This issue echoes their values and beliefs as a commonality. In the same time it calls for a clear and precise response as

Ethical Issues in Nursing Range
Words: 3075 Length: 10 Document Type: Term Paper

1). This is a problem that needs to be addressed by adding more training to the budget. The problem is, most hospitals' budgets are already spread too thin. Therefore, hospital administrators need to work harder to find sources to help fund their activities. Complete Honesty Nurses have more power and responsibility than ever before to ensure that they are making honest reports about their patients. They may be in a rush

Ethical Issues of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia
Words: 6393 Length: 16 Document Type: Term Paper

Ethical Issues of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia The ethical issues relating to assisted suicide and euthanasia have captured the attention of the public. The topic of Euthanasia is a contentious one and it inescapably incites strong emotional argument and gives rise to tough beliefs that do not straight away lend themselves to consensual harmony. It is improbable that a decision can be reached which will meet with universal support whenever such

Ethical Issues Raised by Biomedical
Words: 1736 Length: 4 Document Type: Term Paper

As the narrow policy discussions regarding Physician-Assisted Suicide continue, we ought to encourage all presently existing and legal methods of reducing the painful sufferings during the last phase of life. References Drickamer, Margaret, a; Lee, Melinda. a; Ganzini, Linda. (1997, Jan 15) "Practical Issues in Physician-Assisted Suicide" Annals of Internal Medicine, vol. 126, no. 2, pp: 146-151. Emauel, Ezekiel. (1997, Mar) "Whose right to die?" The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 17, no. 2,

Nursing Law and Ethics Name
Words: 1913 Length: 6 Document Type: Term Paper

The death of a child is significant and in this case avoidable and a plaintiff has the right to seek compensatory damages as is allowed by law. Case Study 1 Part B At the end of the night shift, Nurse Brown took a verbal handover and then noticed the observation chart had not been filled in. To assist her friend, Nurse Harvey, whom she knew had a busy night, filled in the

Nurse Whistleblower Whistleblowing in the
Words: 2192 Length: 8 Document Type: Essay

Though still worthwhile if it leads to an improvement in nursing or medical standards, whistle-blowing can be damaging to the profession (Fritko & Jackson 2005). Whistle-bowing can also empower nurses, however, with successful instances of whistle-blowing potentially inspiring others that had noticed wrongdoing and remained to afraid to speak out. A large part of the importance of whistle-blowing in the nursing profession stems form the fact that the cultures of

Sign Up for Unlimited Study Help

Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.

Get Started Now