As the neonatal intensive care nursery gives rise to many potentially painful procedures, a dilemma exists for caregivers in assessing if sick and/or premature infants are in pain (Nagy 1998). Although newborn pain affects the short-term interests there are possibilities that the lasting effects may also be harmful (Spence, 2000).
For a long time, the medical profession has given its members with the knowledge and skills that are required to treat disease and deformity. Physicians have often been the front line of technological mastery, increasingly emotional with the onerous responsibility of determining when intervention is suitable. Underlying this responsibility is a foundation of core principles, including beneficence, non-malfeasance, and compassion. Conscious use of these principles is not often supportive when the best interests of patients are diverse and apply to many relevant but competing parties. The dispute of applying center principles to complex cases at the beginning of life can confidently engage the morality and empathy of the contemporary medical enterprise (Morrow, 2000).
Clinical encounters for parents are often new and harsh experiences, where expectations and prospects of health and happiness can be endangered by the birth of even a mildly deformed or impaired child. Parents are almost always ill-equipped for premature or hazardous delivery. They often feel mistreated, surprised, mad, and culpable. They may feel undeserving or incapable to assume the role of caregiver. In negotiating the details of intensive care, neonatologists may confuse parents and thereby distort the balance of power. Therefore, empathy is chief when they deliver clinical decisions. Neonatologists must anticipate the vulnerability of parents, collaborate with them, and gently guide them through their decision, especially when parents are hostile or recalcitrant (Morrow, 2000).
All physicians should talk about the standards of care appropriate to similar clinical situations. For instance, failure to treat an infant with a mild case of Down syndrome and correctable intestinal atresia is inconsistent with best medical practice and thus neglectful. Useful and comforting actions a physician can use include introducing parents to families who have come upon similar dilemmas, and connecting them with outreach organizations that help parents raise children with special needs. Likewise, searching for adoptive parents may disclose an abundance of families who are willing to raise such a child, which in turn would seem to weaken the moral acceptability of hastily employing selective infanticide (Morrow, 2000).
The moral difficulties of Baby Doe have required physicians to deliberate the most accountable ways to put into practice new technologies. Federal regulations have often had significant resistance, especially by physicians who think that the medical profession can meet the moral disputes of medicine without duress. Such optimism is warranted if physicians fulfill their duty to explain to the public the ineradicable presence of disease, disability, and less-than-maximum utility in our society. At that point in time, they keep hold of the right to advocate for the sensible and compassionate use of life-saving intercessions. When physicians employ in collective moral communication they can create successful therapeutic alliances with their patients and their patients' families. Then, with collaborative and empathetic decision-making, they will make an increasingly crowded NICU a good place to live (Morrow, 2000).
Counselor involvement with families of severely disabled infants calls for consideration...
Christian Biotechnology: Not a Contradiction in Terms Presented with the idea of "Bioethics" most people in the scientific community today immediately get the impression of repressive, Luddite forces wishing to stifle research and advancement in the name of morality and God. Unfortunately, this stereotype too often holds true. If one looks over the many independent sites on the Internet regarding bioethics, reads popular magazines and publications, or browses library shelves for
Sleep deprivation is frequently a direct result of the need for intensive care, constant surveillance and monitoring that combine to limit the opportunities for uninterrupted sleep in the intensive care unit (ICU). The problem is multifactorial, with patients' chronic underlying illness, pain, pharmacological interventions used for the treatment of the primary illness, as well as the ICU environment itself have all been shown to be contributing factors to the process
consent a "yes or no" response? Enhancing the shared decision-making process for persons with aphasia Informed consent constitutes a legal and moral requisite for any research works that involve fellow human beings. Study subjects are provided information regarding every element of a study trial deemed to be vital for subjects' decision-making, including study significance with respect to societal welfare and for advancing the medical field. After an examination of every
Of this group. 50% were male, 50% were female, 38% were White, 35% were Black, and 16% were Hispanic. Adoption statistics are difficult to find because reporting is not as complete as it should be. The government spent $2.6 billion dollars to conduct the 1990 Census, but still it under-represented minorities and categorized children as "natural or by adoption" without differentiating, while special laws were implemented to "protect" and
Falls THE ISSUE OF ACCIDENTAL FALLS At some point, anyone who had learned how to walk has had the experience of falling down -- it is a universal experience for infants as they gain ambulatory ability. In hospitals, however, the accidental fall is the most reported type of patient safety incident, with elderly patient populations displaying a particular vulnerability (Oliver 2007, p.173). Approximately one-third of adults over the age of sixty-five will
In March of 2005, she was finally removed from life support and died thirteen days later. The case had 14 appeals, numerous motions, petitions and hearings in Florida courts, five suits in the Federal District Court; Florida legislation struck down by the Supreme Court of Florida; a subpoena by a congressional committee in an attempt to qualify Terri for witness protection; federal legislation and four denials of certiorari from
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