The ethical principle of fidelity calls on nurses to stay loyal to patients and keep the commitments they make to them.
Missing Word
fidelity
Fidelity means faithfulness: keeping promises and staying loyal to the patient. Honoring commitments builds the trust the nurse-patient relationship depends on.
Category: Ethical Principles
Question 2
When a clinician overrides a competent patient's informed choice because the clinician believes another option is better for the patient, the clinician is practicing paternalism.
Missing Word
paternalism
Paternalism is acting on what a professional judges best for a patient in place of the patient's own decision. It conflicts with autonomy, the right of a competent patient to make their own care decisions, even ones the care team disagrees with.
Category: Ethical Principles
Question 3
Patient teaching that combines several methods, such as spoken explanation, written handouts, and hands-on practice, is called multimodal education, and it helps meet different learning needs.
Missing Word
multimodal
Multimodal teaching uses a variety of methods so that patients who learn best by hearing, seeing, reading, or doing can all take in the information. Matching methods to the patient's needs and health literacy is part of providing education ethically and equitably.
Category: Ethical Patient Education
Question 4
Disciplinary action by a state board of nursing can include suspension or revocation of a nurse's license.
Missing Word
license
A license is the legal permission to practice nursing granted by a state. Boards of nursing can suspend or revoke it when a nurse's practice endangers patients.
Category: Practice Challenges
Question 5
A nurse who accepts a patient assignment and then leaves the unit without handing off care may be charged with abandonment of the patient.
Missing Word
abandonment
Abandonment occurs when a nurse who has taken responsibility for a patient leaves or becomes unavailable without ensuring care continues. It can lead to discipline and loss of licensure.
Category: Refusing Care
Question 6
When a patient has written instructions about future treatment, such as refusing a ventilator, a copy of the patient's advance directive is placed in the medical record so the care team can follow those wishes.
Missing Word
directive
An advance directive records a patient's treatment wishes in case the patient later cannot speak for themselves. Keeping a copy in the record lets the team honor the patient's autonomy at the end of life instead of relying on memory or a spoken comment.
Category: Practice Challenges
Question 7
A nurse who weighs the risks of two treatments and advocates for the one least likely to injure the patient is applying the principle of nonmaleficence.
Missing Word
nonmaleficence
Nonmaleficence is the duty to do no harm. It requires attention to the risks and benefits of each intervention and choosing the option that causes the least harm.
Category: Ethical Principles
Question 8
After teaching a patient to change a wound dressing, the nurse asks the patient to perform the dressing change while the nurse watches; this check of learning is called a return demonstration.
Missing Word
demonstration
In a return demonstration the patient performs the skill that was taught, which shows whether the patient can actually do it safely at home. It lets the nurse correct errors before discharge rather than assuming the teaching was understood.
Category: Ethical Patient Education
Question 9
When a clinician directly gives a substance intended to end a patient's life to relieve suffering, the act is called euthanasia, which differs from assisted dying, in which the patient takes the substance.
Missing Word
euthanasia
Euthanasia is the deliberate ending of a patient's life by another person to relieve suffering. Laws on these practices differ by jurisdiction, and they are a source of ethical, political, and legal debate.
Category: Ethical Decision Making
Question 10
Unlike competence, which is decided by a court, capacity is a clinical judgment about whether a patient can understand information and weigh the consequences of a decision.
Missing Word
capacity
Decision-making capacity is assessed by clinicians and can change with illness or treatment. A patient with capacity can accept or refuse care, so assessing it is a key step when a decision is in dispute.
Category: Ethical Decision Making
Question 11
Applying restraints to keep a confused patient from pulling out tubes creates an ethical conflict because it trades the patient's freedom of movement for safety.
Missing Word
restraints
Restraints limit a patient's movement. Their use requires weighing the loss of the patient's freedom and dignity against the gain in safety, which is why they are a common source of ethical conflict.
Category: Ethical Decision Making
Question 12
A situation in which a nurse must choose between courses of action that each conflict with an ethical principle, so that no choice is fully satisfactory, is called an ethical dilemma.
Missing Word
dilemma
In an ethical dilemma, honoring one principle, such as autonomy, means giving up part of another, such as beneficence. Nurses work through a dilemma with a structured decision-making process and can seek help from the ethics committee.
Category: Ethical Decision Making
Question 13
Helping patients work through billing, insurance, and legal questions is part of the nurse's role in advocacy.
Missing Word
advocacy
Advocacy means supporting and speaking up for a cause or a person. Nurses advocate by communicating with providers, protecting patients' rights, providing teaching, and helping patients navigate the health-care system.
Category: Reporting and Advocacy
Question 14
A nurse whose ability to practice safely is reduced by alcohol or drug use or by a mental or physical illness has an impairment, which must be reported to protect patients.
Missing Word
impairment
Impairment means a nurse cannot practice safely because of substance use or a health condition. Colleagues report it through the supervisor so patients are protected and the nurse can be referred for help and recovery.
Category: Reporting and Advocacy
Question 15
Unlike privacy, which is a patient's right to control access to their personal information, confidentiality is the professional's duty to protect information a patient has shared.
Missing Word
confidentiality
Confidentiality is the duty of health-care workers to protect what patients disclose to them. It applies to all personal and clinical information, in every setting, at work and off duty.
Category: Privacy and Confidentiality