People in extraordinary situations are vulnerable. As research participants, they are additionally threatened by abuse or exploitation and the possibility of harm through research. To protect people against these threats, informed consent as an instrument of self-determination has been introduced. Self-determination requires autonomous persons, who voluntarily make decisions based on their values and morals. However, in nursing research, this requirement cannot always be met. Advanced age, chronic illness, co-morbidity and frailty are reasons for dependencies. These in turn lead to limited abilities or opportunities for decision-making and self-determination. Exclusion of vulnerable people from research projects would disadvantage them by not covering their needs, which would violate the ethical principles of justice and beneficence. Commonly, vulnerability is attributed to social groups. The consequence for individuals, attributed as belonging to such a vulnerable group, is that the principles of respect for autonomy, justice and beneficence are subordinated to the principle of non-maleficence, understood as avoiding the risk to cause more harm than good. In addition, group-specific attribution could lead to stigmatizing because labelling a person as deviation from a norm violates integrity. For clinical nursing research, the question arises how the protection of vulnerable people could be granted without compromising ethical principles. The concept of relational ethics provides a possible approach. It defines vulnerability as the relation between a person's health status and the extent to which this person is dependent on the researcher and the research context. Vulnerability is not attributed solely to a person but to a situation, meaning the person is viewed in context. By combining vulnerability as a context-related and situational concept with existing approaches of informed consent, the different ethical principles can be balanced and preserved at every step of the research process.

Aim Analysis of the concept and development of a conceptual definition of homebound. Background Homebound persons have a significantly higher mortality risk as well as physical and psychosocial burden. A clarification of the term is necessary to develop preventive measures. Design Concept analysis. Data Sources Scientific literature from electronic databases (CINAHL, Medline via PubMed, PsycINFO, PsycArticles, and Scopus) and definitions from online dictionaries. Review Methods Walker and Avant's method was applied to guide the concept analysis. To prevent arbitrary and empty results in determining the attributes, antecedents, and consequences a thematic analysis was carried out. Results Homebound is defined as an enduring condition in which the life‐space is reduced to the home, but moving around in the home is possible (by walking short distances alone or by holding on to furniture, or with the help of a stick, walker, or another person). Homebound has six attributes: in need of help in ADL/IADL and in leaving the life‐space, powerlessness, life‐space confinement, mobility limitation, endurance, and weakness. Physiological instability and physical immobility are antecedents with wide‐ranging influencing factors as illness, complexity, burden, and endogenous/exogenous booster. Homebound has also wide‐ranging consequences such as the progression of inactivity, physical, psychosocial, and/or spiritual problems. Conclusions The multidimensional concept of homebound modifies the concepts of mobility and immobility. Given the extensive consequences of homebound nurses play a central role in the prevention.

The introduction of and the commitment to evidence-based nursing in all care settings have led to a rapid increase of intervention and outcome-based research programs. Yet, the topics of nursing research are not only affected by interventions and outcomes but also affected by the concept of caring derived from humanistic philosophy. Considering this twofold orientation of nursing science, nuanced ethical regulations for nursing research programs are called for. In addition to the different research approaches, further arguments for ethical regulations are as follows: first, the different degrees of contextualization and the variety of participation models regarding the target groups; second, the capacities and opportunities of participants; and third, the caring relationship between nurses and research subjects. To capture these special features of nursing science, four approaches to fill the gaps in existing ethical regulations for nursing research are proposed: (a) process orientation, (b) community orientation, (c) context orientation, and (d) relation orientation.

Background: Local confinement and bedridden are important phenomena in nursing care. Nevertheless, conceptual definitions and appropriate nursing diagnoses are missing in the current nursing classification systems. Aim: The aim is to provide the basis for a conceptual definition. To this end, the current state of the German and English usage of the terms local confinement and bedridden are presented. At the same time, definitions of English-language terms, which are internationally widely recognized, are elaborated. Additionally, phenomena associated with local confinement and bedridden are recorded and delimited of each other. Method: The identification of the German and English conceptual usage takes place through an integrative literature review covering the period from 1990 to 2016. Results: There are a variety of English-language terms of location confinement and bedridden. The concepts of homebound, wheelchairbound and bedridden form of local confinement and bedridden most extensively. Instability, immobility is connected as cause and inactivity as a consequence. In contrast to this is bedrest, which is ordered and temporally limited. Conclusions: Local confinement and bedridden are to be viewed through the definition of boundedness. The antecedents (instability, immobility) must be diagnosed to derive adequate interventions to avoid or alleviate the consequences.

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