Ethical Decision Making in Clinical Practice

The value of nurse bioethicists

“…He wrote of his conviction that “[T]he issues of the field, whether birth, life, or death, should always be looked at through the lens of every discipline that has something of pertinence to say. A corollary conviction was that no single discipline could claim to have a privileged status in the analysis of ethical issues.” 19 In addition, Frank Leavitt, an important 20 th century voice in bioethics, predicted in 1996 that “within 20 years, some of the most important people in bioethics will be nurses,” 10 primarily because of their clinical experience, but also because nurses are well-suited to be bioethics educators and researchers. The statement by Leavitt is not meant to be exclusionary of other important and diverse voices in bioethics but recognizes that nurses bring a distinctive and valuable point of view to bioethics.…”

“…Their early writings are wide ranging, addressing topics such as the importance of caring and caregiving, advocacy, ethical decision making, resuscitation, truth-telling, research ethics, professionalism, and the value of ethics education. [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] In fact, more than 40 years ago, Mila Aroskar 5 argued for faculty and administrative commitment to the study of bioethics in nursing practice, recognizing that nurses are "particularly vulnerable" to ethical issues that can create both personal and professional conflicts.…”