A Descriptive Study to Assess the Knowledge and Practice Regarding Legal and Ethical Aspects among Staff Nurses
Journal Title: International Journal of Health Sciences and Research - Year 2017, Vol 7, Issue 5
Abstract
Introduction- Legal ethics is a term used to describe the code of conduct governing professional behavior, which establishes the nature of obligations owed to individuals and to society to interact with one another. In modern society, ethics defines how individuals, professionals and corporations choose to interact with one another. Legal ethics is the minimum standard of the appropriate conduct within the legal profession. According to medical dictionary the word ethics is derived from the Greek word ‘Ethos’ which means “character” and from the Latin word ‘Mores’ which means “customs”. Nursing ethics is a system of principles governing the conduct of a nurse and is a branch of applied ethics that concerns itself with activities in the field of nursing. These are the values or moral principles governing relationships between the nurse and patient, the patient’s family, other members of the health profession and the general public. The code of ethics for registered nurses is a statement of ethical commitment of nurses to those they serve. Nurses have developed it for their profession and set forth the ethical standards by which they are to conduct their nursing practice (CANcode of ethics 2002). The legal implications of nursing practice are related to licensure, state and federal laws, scope of practice and a public expectation that nurses practice at a high professional standard. Materials & Method- Fifty (50) staff nurses of Civil Hospital, Phase-6, Mohali were selected by consecutive sampling as per inclusion and exclusion criteria. The data was collected from subjects by structured questionnaire, consisting of socio-bio-demographic characteristics, questionnaire regarding legal and ethical aspects and checklist regarding practice of legal and ethical aspects related to drug administration. Result- The study findings revealed that the mean knowledge score of subjects regarding legal and ethical aspects was 17.44 ± 4.44 and maximum mean practice score of the subjects regarding legal and ethical aspects of drug administration was 13.36 ± 1.66. It also showed that maximum 42 (80.00%) of subjects had average level of knowledge and majority 49 (98.00%) of subjects had good level of practice. The statistical testing of knowledge and practice association revealed a moderately positive correlation. The association of knowledge and practice with various socio-bio-demographic variables (i.e.,- age and professional experience) when statistically tested showed no significant association of p>0.05. Whereas in the statistical testing of association of knowledge and practice with professional qualification, only practice was found to be significant at p<0.05. Conclusion- It was concluded that majority of subjects 41 (82.00%) had average level of knowledge regarding legal and ethical aspects with mean ± SD of 17.44 ± 1.44. It also revealed the mean practice score regarding legal and ethical aspects related to drug administration as 13.36 ± 1.66 and maximum 48 (96.00%) had good level of practice.
Authors and Affiliations
Sandeep Kaur
Keywords
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