Legal & Ethical Flashcards
The HIPAA law was passed by congress in-
1996
What does HIPAA protect?
Health insurance benefits for workers who lose or change jobs
Also protects people with preexisting medical conditions
What is ethics?
The moral principles that govern a person’s behavior or the conducting of an activity
What’s morality?
Personal values, character, or conduct of individuals within communities or societies
Ethical principle can be used with what to determine a course of action?
Clinical judgement
What is an ethical principle?
A general guide, basic truth, or assumption
What are the 4 ethical principles?
Beneficence
Nonmaleficence
Autonomy
Justice
What is a code of ethics?
Set for a profession. Makes their primary obligations, values, and ideals explicit
What’s provision 1 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse practices within compassion and respect toward every person
What’s provision 2 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse promotes and advocates for and protects the rights, health, and safety of the patient
What’s provision 3 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse’s primary commitment is to the patient; whether it be an individual, family, group, community, or population
What’s provision 4 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse has accountability, authority, and responsibility to promote health and safety, preserve the wholeness or character and integrity, maintain competence, and continue personal and professional growth
What’s provision 5 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse owes the same duties to self as others, including the responsibility to promote health and safety, preserve wholeness of character and integrity, maintain competence, and continue personal and professional growth
What’s provision 6 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse, through individual and collective effort, establishes maintains, and improves the ethical environment of the work setting and conditions of employment that are conductive to safe, quality health care
What’s provision 7 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse, in all roles and settings, advances the profession through research and scholarly inquiry, professional standards development, and the generation of both nursing and health policy
What’s provision 8 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The nurse collaborates with other health professionals and the public to protect human rights, promote health diplomacy, and reduce health disparities
What’s provision 9 of the ANA Code of Ethics?
The profession of nursing, collectively through its professional orgs, must articulate nursing values, maintain the integrity of the profession, and integrate principles of social Justice into nursing and health policy
In addition to publishing the code of ethics, what else was established to help nurses navigate ethical and value conflicts and life-and-death decisions?
The ANA Center for Ethics & Human Rights
What is beneficence?
Moral duty to promote the course of action that they believe is in the best interests of the patient
What is non-maleficence?
Doing the least amount of harm necessary while trying to achieve the best possible outcome for the client
What is autonomy?
Self-regulation. Independence
What is justice?
Impartial, fair, and equitable standards and care for all clients
What is social justice?
Change in health policy aimed at analysis and critique of social structures, laws, and customs that harm groups through exclusion. Every person has the right to quality health care
What does HIPAA establish?
Standards to protect the privacy of personal health info
What does the Emergency Medical Treatment & Active Labor Act (EMTLA) do?
Requires facilities to provide emergency medical treatment to patients who seek healthcare in the emergency department regardless of ability to play (socioeconomic status), legal status, or citizenship status
The EMTLA sets forward the obligation for medical facilities to always-
Provide medical screening to determine whether an emergency exists and to stabilize the patient before transferring them to another healthcare facility
The Patient Self-Determination Act of 1991 does what?
Recognizes the patients right to make decisions regarding their own healthcare provider, regarding the medical or surgical treatment options available, the benefits, risks, and alternatives
What are 2 types of legal written advance directives-
The Living Will
Durable Power of Attorney for Healthcare
What’s a Living Will?
Prepared by a competent individual that gives direction to other’s about the person’s wishes regarding life-prolonging treatments if the person becomes unable to make those decisions
What’s a Durable Power of Attorney for Healthcare?
Identifies a person who will make healthcare decision in the event the patient is unable to do so. The person given the right to do so. The person given the right to do so is called the surrogate decision maker
What are the 4 ANA responsibilities?
Listen to patients to identify their concerns, expectations, and hopes regarding end of life care.
Review patient’s documented preferences upon admission to healthcare facilities.
Recognize that advance care planning is a continual process and not a one time execution of documents.
Encourage the patient and family participation in healthcare decisions about advance directives and end-of-life care.
When and why was the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) created?
Created in 1990 to provide protection against discrimination of individuals with disabilities
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) says that employers must-
Provide reasonable accommodations within the work setting to allow employees with disabilities to perform their jobs
What do Mandatory Reporting Laws require healthcare workers to report?
That healthcare workers report communicable diseases, and any kind of abuse or neglect
What’s the intent of mandatory reporting laws?
To protect people who can’t protect themselves
What are Good Samaritan Laws designed to do?
Protect from liability those who provide emergency care to someone who is in need of medical services
In order to be protected by Good Samaritan Laws, one must:
Provide the care in an emergency situation
Provide the care in a reasonably competent manner
Provide the care voluntarily
Not provide care if refused to do so
What are Nurse Practice Acts?
Statutory laws passed by each state’s legislative body that define the practice of nursing
What do Nurse Practice Acts define?
The scope of nursing practice
What do Nurse Practice Acts regulate and why?
Nursing practice to protect the health, safety, and welfare of the general public
What approves pre-licensure nursing programs to students?
Nurse Practice Acts
What is medical malpractice?
Lawsuits brought against healthcare providers for damages when there has been death of, injury to, or loss of the person being treated
Medical malpractice laws differ from state to state
True or false
True
Institutional Policies and Procedures are-
Usually more pacific and detailed than standards set by professional organizations
Healthcare facilities should not have policies and procedures that conflict with-
The Nurse Practice Act, Professional Standards of Practice, the ANA Code of Ethics, or other documents that guide nursing practice
The ANA Code of Ethics describes-
Standards of professional responsibility for nurses and provides insight into ethical and acceptable behavior.
What describes a nurses’ obligations for safe, compassionate, non-discriminatory, and quality care while defining commitments to self, the patient, employer, and the profession?
The ANA Code of Ethics
The Patient Care Partnership replaced the-
American Association’s Patient Bill of Rights
The Patient Care Partnership ensures that patients have the right to expect:
High quality care
Clean and safe environment
Involvement in care
Protection of privacy
Help when leaving the hospital
Help with billing claims
What is a Nurse Practice Act?
A provision that creates and empowers state board of nursing to regulate the practice of nursing in that state
NPA’s remain the same in every state
True or false?
False.
NPA’S vary from state to state, but do have very similar components
What’s one of the most important functions of the State Boards of Nursing?
To provide requirements for licensure
What are the 5 steps to becoming a licensed nurse?
- Graduate from approved/ accredited program
- Meet established character criteria
- Undergo a criminal background check and fingerprinting
- Pass the NCLEX
- Some states require extra examinations before receiving a permanent license
In order to follow the nursing Scope of Practice, what do nurses need to be familiar with?
The scope at their level of care and how to implement care that is consistent with their scope of practice
Felonies are crimes that can result in how much prison time?
Over a year
Most misdemeanors are crimes that can result in how much prison time?
Less than a year of imprisonment
Assault, battery, and petty theft are all examples of-
Misdemeanors
Is assisted suicide a misdemeanor or a felony?
A felony
What is a tort?
Carrying out/ failing to carry out an act, which results in harm to the patient
What are Quasi Intentional Torts?
Actions that inure a person’s reputation. Involves written or oral communication
What is Libel?
The written/ published form of defamation
What is Slander?
The spoken or verbal form of defamation
What’s an intentional tort?
An action taken by one person with the intent to harm another person
What are the most common unintentional torts?
Negligence and Malpractice
What is Negligence and Malpractice?
Negligence = Failure to use ordinary or reasonable care or the failure to act in a reasonable and prudent manner
Malpractice = Similar, but involves medical personnel such as physicians and nurses
Whenever you violate a person’s rights to be left alone, you are committing a-
Violation of Privacy
What is Fraud?
A false representation of significant facts by word or conduct- intentional misleading or deceiving another person
What are 3 things that you can do to minimize malpractice risks?
Perform timely assessments and document findings
Communicate and document all changes to healthcare provider
Use the proper chain of command and timely care
When charting, what must you report and document?
All interactions with clients, as well as any non-compliance or refusal of treatment. Document all telephone conversations-time, content of communication, and action taken
What are 6 ways that you can chart things correctly?
Document the facts, not opinions
Be accurate
Be timely
Be complete
Be diligent- document anything unusual
Document assessments
If a standard of care or something unusual has occurred (patient/ visitor fall) what do you need to do?
File an incident or variance report
What are incident reports used for and not used for?
Used for quality improvement
Not used to discipline staff
What are the goals of incident reports?
Prevent it from happening again
What do you need to document when making a incident report?
Be complete and precise, document location, time, and date
A RN should never delegate to LPNs or CNAs patients who-
Require complex care, are unpredictable, require nursing judgement, or involve a high level of interaction
Are nursing students held to the same standards of care as licensed nurses?
Yes
