Theme 2: Ethics

Question 1

What are the four principles of ethics?

Answer 1

Beneficence, nonmaleficence, autonomy, and justice

Question 2

What is autonomy?

Answer 2

respecting the decision-making capacities of autonomous persons; enabling individuals to make reasoned informed choices.

Question 3

What is non maleficence?

Answer 3

This is the principle of doing no harm to patients. Beauchamp and Childress state: “the principle of non- maleficence obligates us to refrain from causing harm to others.” This may be intentional or unintentional, however, both can apply to laws of negligence

E.g
Intentionally imposing unreasonable risks of harm. An example of this would be a nurse who knowingly does not change a patient’s bandage despite the increased risk of infection.

Question 4

What is beneficence?

Answer 4

Beneficence, or doing good, not only “requires that we treat persons autonomously and refrain from harming them, but also that we contribute to their welfare.” In other words, we must do some good for the patient. A simple example of this would be a patient being treated for a heart attack in an A+E department. Here, there is positive action to help the patient recover from their ailment.

Question 5

What is justice?

Answer 5

In the case of healthcare we consider distributive justice which is defined as the “fair, equitable, and appropriate distribution of benefits and norms.” Often healthcare resources can be limited so it is the job of public health and healthcare professionals to consider how best to distribute them. This can be a difficult task and even in the UK we can see inequalities in healthcare based on geographic locations and socioeconomic factors.