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In recent years, the human values at the heart of the nursing profession seem to have become side-lined by an increased focus on managerialist approaches to health care provision. Nursing's values are in danger of becoming marginalised further precisely because that which nursing does best - providing care and helping individuals through the human trauma of illness - is difficult to measure, and therefore plays little, if any, part in official accounts of outcome measures. Derek Sellman sets out the case for re-establishing the primacy of the virtues that underpin the practice of nursing in order to address the question: what makes a good nurse? He provides those in the caring professions wi...
Short case studies, based on real stories from the health care arena, ensure that each chapter of this book is rooted in descriptions of nursing practise that are grounded, salient narratives of nursing care. The reader is assisted to explore the ethical dimension of nursing practice: what it is and how it can be portrayed, discussed, and analysed within a variety of practice and theoretical contexts. One of the unique contributions of this book is to consider nursing not only in the context of the individual nurse – patient relationship but also as a social good that is of necessity limited, due to the ultimate limits on the nursing and health care resource. This book will help the reader...
In this work, Botin begins by reflecting on the development of electronic records in the Danish healthcare system. Richard Cooper takes the theme of electronic health records into the field of pharmacy. On the face of it both of these would seem to provide a way of improving service. However, the more we use technology the more it is important to examine underlying values and ethical issues, and this leads to an increased focus on developing and maintaining the autonomy and responsibility of the patient or customer. Rolv Blaker, Eileen Nafstad and Norman Andressen then take the focus to psychology. Blaker directly addresses the ideology that may be predominant in a society and thus may be re...
The guidelines and skills required to become a nurse are always changing and it can be difficult to stay up-to-date with the current standards. This book has been specifically designed to address the main skills you need to meet NMC requirements. Becoming a Nurse will demystify what you need to know while preparing you to meet NMC standards and become a confident, practising professional. The book introduces the many subjects outside the biological which are none the less essential for both pre-registration and practising nurses. This new edition has been thoroughly updated throughout, and includes four new chapters on psychosocial concepts for nursing; sociological concepts for nursing; spi...
This book examines the services that chaplains provide to dying patients and the unique relationship that palliative care staff construct with people at the end of life. It explores the nature of hope when faced with the inevitable and develops a theory of spiritual care rooted in relationship that has implications for all healthcare professionals.
What does it mean to be a good professional? What is the role of courage in professional life? How do we develop the moral qualities of respectfulness, justice and care? Firmly rooted in practice, this book is a timely exploration of the nature and value of a virtue-based approach to ethics in health and social care. Skilfully drawing on relevant moral philosophical literature, Part I offers a clear yet critical account of virtue ethics. Virtue ethics bases ethical evaluations on the moral qualities or character traits of professional practitioners. This approach, the authors argue, is a vital counter-balance to the recent emphasis in professional ethics on the regulation of conduct by rules and procedures. Part II explores the key virtues of professional wisdom, courage, respectfulness, care, trustworthiness, justice and integrity. Each chapter starts with examples from practice and ends with strategies for cultivating these key virtues in education and practice. Ethics in Professional Life is a challenging and original text that is ideal reading for all students, practitioners and academics in the field of health and social care.
Despite sustained debate and progress the evolving thing that is evidence based nursing or practice (EBP) continues to dangle a variety of conceptual and practical loose threads. Moreover, when we think about what is being asked of students and registered or licenced practitioners in terms of EBP, it is difficult not to concede that this ‘ask’ is in many instances quite large and, occasionally, it may be unachievable. EBP has and continues to improve patient, client and user care. Yet significant questions concerning its most basic elements remain unresolved and, if nurses are to contribute to the resolution or reconfiguration of these questions then, as a first step, we must acknowledge...
Ethical Maturity in the Helping Professions provides a comprehensive overview of the most influential ideas in ethical thinking across the ages. It explores the ethical challenges through an interdisciplinary approach and presents a brand new model for becoming ethically mature professionals in the process.
First used to describe the weariness the public felt toward media portrayals of societal crises, the term compassion fatigue has been taken up by health professionals to name—along with burnout, vicarious traumatization, compassion stress, and secondary traumatic stress—the condition of caregivers who become “too tired to care.” Compassion, long seen as the foundation of ethical caring, is increasingly understood as a threat to the well-being of those who offer it. Through the lens of hermeneutic phenomenology, the authors present an insider’s perspective on compassion fatigue, its effects on the body, on the experience of time and space, and on personal and professional relationsh...
Written for those involved in care services, this book aims to improve understanding of communication and relationships in health and social care settings, enabling critical reflection on practice and experience.