Introduction
Ethical dilemmas refer to situations wherein a professional is stuck between two or more issues with similar values. As such, they are stranded on what to decide because consequences are inevitable regardless of their choice. Similarly, in the medical profession, nurses and physicians are often faced with ethical issues requiring them to make decisions that conflict with their conscience, patients’ needs, and medical ethics. Some of the common causes of ethical dilemmas among nurses include difficult medical choices, treatment refusal among patients, and conflicting patients’ beliefs. It is essential to delve into how patients’ addiction to prescription drugs poses an ethical predicament to nurses.
Healthcare Scenario
Nurses are at times faced with ethical impasses that influence their practices. For instance, when a patient is brought into the hospital’s emergency room with fatal injuries from a motor vehicle accident, the emergency doctor on duty will admit the patient for cross-examination. The patient is not new to the hospital since he has been admitted before because of drug addiction and abuse, meaning the staff knows him and understands he has a problem with pain drugs. After examining the patient, the attending physician orders an X-Ray imaging to inspect his fractured limb (Faubion, 2022). However, while waiting for the X-Ray, the patient persistently cries that his leg is hurting and thus asks the doctor for pills to relieve the pain. However, the doctor declined the appeal for pain drugs because that would cause a relapse for the patient.
The scenario presents a dilemma for the nurses caring for the patient. The nurses are stuck between ignoring the doctor’s orders and giving the patient the much-needed m pain tablet or reporting to the supervisor. Nonetheless, going to the supervisor would be seen as insubordination and thus attract penalties. Conversely, ignoring doctors’ orders would lead to legal retribution because they would put the patient in danger of possible reversion or encourage their addiction problem (Faubion, 2022). Though the drugs may have adverse effects on a patient, the pain has a worse effect on patients since it impacts their mental and physical well-being. As such, the attending doctor has to provide an alternative method of reducing the pain that would not endanger the patient’s health.
To ensure that the alternative medication procedure is as per the law, the attending physician employed the four basic principles of ethical concerns: beneficence, justice, non-maleficence, and autonomy. Beneficence emphasizes the importance of ensuring that all medical procedures done on a patient are for their good (Olejarczyk & Young, 2021). The Nonmaleficence code states that health practitioners should not cause harm to the patient and should work to ensure they experience minimum pain. Autonomy, on the other hand, emphasizes the rights of patients to make their own decisions without physician intervention and manipulation (Smeltzer et al., 2017). The Justice principle focuses on the equal and unbiased treatment of all patients. The attending doctors opted for virtual reality therapy, and no drug is involved; it helps to distract the patients from their pain.
Assessment
The procedure was limited to hospitalized patients and thus could not help the in-patients. More so, the technology would be difficult for some healthcare facilities to acquire; its practicability would only be possible in top-tier hospitals. The patients were initially reluctant to wear the Oculus headset gear because they wanted the drugs; however, after persuasion, they agreed to try the headset (Spiegel et al., 2019). Virtual reality therapy uses technology to relieve the patient’s pain; it involves using a VR headset that enables the patient to experience relief (Spiegel et al., 2019). Some of the moral parameters that impacted the application of drug-free therapy were utilitarianism, Kantian deontology, and the beneficence principle. The code emphasizes the patient’s well-being; this means the doctor had to ensure that any pain remedy administered to the patient would be for their good and not add to their addiction problem.
The utilitarianism theory dictates that results justify the means; thus, the doctor had to choose a method that guaranteed the patient’s happiness, hence the drug-free therapy. Kantianism advocates for the sanctity of life; human life is sacred. Thus the physician had to opt for a method that upheld the significance of life rather than giving the patient drugs that would trigger their addiction problem (Mandal et al., 2019). Social technologies would be very significant in creating awareness for better pain of this technology. The technology is still unfamiliar to many; therefore, blogs, Wikipedia, and other social technology platforms would help more people know and understand its importance. These technologies are mandated to help improve the quality of life of the people, following utilitarianism and Kantianism theories.
Conclusion
Nurses are often faced with various ethical dilemmas while executing their duties. In recent years, opioid addiction has increased among patients, thus giving nurses and physicians a hard time deciding how to help the patients without contributing to their addiction. However, improved methods of pain management have been developed, and they have impacted healthcare provision significantly. The practice of this technology is guided by theories like utilitarianism and Kantianism that ensure better patient care.
References
Faubion, D. (2022). 20 Most-Common Examples of Ethical Dilemmas in Nursing. (2022). Nursingprocess.org. Web.
Mandal, J., Ponnambath, D. K., & Parija, S. C. (2019). Utilitarian and deontological ethics in medicine. Tropical Parasitology, 6(1), 5. Web.
Olejarczyk, J. P., & Young, M. (2021). Patient rights and ethics. StatPearls Publishing.
Smeltzer, K. E., Desai, G. J., & Johnson, B. (2017). Ethical Considerations in Prescribing or Withholding Opioids for Chronic Pain. Osteopathic Family Physician, 9(3). Web.
Spiegel, B., Fuller, G., Lopez, M., Dupuy, T., Noah, B., Howard, A.,… & Danovitch, I. (2019). Virtual reality for management of pain in hospitalized patients: A randomized comparative effectiveness trial. PloS One, 14(8), e0219115. Web.