Implementing Ethics Education for Nurse Managers
Abstract
Background
According to World Health Organization, 42.7 million patients suffer injuries and 8 million die because of poor-quality health care (WHO, 2019). Every day, nurses are faced with making decisions for patient care and may come across complicated ethical decisions. Ethical practice is essential in every health care organization in providing care and how they conduct themselves (ANA, 2015). Nurse managers are responsible for ensuring ethical standards are met by nursing staff.
Problem
In the last three years nurses have been challenged with an increase in complex ill patients, nursing shortage and burnout that encumbers recognizing ethical dilemmas. There is indication that nurses are deficient in knowledge of ethical principles that affect decisions for patient care. A personal discovery of nurses’ unethical practice causing poor patient outcomes and creating a hostile workplace provoked to explore if ethics education would improve ethics knowledge, improve patient outcomes, and create a positive work culture.
Methods
A quantitative cross-sectional study was performed that compared survey results before and after ethics training. Participants included nurse managers and charge nurses from two Indian Health Service hospitals. A sample t-test was performed to determine the effectiveness of education.
Results
The findings of the study indicate there was improvement in knowledge of nursing ethics after receiving training. The t-test revealed a statistically significant increase from pretest knowledge (M = 86, SD = 2.74), to posttest knowledge (M = 95.2, SD = 6.57) is found t (5) = -3.07, p value = 0.037042, P value of 0.05 indicating statistical significance.
