Laws and regulations are a set of rules put in place to regulate the behaviors and conduct of the subjects, and they are enforceable by an established body which penalizes those that don't act by them. In nursing, there are sets of laws aimed at protecting the public health sector which varies from state to state, but a Board of Nursing enforces all fall under the Nurse Practice Act and under the full force and effect of the law. The rules and regulations issue directives on the governing body requirements, education qualifications for nursing, the standards and scope of the nursing practice, licensing requirements and types and the grounds for disciplinary action, other violations, and possible remedies. Ethics are a set of principles and guidelines that guide nurses in their day to day activities and was developed by The American Nurses Association. The laws, regulations, and ethics in nursing are critical in ensuring that the nursing practice is guided by professionalism, altruism, accountability and healthy working relationships for improved health outcomes. They also regulate the nursing practice and licensure process, protect the patients from malpractices, state the scope of the nursing practice and also prevent the nursing practice from government interference.
The nursing laws and regulations uphold professionalism and the integrity of the nursing profession through the established Nurses Practice Act (Baid, Creed & Hargreaves, 2016). The legislation and regulations provided for in the Act state that nurses should be guided by compassion and respect for human dignity. They should uphold professionalism in all their relationships with patients and colleagues and not cross the professional line at all costs (Sellman, 2017). The law also states that the nurses’ acts should be aimed at maximizing the promotion, advocacy for, and protection of the rights, health, and safety of the clients. The nurses are expected to handle the patient's medical records with utmost confidentiality, and all their actions should be guided by the desire to optimize and increase the patients’ health outcomes. The laws and regulations also state that the nurses owe the same duties to self as to others and they should take good care of their health, be wholesome of character and optimize their personal and professional growth while at the job (Dossey, Keegan, Barrere, Helming, Shields, & Avino, 2016). The nurses are also expected to provide a conducive environment for the patients to the best of their ability for improved health outcomes and for assisting the recuperation and the health process. These laws and regulations ensure that the nurses behave with integrity, competence; professionalism and altruism which makes the nursing practice attain a professionally reputable status not only in the medical field but among their other professional peers in other areas (Baid et.al., 2016). The overall impact of the laws and regulations on the nursing practice are, therefore; facilitation of non-biased care for patients, integrity and respect in the nursing practice, personal discipline and alleviation of suffering.
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Laws and regulations and ethics protect the patients and nurses’ rights and needs in the nursing practice (Buka & Watkinson, 2015). Since the legislations and regulations clearly outline the scope of the nurse's obligations, they are protected from an unfair judgment in case a patient wants to seek legal redress for something that was not their fault (Sellman, 2017). The duties of a nurse are listed as writing prescriptions, diagnoses, and cure of acute illnesses, conducting and ordering diagnostic tests to be taken by responsible parties, and recording and examining patient's medical history, diagnosis, and systems (Dossey et.al., 2016). The nurse is also tasked with advising the patient on the best health practices and recommending further medical help if need be and Counseling and educating the patient on health related matters. It is, however, the patient's duty to follow the nurse's directions to achieve the best health outcomes but sometimes there may be issues arising from the patient-nurse interactions. As long as the nurse acted within the scope of their profession and did so ethically, the laws and regulations protect the nurse from prosecution. The laws also protect the patients from being taken advantage of by the nursing practitioners (Fowler, 2015). The licensing process protects them from quacks since they are only issued to deserving nurses with the right accreditations and the required academic qualifications and training.
The code of ethics also prevents the nurses from taking advantage of the information asymmetry between the practitioners and the patients. It ensures that patient’s health records are kept private and confidential (Dossey et.al., 2016). The privacy and confidentiality are critical in creating a safe environment for the patient to share sensitive and personal critical information necessary to the nurse for designing an effective healthcare plan. It also ensures that the nurse can not divulge information contained to third parties unless the laws allow it and they cannot use the information for personal purposes. The ethics also set professional boundaries on how the nurses should relate with each other and with the patients which protect all the parties involved from uncomfortable and untoward workplace behaviors (Sellman, 2017). The result is the creation of conducive healthcare environment where the nurses interact professionally with each other and offer the best services to their patients within the legally permitted boundaries (Buka & Watkinson, 2015). The code of ethics also clearly stipulates that nurses should abstain from handling cases that may cause situations of conflict of interest. The guideline protects the patient from being taken under the care of a nurse whose personal interests interfere with their best health outcomes which could be detrimental to the nurse’s service provision (Fowler, 2015). The laws, regulations, and ethics, therefore, protect the patients and nursing practitioners from harassment, misjudgment, and mistreatment which is critical for continued health services provision.
The ethics made by nurses for nurses are critical in ensuring that the nursing profession runs smoothly and minimizes the need for governmental interference (Dossey et.al., 2016). The laws and code of ethics give accountability the utmost importance in upholding the professionalism and respectability of the nursing profession. The nursing laws, regulations, and code of ethics state that the nursing practitioners have a collective role in upholding nursing values, the integrity of the nursing profession and embedding social justice into the nursing practice and the general health policy (Fowler, 2015). The nurses' right to self-determination and the requirement of continuous self and professional advancement ensures that the chances of the nurses engaging in questionable illegal health practices out of ignorance are minimized (Buka & Watkinson, 2015). The law clearly stipulates that the nurses have the authority, accountability, and responsibility for their decisions when attending to patients. The nurses are ordered to give the promotion of health and the optimization of health care precedence in their decision-making process, and they are held personally liable for those decisions. The emphasis on accountability ensures that the nursing practice is run within the set laws which keep the government and other regulatory bodies from interference in the nursing practice (Baid et.al., 2016). It also ensures that the nurses ensure the primacy of patients needs and also reduce incidents of carelessness at work and lawsuits.
In sum, the code of ethics and the laws and regulations put in place by the professional bodies in charge of the nursing practice impact the profession in a positive way. They provide a scope of the nursing profession, uphold professionalism and accountability and the code of ethics guides workplace behaviors and interactions to create a conducive environment for patients. The impacts are less government interference, accountability by the nurses, protection of the patients and nurses’ rights and improved health outcomes.
References
Baid, H., Creed, F., & Hargreaves, J. (2016). Oxford handbook of critical care nursing . Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
Buka, P., & Watkinson, S. (2015). Patients' rights, law, and ethics for nurses . Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
Dossey, B. M., Keegan, L., Barrere, C., Helming, M. B., Shields, D. A., & Avino, K. M. (2016). Holistic nursing: a handbook for practice . Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Fowler, M. D. (2015). Guide to the code of ethics for nurses with interpretive statements: development, interpretation, and application . Silver Spring, MD: American Nurses Association.
Sellman, D. (2017). Virtue Ethics and Nursing Practice. Key Concepts and Issues in Nursing Ethics, 43-54. Doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-49250-6_4
