The five most important ways to protect participants in a nursing study include firstly, acquiring information with consent of the relevant persons of authority (Polit & Beck 2014). Where participants are minors, parents or legal guardians must be involved and where they are adults, they must be well informed of the purpose of the research and clearly requested for permission to proceed, orally or in writing. In doing so, the researcher practices transparency by engaging within legal requirements. The researcher thus makes his or her interviewees comfortable and protects them as well as herself.
Secondly, researchers must ensure that the interviewee is well protected through ensuring that they maintain all due confidentiality, and that they do not reveal any of sensitive information that shall have been provided to them by the respondents (Polit & Beck 2014). It is important to carry out anonymous researches where one may and ensure that information is protected through protection of lines during phone calls and unique data codes. This is because researchers have a responsibility toward their correspondents and aim at achieving only the most relevant information.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Third, is to regulate codes based on the principles of justice, beneficence and respect. In this manner, the researcher ensures that research itself does not pose risk on participants more than it benefits them and that it regards sociocultural issues such as religion and personal beliefs.
Fourth is to consider the risk of harm on interviewees that involve psychosocial influence such as stigmatization that is not necessarily physical harm but is indeed damage. Depression and loss of such things as insurance, distress from personal relationships and emotional stress are things to bear in mind (Polit & Beck 2014). Researchers must understand that these are influenced by age, ethnicity, and gender and do a proper review of a society prior to carrying out the actual research in order to be prepared for it. Such are the ethics of professionals in the medical profession following their primary goal to protect and nurture the vulnerable in society.
Lastly, it is crucial to consider vulnerable subjects and their needs. Should a research go into an environment with disadvantaged people, economically and socially, the mentally ill, pregnant women, minors or prisoners, should it involve fetuses, cognitively challenged or other sensitive members, then it should aim at being as simple as possible and definitely anonymous (Polit & Beck 2014). In such cases as where the research may not be avoided then involvement of these groups ought to be regarded with the greatest precaution. It is important to note that engaging such members of society is likely to be unnecessary unless where they are the target groups.
References
Polit, D. F. & Beck, C. T. (2014). Essentials of nursing research: Appraising evidence for nursing practice (8th Ed). ISBN-13: 860-1406053441 Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
