Legal and Ethical Issues of Advanced Practice Nursing Week 1 Practice Experience

Case Study: Ethical Obligations of the RN-Ethics Committee Report

Facts: Mr. Freily suffered head injuries from a fight in a barroom approximately one year ago. This wasn’t his first fight; in fact, his parents are not comfortable with him going to bars, although he is 38, because he is “developmentally delayed.” His nurse, T. Mack, RN, notices on his chart that he has a “bruised” frontal lobe of his brain and the neurosurgeon in charge of this case performed a prefrontal lobotomy. In her 20 years as a neurosurgery ICU nurse, she has never seen this type of a procedure done for a “bruised” brain.

The chair of the hospital ethics committee has asked you to review the above case and to synthesize a 2 page formal report regarding the following:

1.  Analyze Nurse Mack’s ethical obligations in this situation

2.  What next steps should Nurse Mack take?

3.  State the Code of Ethics provisions in defense of the proposed next steps.