Nursing Legal Issues

There have been a lot of legal issues affecting the nursing profession in recent years. In lieu of this, it is important for nurses to know how to protect themselves from lawsuits through knowing the scope of their legal and ethical responsibilities. The standard procedures have already been laid out on how medications must be administered, securing a consent from the patient or guardian before performing any surgical procedure and so on. Failure to meet these conformed standards will merit a most probable lawsuit.

Looking at a simple perspective, there are five major legal responsibilities that nurses must exercise at all times in order to spare them from legal concerns.

First, upon any physician’s order to perform a procedure, nurses must fully understand the procedure in order to answer any queries that patients and family members will be asking. After thorough explanation of the procedure about to be performed including any possible alternatives, secure a written consent.

Second, always keep in mind to make a documentation of each and every care and procedure performed together with the time it was done. If an erroneous entry was made, cross it out with one line and put in the correction together with the reason for the error.

Third, any allegations of abuse or wrong doing must be reported ASAP to the proper authorities.

Fourth, keep private all patients’ information and records and must only be left accessible to care providers concerned.

Lastly, follow by heart the right dose, right drug, right route, right time, and right patient in administering drugs at all times.