Introduction
The policy of informed consent is a legit concept which applies to all healthcare providers and healthcare workers. Such doctrine lies on the premise that each human being of adult years and have a sound mind has the right to identify what shall be down with his own body. In the medical scene, the notion of informed consent has been the considered as one of the important aspects of promoting patient and healthcare providers relationship. The informed consent contexts depend on the unique clinical situations, some jurisdiction may inflict greater or lesser accountabilities on the healthcare providers than others (Liang, 1996).
For a patient to be considered legally informed the policy of informed consent needs a patient to have reasonable knowledge of the procedure and some understanding of the nature of the risks involved in the process. The following are three common clinical scenarios, the unconscious patient, the conscious patient, and the minor patient. Primarily, the goal of this paper is to analyse the informed consent aspects and its complexities to achieve.
Analysis and Discussion
The professional healthcare providers have a duty to respect the patient’s rights because, if the patient would be given enough space to know everything about his or her situation, it can be argued that it can be helpful for the treatment process. The principle of patient’s autonomy expresses that professionals have a job to treat the patient according to the patient’s desire, within the limits of accepted treatment and to protect the patient’s confidentiality and privacy. Under which, the healthcare providers has the core responsibility to let the patients be involved in treatment decisions in a meaningful way.
Given the perception that patients have regularly been as uninformed as they are powerless in health care, the basic prescription has been to inform them and alter that power structure. Impeaching all forms of
paternalism, at least for competent patients, the notion of praxis towards the role of the healthcare providers has advanced the doctrines of informed consent and the right to refuse treatment toward enabling and empowering patients to retain control of their lives in health care (Moujan, 1994).
Informed consent is said to be very complex among patients who are consciously intubated. Accordingly, the policy as well as its protection of bodily self-determination guarantees that in all conditions, the health care providers must respect the refusal of treatment and medication by a patient who can be considered as capable of providing consent. Accordingly, informed consent circumstance is more complex if the patient is conscious but not capable of accurately understanding his or her own medical situation. In such cases, the healthcare providers must evaluate whether the patient is medically incapable, hence not capable of expressly giving informed consent. If the healthcare providers determines that t he patient is medically unresponsive, the healthcare providers must attempt to give consent from a relative of the patient when feasible (Zitter, 1996).
Nonetheless, if no alternate source for the needed consent is available, the healthcare providers may treat the patient without consent if the medical treatment is in the best interest of the patient. The critical question for the
healthcare providers is: under what conditions is a patient medically incapable of giving informed consent? There are some standards identifying the medical incapability of a patient. In general, it has been accepted that the patient’s medical competency to give consent to medical treatment has given emphasis on the patient’s comprehension.
The healthcare providers must evaluates if the patient in need of emergency medical treatment has the mental capacity and ability to reasonably comprehend the following information. These include the nature of the patient’s condition, nature, and effect of any proposed medical treatment, the risks of both continuing any proposed medical treatment and not pursuing any of it. In spite of the objective criteria, the medical competency conscious patient is a subjective assessment of the capacity of the patient to give consent based on the current conditions which affect the patient. Since the assessment is subjective, courts are trying to individualised standards to identify the competency of patient to give informed consent.
In this regard, the burden of the initial competency evaluation is given on the healthcare providers (i.e., the healthcare providers must evaluates
the patient utilising the previously noted criteria). Nonetheless, ultimately the court may provide the final judgment whether a specific patient lacked the needed mental state to be considered as medically competent.
The healthcare providers have a duty to respect the patient’s rights to self-determination and confidentiality which is under the patient autonomy and giving informed consent is part of it. The principle of patient’s autonomy expresses that professionals have a job to treat the patient according to the patient’s desire, within the limits of accepted treatment and to protect the patient’s confidentiality and privacy. Under which, the healthcare providers has the core responsibility to let the patients be involved in treatment decisions in a meaningful way with due consideration being given to the patients’ demands, desire and abilities and safeguarding their private life.
It can be said that consideration of informed consent among patients who are conscious is a great responsibility and healthcare provided are responsible in promoting patient autonomy by means of considering various factors and standards. In the issue of patient autonomy, there are patients which engage themselves
In order to avoid professional issues the healthcare providers must provide patient-centered care based on the demands and needs of the patients. With this, the nurse must be able to provide services which composed of every level of care in a diversified system throughout the lifespan of the patients regardless of their health, status, race, gender, culture, and religion. It is the role of the healthcare providers to deliver high quality competent, effective, efficient, and collaborative care according to the established standards of nursing. The healthcare providers are accountable in every clinical management of practice and they must be able to do their job appropriately. Each member of the healthcare staff must have the ability to value a certain system incorporating the highest level of their ethics, judgment, confidentiality, and respect for every individual’s rights, dignity, and diversity.
The main objective of being a healthcare provider is to assist individuals in the achievement of an optimal level of wellness and provide respect to the choices and desires of the patient. The focus of clinical practice is on individuals’ specific needs based on their healthcare choices related to physiological, psychological, sociocultural, developmental, and spiritual dimensions of individual lifestyles. Hence, informed consent in the condition whereon the patient is consciously intubated, these views are tagged on ethical perspectives which suggests that healthcare providers must be guided by a moral rule of conduct, encouraging each healthcare providers to act truly and justly in which clinical practice entails theory and practice in a dialectical and complementary relationship.
This can be accomplished through the promotion, restoration, and maintenance of health, based on the individual’s level of functioning and perceived needs. Meaning, the role of the healthcare providers is to ensure that their patients have been receiving the services it deserves as an individual seeking for health care and to provide them the respect they wanted. Through health education, the healthcare professional should assists individuals in making informed choices and supports individuals and families in decisions regarding healthcare. The healthcare providers are accountable for providing comprehensive care to individuals, families, and groups in a variety of settings. Healthcare providers have always recognized the rights of clients of all ages to be both informed and active participants in care. It is important for patients to understand that the role of the healthcare providers is to promote & maintain healthy systems putting what they have learned into practice.
The process by which a person acquires the knowledge, skills, and sense of occupational identity characteristics of a professional involves the internalization of the values and norms of a professional group into one’s own behavior and self-conception (Chaska, 1978). It is suggested that in professionalism issues like in the issue of patient autonomy, specifically informed consent among conscious patients healthcare providers must possess substantial knowledge (theory), judgment and skill based on principles of the biological, physiological, and behavioral and social sciences and put it accurately into actions in order to meet and provide the needs of the patient. Biological, psychological, sociocultural, and developmental variables are constantly interacting, and evaluation of these systems must be seen and related to the context of the whole person (Leddy et al, 1989).
Consequently, healthcare providers will often experience conflict between the contexts in which society chooses to view illness, and the experiences that both healthcare providers and patients have of working together to ease suffering. As part of professional issues, professional care systems, care orientations are described as specialist-centered (Honko, 1994, Helman, 1998) although different types of practitioners are found also in lay care systems. (Swantz L. 1990; Serkkola, 1994; Helman, 1998; Miller, 2000). Professional care systems specifically healthcare providers must be orientated by a rational, systematic and linear way of thinking. This is seen in applications of general principles to individual situations, or vice versa, subsuming individual cases under general laws for the patients’ wellness.
Conclusion
All in all, patient autonomy, specifically informed consent is one of the crucial issues in contemporary debate in the field of medical care, particularly in the area of medical treatment. It is believed that respecting autonomy is not always straightforward. There are some critiques which address the importance of healthcare providers in committing to a consistent, ethical defensible approach to the patients autonomy to achieve equality in the health care system. Thus, in responding to the demands and needs of patients it is required that the health care system and the healthcare providers should merge to avoid the consequences of such issues. In this manner, the needs for patient advocacy has been rooted fro impact of illness on the patient autonomy and ability to make their own decisions which places the healthcare providers in a powerful position. Oftentimes, patients feel powerless in the health care system which can be resulted to perceive as extremely vulnerable which leads the role of the professional as advocate which is important to patient care.
It can be said that informed consent is an essential legal policy for all healthcare providers. However, emergency care situations and situations by which patients are conscious pose special concerns. By considering basic procedures of medical evaluation and assessment, comprehension of the legal rights of the patient as well as the understanding of the exceptions to the rule, the healthcare providers can act in the best interest of patients without incurring legal liabilities. On one hand, patients who are conscious must be asked for informed consent and if they are conscious but mentally incompetent to give judgment and consent, the healthcare providers must do their decisions ethically.
It is believed that respecting patients’ autonomy and their right to provide informed consent is not always straightforward. There are some critiques which address the importance of healthcare professionals in committing to a consistent, ethical defensible approach to in lined with informed consent to achieve equality in the health care system. In this manner, the needs for patient advocacy has been rooted fro impact of illness on the patient autonomy and ability to make their own decisions which places the healthcare providers in a powerful position.
In general, it can be argued that informed consent poses more challenges and complexities when the patient is conscious. Oftentimes, patients feel powerless in the health care system which can be resulted to perceive as extremely vulnerable which leads the role of the professional as advocate which is important to patient care. In addition, as healthcare providers who has been educated and have learned many theoretical concepts, their core obligation is to safeguard the patient from the incompetence of other health care professionals. Building harmonious relationship with the patient, attached with trusts and build respect.
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