Nurses have access to very sensitive information about their patients and if they do not take care to safeguard that material it becomes a major error in nurse-patient confidentiality. Especially as technology in the nursing profession begins to change and technology becomes more ingrained in the profession, it becomes harder and more important to take steps to protect patients right to privacy. When a nurse decides to ignore a patient right to confidentiality, then they can cause undue stress and embarrassment for the patient. The Canadian Nurse Association (2017) states that nurses have the obligation to “recognize the importance of privacy and confidentiality and safeguard personal, family and community information obtained in the context
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Before a nurse makes the decision to disclose information there are things that the nurse must keep in mind. The majority of the time a nurse must make sure that they have consent from that patient, there are very few cases that a nurse may be able to disclose information without a patients consent. To ensure that a nurse is maintaining patients right to privacy they need to make sure that they have permission from that patient. Nurses must not rely solely or automatically on implied consent from their patient and guarantee that any information that is given to other healthcare personnel is only the essential information needed (Cox, 2016). If a patient clearly states that they do not want their information to be distributed to anyone else or if they state that they do not even want the information given to the nurse to be recorded then the nurse must listen to the wishes of the patient (Cox, 2016). By doing things such as making sure that the patients consent is explicitly given to the sharing of material or listening to the patient’s wishes if they express the want for their information to be kept secret it is helping to protect the patient’s wishes and helping to ensure that the patient continues to trust and create a relationship with the patient. The nurse can then give that patient the best care …show more content…
One of the hearing tribunals (“Publications Ordered”, 2016) was a nurse who took a cellphone picture of a patients transfer summary. The document did not have the patients name on it, but it did have other personal and identifiable information about the patient. The summary also had an embarrassing reason that the patient was in the Emergency room at that time. The nurse then proceeded to send the picture to her friends and boyfriend, and either showed the photo or talk about the situation to other nursing staff and even security guards at the facility. When asked about the photo by her manager, she proceeded to lie about it. The nurse in this situation violated the Code of Ethics by taking a photo of personal, private information about a patient. While the nurse might have thought that the photo that she took did not have the patients name in it and therefore alright for her to share with other people. The image still had personal information like the patients age and their gender, and because she showed the photo to a number of people who worked at the facility, it would not have been hard for others to figure out who the patient was. The Nurse did not have consent from patient to take this photo or for this
Before a nurse makes the decision to disclose information there are things that the nurse must keep in mind. The majority of the time a nurse must make sure that they have consent from that patient, there are very few cases that a nurse may be able to disclose information without a patients consent. To ensure that a nurse is maintaining patients right to privacy they need to make sure that they have permission from that patient. Nurses must not rely solely or automatically on implied consent from their patient and guarantee that any information that is given to other healthcare personnel is only the essential information needed (Cox, 2016). If a patient clearly states that they do not want their information to be distributed to anyone else or if they state that they do not even want the information given to the nurse to be recorded then the nurse must listen to the wishes of the patient (Cox, 2016). By doing things such as making sure that the patients consent is explicitly given to the sharing of material or listening to the patient’s wishes if they express the want for their information to be kept secret it is helping to protect the patient’s wishes and helping to ensure that the patient continues to trust and create a relationship with the patient. The nurse can then give that patient the best care …show more content…
One of the hearing tribunals (“Publications Ordered”, 2016) was a nurse who took a cellphone picture of a patients transfer summary. The document did not have the patients name on it, but it did have other personal and identifiable information about the patient. The summary also had an embarrassing reason that the patient was in the Emergency room at that time. The nurse then proceeded to send the picture to her friends and boyfriend, and either showed the photo or talk about the situation to other nursing staff and even security guards at the facility. When asked about the photo by her manager, she proceeded to lie about it. The nurse in this situation violated the Code of Ethics by taking a photo of personal, private information about a patient. While the nurse might have thought that the photo that she took did not have the patients name in it and therefore alright for her to share with other people. The image still had personal information like the patients age and their gender, and because she showed the photo to a number of people who worked at the facility, it would not have been hard for others to figure out who the patient was. The Nurse did not have consent from patient to take this photo or for this