Vaccine Refusal and Pharmaceutical Acquiescence Essay Paper
Ethical And Legal Foundations of PMHNP Response
Patient autonomy is one of the four major bioethics principles in nursing. As Varkey (2021) accentuate, autonomy revolves around letting the patients prevail when choosing their treatment and care plan. However, autonomy for children with mental health issues may be complex since the parents must decide on their behalf. According to Reich (2020), parents or guardians must make medical decisions in their children’s best interest. However, there are instances when a physician can overlook autonomy, particularly when the decisions of the parents or guardians may contradict the beneficence and nonmaleficence principles. That is because the beneficence principle directs healthcare professionals to ensure that their actions towards the patients are beneficial. Also, the nonmaleficence principle requires healthcare professionals to ensure that patients experience no harm (Varkey, 2021). Vaccine Refusal and Pharmaceutical Acquiescence Essay Paper
Some of the ethical dilemmas that may show up concern parents’ religious beliefs, where the parents may overlook the need to seek mental health issues like autism. Hence, in such a situation, especially where the parent or the guardian may fail to consent to the child’s treatment, the attending physician needs to seek help on how to go about the issue. One way is by engaging the parents or guardians in patient education, enlightening them concerning the child’s condition, and the best way to intervene for better healthcare outcomes (Van-Der-Kaap-Deeder et al., 2019). Also, the healthcare practitioners can integrate a healthcare chaplain to convince the parents of the need for the treatment using a religious perspective. However, if all these trials fail, the healthcare provider may consult a reliable authority such as the ethical committee or a court for legal consideration, which can help preserve such a child’s rights without being biased. Vaccine Refusal and Pharmaceutical Acquiescence Essay Paper
References
Reich, J. A. (2020). Vaccine Refusal and Pharmaceutical Acquiescence: Parental Control and Ambivalence in Managing Children’s Health. American Sociological Review, 85(1), 106–127. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003122419899604
Van-Der-Kaap-Deeder, J., Soenens, B., Mabbe, E., Dieleman, L., Mouratidis, A., Campbell, R., & Vansteenkiste, M. (2019). From Daily Need Experiences to Autonomy-Supportive and Psychologically Controlling Parenting via Psychological Availability and Stress. Parenting, 19(3), 177–202. https://doi.org/10.1080/15295192.2019.1615791
Varkey, B. (2021). Principles of clinical ethics and their application to practice. Medical Principles and Practice, 30(1), 17–28. https://doi.org/10.1159/000509119 Vaccine Refusal and Pharmaceutical Acquiescence Essay Paper