engleski

Ethical pluralism in nursing practice

The approach to ethics and moral decision-making in nursing practice is very complex. It goes right to the core of nurse-patient relationship, and is very often burdened by health policy, social, economic and cultural trends. In such social environment it is difficult to live according to universal values because the postmodern spirit, which puts material values before the spiritual ones, creates a moral wasteland in most people. This tearing of objectivity, morality and impartiality from the universal moral order, encourages the thriving of subjectivity, relativism, egotism, arrogance and nihilism. Even nursing profession is not exempt from this matter because a more complex analysis shows the division and disagreement regarding the question of professional (and moral) integrity and what constitutes its true essence. On one hand, there is the nursing ideal determined by the moral authority of Florence Nightingale (nursing as a „calling“). On the other hand, there are demands for sophisticated scientific work (achieving professional status in the field of biomedicine based on the use of highly developed technology and mechanistic approach towards physical dimension of the patient). They point to a serious professional difference of opinion. However, some nursing theoreticians are trying to unite those two opposites into a common goal: both approaches help to satisfy basic human needs of a healthy or ill person. This very matter of using different approaches and expecting the same results brings into question the existence of nursing ethics established on universal values. The end should never justify the means! Pluralism in the approach to solving ethical dilemmas in nursing practice means finding the best possible solution by taking into consideration all of the aspects, analysing them from different perspectives (pluriperspectivism). Such an approach sees a person as a holistic, physically unique (matter) and transcendental being (soul). That is why it needs a solution suited to that uniqueness and holism. Solving moral dilemmas in nursing practice should be viewed in the light of interactive relationship between two people: a (unique) nurse and a (unique) patient. Nurses should never feel like there is only one ethical theory, one ethical model and one most important principle to be followed in every situation. The fundamental notion that each man is unique and unrepeatable, always has to determine the path towards deliberation and activity because it too has to be special, unique and adapted to the uniqueness of the situation.

pluriperspectivism, universal values, nursing

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