Profesional Accountability

Professional Accountability

Professional Accountability

Professional accountability is one of the biggest responsibilities of both nurses and students. Nurses are responsible for the welfare of their patients and must be able to take responsibility for their individual nursing actions. Students are responsible for their learning and actions when in school.

Provision 4 of the American Nurses Association Code of Ethics (2001) states "The nurse is responsible and accountable for individual nursing practice and determines the appropriate delegation of tasks consistent with the nurse's obligation to provide optimum patient care." This is further defined in the interpretive statement section 4.1

Acceptance of accountability and responsibility - individual registered nurses bear primary responsibility for the nursing care that their patients receive and are individually accountable for their practice. Nursing practice includes direct care activities, acts of delegation, and other responsibilities. Such as teaching, research, and administration. In each instance, the nurse retains accountability, and responsibility, for the quality of practice and for conformity with standards of care.

The professional nurse is expected to act within the code of ethics at all times. The entire code of ethics is available on line at nursingworld.org. Today's nurses are charged and challenged with the responsibility of caring for their assigned clients, this task has become monumental. In order for this to be accomplished the nurse must delegate some duties. The nurse is accountable for all duties delegated and must be assured that any duty being delegated by them is within the scope of practice of the coworker that the nurse is delegating the task upon. This requires the nurse to think about the person she is delegating to and determine her skill level not just the initials after her name. A registered nurse could delegate to a licensed practical nurse to start an IV because it is within the state scope of practice; however the RN is responsible to know if the LPN is certified to start IV's. Nurses must keep in mind that they can perform a patient care task; however can not ask an unlicensed person to perform a nursing task. As a student your may work on a group project, but to remain honest and professional you must do your part of the project.

The Professional student has many of the same responsibilities. The University of Phoenix has a code of student responsibility that was created with the working adult in mind. Included in that code for the students are 12 areas. Number 7 states "Accepts responsibility and accountability for one's one actions, oral and written communications, and interactions with faculty, students, and staff." I believe that this is well aligned with the nursing code of ethics; the point that is being made is that students must accept responsibility for their work, making sure all work submitted is their own work. This statement goes on to say

...