South Florida Nurse Cause Harm to Hundreds of Patients

Last year there was a nurse in South Florida who was accused of reusing IV bags on multiple patients. There were nearly 2,000 she exposed to several infectious diseases such as TB, HIV, hepatitis and other diseases. The nurse had been a nurse for multiple years, and it is unknown if she had done this in previous years. This case shows many ethical dilemmas because she put the health of the patients at risk. Health care providers are taught to give the best care to patients and in this case she did not.

If she was worried about the lack of supplies, this should have been an issue she could have addressed with her manager. She should not have taken into her own hands to manage the supplies. This jeopardized the health of her patients and her actions made it seem as if the hospital was not producing quality care.

In health care ethics, one of the principles is nonmaleficence which is to avoid causing harm to patients. Nonmaleficence is a standard in the health care industry. In this case, the caregiver caused harm to many patients and exposed them to many deadly infections. She did not “avoid” causing harm to patients. This principle is important is all aspects of the health care industry. The health care system is used by patients to help with the improvement of their health. Patients should not leave a facility feeling as if they have been harm in some kind of way. The patients were not informed of the nurse’s actions until several months later, because that’s when the hospital were informed of it.

Another ethical principle that was questioned is beneficence requires doing good and helping others. In this matter, the nurse did not help others and her behavior is not labeled as doing good. If there was an issue with supplies, this should have been noted and expressed to her superiors. She did not help the patients, coworkers and other hospital staff by not mentioning to them what she was doing.

The health care administrators ensured that the patients were exposed were informed and requested they return for testing of infectious diseases that they could have been exposed to. Administrators could also review the ethics policy with the employees to ensure that they are aware of what is expected of them. This case cost the hospital a lot and reviewing the principles and standards of the hospital could reduce the risk of this happening again.