Moral Distress: Understanding Its Effects on Nurses and the Nursing Profession

By Gary Harper

Nurses encounter stress daily in their profession and suffer from moral distress on many of those encounters. Moral Distress is the personal belief of doing what is right for the patient but can not do it due to rules, regulations and conflict of religious and cultural beliefs. This guide is to help identify nurses suffering from moral distress and suggestions to help them handle their suffering. Real life situations are included and how moral distress was experienced by the nurse and other health care providers. Moral distress is afactor among nurses on why they leave the medical field.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gary Harper
• Release date: Jun 18, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476443386

Gary Harper

Gary is a former Northern Territory of Australia teacher and school principal. He retired in 2011 and continues his outdoor adventures.

Book preview

Moral Distress: Understanding its effects on Nurses and the Nursing Profession

Gary Harper MSN, RN

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2012 Gary Harper

About the Author

Gary started his nursing career in his mid-thirties. He received his Associate Degree of Nursing from West Kentucky Community and Technical College. He proceeded to continue his education from Chamberlain College of Nursing where he achieved his Bachelor of Science Degree in Nursing and his Master’s Degree in Nursing Management. He currently is a nursing instructor for West Kentucky Community and Technical College RN program. He also works part-time in an area critical care department. He lives in Calloway County with his daughters and he is currently seeking his PhD in nursing from the University of Phoenix.

Introduction

Moral distress is a term which is resurfacing from the 1980’s. The term refers to the personal conflict which a nurse suffers when they are conflicted with what is right and what is being performed (Jameton, 1984). Nurses have seen an increase in moral distress as more facilities are trying to perform more work with less staff and the nursing shortage worldwide is only adding to the dilemma. One of the largest issues of moral distress is its accumulative effect on the nurse over time. If untreated or unrecognized moral distress can lead to compassion fatigue then onward to burnout. As the nursing shortage continues to grow it is paramount for healthcare to realize the commodity of the bedside nurse and try to retain them to remain in the healthcare field.

Every nurse will experience moral distress at some point in their career and some will experience moral distress many times a week. The more specialized the area of practice the more the nurse will encounter moral distress. If the nurse or the facility ignores the moral distress it will lead to compassion fatigue and burnout and in the end healthcare will lose another valuable nurse. The concept and the purpose of this information are to recognize moral distress and how it effects generations of nurses, individuals and the nursing profession. The continued purpose is to present possible solutions for individuals in order to handle moral distress before it progresses further into compassion fatigue (Jameton, 1984).

There are multiple situations where emotional distress can affect a person and some of the symptoms are similar. However, the effect of emotional distress is limited and can lead to other issues but the purpose of this document is to express the dangers of moral distress and the different experiences in which the nurse suffers from moral distress. Moral distress has a deeper impression upon a person due to the conflict of the person’s personal values and beliefs. This is a reason it is important for people going into nursing and healthcare to understand the importance of their own values and beliefs because they will be challenged and conflicted in their nursing and healthcare career.

The idea of moral distress is the personal conflict a person feels and not necessarily the moral code of a society or particular religious organization. Even though nursing is talked about throughout this book as a group; it is very important to understand the individual aspect and the individual impact of nurses who suffer from moral distress. The entire concept revolves around what a nurse believes to be right and cannot perform what is right because of professional constraints, professional constraints, and even personal constraints. Each nurse has a set of personal beliefs and values and these can be compromised or challenged while caring for their patients.

Chapter 1

Generations

Each generation has a definitive value system and it changes from one to another with some large differences and some with minor changes. Each generation will experience moral distress as related to their belief and value system. The method in which each generation views and handles moral distress will become evident and it will also become evident between generations on what causes moral distress for each generation. The major cause of moral distress among any individual is the perceived conflict of personal and professional values and the amount of autonomy to change the offensive distress. As all nurses are aware death, dying and chronic diseases are a large part of the nursing profession. The way each individual is treated by physicians, nurses and other health disciplines opens up areas where moral distress can occur. For example, a patient is being escorted to radiology by a transporter and the nurse. The transporter may make a comment in a flirtatious manner to the nurse and the nurse becomes embarrassed because of the situation but more so because it is happening in front of the patient. The nurse does not get a chance to confront the transporter or to vent her emotions over the situation. The work day continues and the nurse pushes the thought of the encounter to the back of her mind. This becomes the first seed of moral distress which can lead the nurse to compassion fatigue and burnout because the nurse was unable to handle the situation as it occurred and due to her responsibility and professionalism in front of the