Ethics

Ethics is essential in decision making. Ethics is often associated with the concepts of morals, mores and values. Ethical decision making plays an important role in determining our life processes. Four factors contribute to ethical decision making.

These are experience, culture, religion and science. Experiences in life help shape our morals. Birth, love, marriage and death affect our way of living in one way or another. All experiences whether positive or negative, influence our decision making. These experiences may have helped in shaping our values into the person we are today. Culture determines ones ethnic values. It helps a person to decide what is acceptable or not based on the beliefs and practices of the ethnicity where he belongs. Normally, a person adjusts to the standards of his culture as a way for him to be accepted in his society. Religion has a greater weight on influencing ones decision making. Religious beliefs help a person to develop a system of reward and punishment based on what he believes is right or wrong. Religion has something to do with faith. Faith, on the other hand, is something that is learned independently in life based from the environment. Lastly, science provides truth which proves the validity of ones decision. Through science, one is able to determine the values of things by constantly searching for the truth.

The Dowd Model is a suggested model for ethical decision making. The model first assesses the problem. It then isolates the issue, and with all the information gathered, it analyzes the data. The next step is to develop a plan and effectively implement it. Lastly, the results of the actions are analyzed and interpreted.

The application of ethics is vital in a hospital environment. Health care is notably considered by all people. A medical practitioner is required to study the medical ethics and law. A practitioner typically faces a lot of ethical issues and problems every day as they practice their profession. These problems may be medical negligence and malpractice.

The most common ethical dilemma that is encountered by medical practitioners is ethical incompetence. Ever medical practitioner should be at least in a good state of mind and character. One which is not in such ideal situation often causes medical malpractices. A medical practitioner is considered incompetent if he is ignorant, physically impaired, sexual pervert and most especially, inexperienced. Though common, this dilemma is continued to be faced by a lot of medical practitioners. The surest way to prevent this is by providing people with awareness regarding these types of people who practice unethical and inappropriate medical procedures.

Another issue faced by medical practitioners and technologists is the manner they deliver their services. People in the world of medicine are required to deliver their services unrestrictedly. They should not be a source of discrimination among individuals regardless of their age, sex, race and religion.

Furthermore, medical doctors should not be bias in delivering their services to their patients. They must put out any personal interests or guilt on their patients when they are performing any medical procedure. To sum it up, medical practitioners and technologists should be at least professional. They must put into practice the medical ethics and laws that they have studied.

The Dowd Model is helpful in assessing the risks and predicting the harm which may be brought by the ethical dilemmas. Based from the examples, the Dowd Model is sensibly applied to ethical dilemmas in a hospital environment. Risks are hard to predict that is why there is a need for consulting ethics in decision making. Thus, medical practitioners should have effective ethical decision making skills which can cope up with such dilemmas.