Elmer Alexandrew V.

Balan BSN 2A Healthcare Ethics

Activity #1: What is the difference between person and personhood?

- Person is a being who is part of our moral community. it is a physical body of a being seen as distinct from
the mind, character, and many more. Being a person is having certain capabilities of reasoning, knowing right
from wrong, and having consciousness. it has freedom to know what is morally right and make choices.
Personhood, on the other hand, is the status of being a person. it is a vital characteristic of an individual to
have universal value and an excellent standing. you cannot call yourself a natural person if you do not have
sense of personhood. it consists of bring conscious to the world, having the knowledge to demonstrate
actions, and make decisions for its welfare. Personhood also subjects to the contrasting viewpoints, beliefs,
and assumptions of a person. Person differ to each other because of personhood because we are founded in
differences of belief and how we live our lives.

Activity #2: Why is personhood important?

- Personhood is important because it is an essential trait for an individual to be called a natural person. It
makes an individual have its universal worth and exceptional standing. Personhood makes a person have the
freedom of knowing what is right and wrong and make choices. Our capacity to think and how we perceive the
world is brought by our personhood which is developed and molded by the experiences and people that we
encounter and stumble as we traverse the journey of our lives. We cannot define ourselves to be distinct to
someone else if we do not have personhood in us.

Activity #1: Differentiate human acts from acts of man and give 5 examples each.
- Human acts are actions that is under our control or we have consciousness doing the action. It is done freely
but we are aware about our action and we understand why we are doing an action. examples of acts of man is
going to school because we want to graduate, helping an old woman cross the street, listening to teachers,
doing assignments, and watching a movie. on the other hand, acts of man are actions beyond one's
consciousness. There are acts that we perform indeliberately or without advertence. examples would be sleep
walking, doing things when high on drugs, actions done out of anger or emotions, talking about a subject that
should not be talked about, and harming a patient with a drug you prepared that could give relief.

Activity #1: Are human rights only a problem in non-democratic countries? Why?
- Human rights are moral principles or norms that describe certain standards of human behavior and are
regularly protected in municipal and international law. it is ought to be respected and taken care of because it
guarantees people the means necessary to satisfy their basic needs, such as food, housing, and education, so
they can take full advantage of all opportunities. Human rights are common on constitutional democratic
countries rather than non-democratic countries. For example, North Korea is country with a dictatorship type
of government. North Korean citizens are deprived of many things. they are deprived of their human rights,
relentless indoctrination, and barred from any sort of technological communications. these restrictions
imposed by the north Korean government brought pain and oppression to its citizens. North Korea’s poverty is
the tragic consequence of the ruling elite’s absolute prioritization of political control, maintained through the
micromanagement of society and the economy, and the ruthless repression of alternative views and
approaches.
Activity #2: Is there a difference between conscious and conscience?

- Conscience refers to an individual's state of consciousness or a sense that a person's actions or motives are
either right or wrong. it is linked with a responsibility to do the right thing. it is the feeling you feel when you
thought to yourself that you have committed a grave mistake or did harm others because of unintentional or
intentional actions. our conscience can be our guide so that we can avoid doing wrong acts. on the other hand,
consciousness is an indication that an individual is aware, alert, and able to comprehend what is happening in
its environment. it also signifies that we are aware of what we are feeling or the feelings of others.
consciousness and conscience are linked to each other because they are always present in every scenario and
action that we took part. we should be conscious if ever we are in tight situation and listen to what our
conscience wants to tells us. our conscience will help us achieve morality in every scenario or problem and we
can be able to make just and right decisions.

Activity #1: Art and Mike are good friends. They both graduated from the same and have gone to work in
the same radiography department. Part of their duties is to be sure that the standby equipment is ready for
service in the ward. Art and Mike are working the night shift and while playing around Mike inadvertently
bumped the equipment, tips it over and breaks the standby instrument. In that it was an accident, Mike as
you as a friend to not tell anyone it was his fault. In your head comes in and notices that the instrument had
been sent down to maintenance. He asked what happened and Mike says “I don’t know, someone from out
of the department must have bumped it or something”. The boss looked at you and asked you the same
question. If you are Art, what would you do in this kind of scenario? Solve this problem using duty-oriented
or principled reasoning.
- in the problem, Mike and Art have duties to ensure that the standby equipment is ready for service in the
ward but suddenly Mike bumped the equipment and have been broken. now, the dilemma escalated as mike
tells art not to tell anyone that he has broken the equipment. in this moral dilemma, i am thinking of a resolve
which is talking to Mike and explaining that lying can threaten people's self-worth by preventing them from
seeing themselves as “good” people and admitting his mistake will mitigate his consequences. my 2nd resolve
is to explain to the boss that it is our fault because we are the ones who are assigned to that duty so mistake
of Mike is my mistake also. all of my proposed solutions will have consequences. in solution 1, Mike will be
disappointed of me because I will not follow what he has intended me to do. in the 2nd solution, ME and Mike
will bear the consequences of breaking the equipment even though Mike was the perpetrator. the best
solution out of all that I have proposed would be solution number 2. as a friend, we should not tolerate our
friend of doing wrong acts. Being a true friend is correcting him to be better tomorrow and be with him
through ups and downs.

Activity #1: The characteristics of a good health provider. How does the lack of this affect the delivery of
health care?
- As a future nurse, having the qualities or characteristics of an effective healthcare providers in the future will
give satisfaction to me and to my clients. I can win their trust and make them comfortable and safe that they
will be cared in a professional manner with a systematic way. if we do not have the characteristics of an
effective healthcare provider, we can encounter various medical dilemmas. various medical dilemmas like
disputes between family, patients, and medical staff will occur. this may give an impression to the current and
future clients that we are not capable of handling and giving medical care to them thoroughly. they will have
doubts if we can assure that we can deliver the care they need. not having the characteristics of an effective
healthcare worker makes our medical school useless because we cannot call ourselves professional if we do
not have manners and the characteristics of a professional. disputes within co-workers will also arise. pride,
selfishness, and boastfulness will affect the way of delivery of healthcare because there is a chance of
sabotaging an order leading to danger to the client that will cost its life, careers of medical staff, and the
reputation of the hospital.

Activity #2: If many members of your professions behave unethically, what should you do?
- If I saw or observe someone behaving unethically, I will report it as soon as possible to the head nurse or
doctor in the hospital. If I will not say this as soon as possible, chances are there can be danger or risk that will
arise affecting the patients, other medical team, and the reputation of the hospital. Unethical behaviors in a
medical environment will affect the healthcare delivery system not meeting the desired outcome or goal for
the patient. I do not care if it is my friend or a colleague from med school, if I know it is wrong that will
endanger someone’s life, I will not hesitate to report. As a future part of a professional medical team, we are
handling lives and not toys that is why we should be mindful of our actions. Unethical behavior in the
workplace also has the potential to lead to a lack of trust among employees, which is detrimental to a business
that relies on collaboration and a sense of community.

Write your opinion.

1.Is it fair game for the physician's discussion with the patient here to touch on personal values that it might
not be fair for the patient to ask the physician to compromise? Are there foreseeable consequences of
what, to the patient, looks like a personal choice that might impact the physician's relationship with other
patients, with her professional community, or with the larger community?
- I think the consequences would be the chance of mistrust that might damage the reputation of the client, the
staff, and the workplace. it is okay to ask the patient about its personal values if it concerns about her health
or on how he/she is coping with problems about herself. by asking them their attitude towards something, the
physician can formulate an intervention that will suit the client's attitude and making them collaborate to the
healthcare delivery to achieve the desired goal. There would only be a consequence of mistrust because if the
physician is not trustworthy, then the discussions they had with them will not be respected and will be known
by others. confidentiality helps to build and develop trust. It potentially allows for the free flow of information
between the client and worker and acknowledges that a client's personal life and all the issues and problems
that they have belong to them.

2.As a healthcare giver what responsibilities do you have if the community where you are often polluted
with garbage and smoke?
- Smoking remains the single biggest avoidable cause of cancer and causes multiple health conditions including
ischemic heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. improper garbage disposal, on the other
hand, is a factor to growing air pollution in the environment because of the smell and unwanted toxic
chemicals from it. just like smoking, it can cause various respiratory diseases and other health effects. as a
nurse, i can mitigate these problems by saying to the doctor the threats of smoking and garbage pollution so
that we, as a healthcare team, can plan ways to suppress these problems. we can hold seminars in the
community to educate them about the bad effects of smoking and garbage pollution in their health and to the
environment. for smokers, we will be setting goals to reduce by a certain number of cigarettes per day until
they can be smoke free. in suppressing garbage pollution, we will instruct them that they should place the
biodegradable garbage like leaves and papers in the compost pit and could be use as organic fertilizer. We will
also advise to them not to burn plastics because burning those will release harmful chemicals in the air making
the air polluted and harmful to the community. While on the other hand, inform them that the non-
biodegradable material such as bottles and cans should be set aside and it can be recycled or sold.
SUMMATIVE TEST

1. Discuss the different Theories of Ethics given in the module.

- Theories of Ethics given in Healthcare Ethics module:

A. Kantian Ethics - It is the basic rightness or wrongness of an act that depends upon its intrinsic nature rather
than upon the situation of consequences. an act itself would either be right or wrong, it could not be both.
This particular worldview is codified in several major ethical systems and religions. It is formulated by German
philosopher Immanuel Kant. Kant used the example of lying as an application of his ethics: because there is a
perfect duty to tell the truth, we must never lie, even if it seems that lying would bring about better
consequences than telling the truth.

B. Rawls's Theory - Rawls's Theory of Justice was formulated by John Rawls which he stated that it
encompasses around adaptation of 2 rudimentary principles of justice which in turn guarantee a just and
morally acceptable society. He wants to use reasoning which all humans have to arrive at the principle of the
good.

C. St. Thomas Aquinas Theory - St. Thomas Aquinas formulated the Natural Law Theory which is based on the
idea that God wants us to want things, specifically the good things. in this theory, Aquinas believed that God
created the world according to natural laws, predictable, and goal driven systems whereby life is sustained,
and everything functions smoothly

D. Ross Ethics - In this theory, W.D Ross suggested that we can know by intuition that we have a set of
fundamental duties, which is called PRIMA FACIE DUTIES. it also meant that we ought to base our conduct on
these, rather than on the idea of overall happiness. in total, there are six prima facie duties. Ross called his
principles "PRIMA FACIE" duties because he believed that for any duty on the list, there could be
circumstances in which it would be overridden by another duty. For Ros, there is no such thing as absolute
goodness and depends on a specific situation.

2. Differentiate Human Acts and Acts of Man.

- Human acts are actions that is under our control or we have consciousness doing the action. It is done freely
but we are aware about our action and we understand why we are doing an action. examples of acts of man is
going to school because we want to graduate, helping an old woman cross the street, listening to teachers,
doing assignments, and watching a movie. on the other hand, acts of man are actions beyond one's
consciousness. There are acts that we perform indeliberately or without advertence. examples would be sleep
walking, doing things when high on drugs, actions done out of anger or emotions, talking about a subject that
should not be talked about, and harming a patient with a drug you prepared that could give relief.