Ethical Conflicts Experienced by Nurses in Geriatric Hospitals in South Korea: “If You Can’t Stand the Heat, Get Out of the Kitchen”

Moonok Kim, Younjae Oh and Byunghye Kong
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Moonok Kim: Department of Nursing, Donggang University, Dongmun-Daero 50, Gwangju 61200, Korea
Younjae Oh: College of Nursing, Research Institute of Nursing Science, Hallym University, Hallymdaehakgil 1, Chuncheon, Gangwon-do 24252, Korea
Byunghye Kong: Department of Nursing, College of Medicine, Chosun University, Pilmun-Daero 309, Dong-Gu, Gwangju 61452, Korea

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 12, 1-13

Abstract: Ethical conflicts among nurses can undermine nurses’ psychological comfort and compromise the quality of patient care. In the last decade, several empirical studies on the phenomena related to ethical conflicts, such as ethical dilemmas, issues, problems, difficulties, or challenges, have been reported; however, they have not always deeply explored the meaning of ethical conflicts experienced by nurses in geriatric care. This study aims to understand the lived experiences of ethical conflict of nurses in geriatric hospitals in South Korea. A phenomenological study was conducted. In-depth, face-to-face interviews were performed with nine registered nurses who cared for elderly patients in geriatric hospitals in South Korea between August 2015 and January 2016. Three main themes emerged from the analysis: (1) confusing values for good nursing, (2) distress resulting from not taking required action despite knowing about a problem, and (3) avoiding ethical conflicts as a last resort. It was found that for geriatric nurses to cope with ethical conflicts successfully, clear ethical guidance, continuing ethics education to improve ethical knowledge and moral behaviors, and a supportive system or program to resolve ethical conflicts involving nurses should be established.

Keywords: ethical conflicts; phenomenological study; geriatric hospital; nurses (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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