LEGAL AND

ETHICAL ASPECTS IN
NURSING
Content
• Definition of legal terms
• CRIMES
• TORTS
– Unintentional
• Negligence
• Malpractice
– Intentional
• Fraud, battery, assault, and others
To practice responsibly, professional
nurses must be able to maintain
competence in their practice and to use
competence in the application of judgment.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Nursing jurisprudence

– all laws, rules, doctrines and

principles, legal opinions, and decisions of
competent authority regarding governance
and regulation of practice of nursing.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Nursing Legislation

– the act of making laws affecting the

science, art, and practice of nursing.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Due process of law

– general law of the land

– a law which hears before it condemns.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Presumption

– inference as to the existence of a fact

which is actually not known arising from its
usual connection with another which is known
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Evidence

– includes the means, sanctioned by

law, of ascertaining in a judicial proceeding,
the truth concerning a matter of fact.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Ignorance

– lack of knowledge.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Incompetence

– lack of ability, legal qualification, or

fitness to discharge the required duty.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Subpoena

– a process directed to a person

requiring him to attend and testify at the
hearing or trial .
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Subpoena duces tecum

– process which requires a person to

bring with him to court any books,
documents, etc.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Administrative action

– an action filed against a nurse before

the board of nursing for the revocation or
suspension of license.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Civil action

– a complaint filed with the court of

justice wherein a person prosecutes another
for the enforcement or protection of a right, or
prevention or redress of a wrong.
Definition of Legal Terminologies
Criminal action

– is instituted and prosecuted before the

courts for the punishment of a crime.
CRIMES
- Acts contrary to the law; wrongs committed
against the state

- Criminal conspiracy – occurs when 2 or more

persons agree to commit a crime
CRIMES
CLASSIFICATION of Persons (criminally liable)

a) Principals
b) Accomplices
c) Accessories
CRIMES Nursing Practice
Misdemeanor – term used to express every
offense inferior to felony
- a term applied to all those crimes and
offenses for which the law has not provided a
particular name
CRIMES Nursing Practice
Felonies – acts or omissions punishable by law
which may be committed not only by means of
deceit but also by means of fault (culpa).

- Intentional felony
- Unintentional felony
CRIMES
Circumstances Affecting Criminal Liability

• Justifying circumstances
• Mitigating circumstances
• Aggravating circumstances
CRIMES
• JUSTIFYING CIRCUMSTANCES includes:
– self-defense
– Defense of spouse, relative or stranger
– Accident
– Fulfillment of duty
– Obedience to an order issued by a superior for
some lawful purpose.
CRIMES

• What may be exempted from

criminal liability?
CRIMES
The following may be exempted:
- A retarded or insane person (unless the latter
acted during lucid interval)
- A person under 9 years of age
- A person over 9 years of age but under 15
(unless he acted with discernment)
- By accident without fault or intention
CRIMES
• MITIGATING CIRCUMSTANCES includes:
- under 18 years or over 70 years old
- Offender voluntarily surrendered or confessed
before the court and prior to the presentation
of evidence
- The offender is suffering from an illness, which
would diminish the exercise of willpower
although not depriving of consciousness of the
act
 CRIMES
• AGGRAVATING CIRCUMSTANCES includes:
- Has taken advantage of public position
- Act committed with insult to public authorities
- Act committed on the occasion of a fire,
shipwreck, earthquake, or other calamities
- Act committed in consideration of a price,
reward or promise
- Act committed with evident premeditation
- Fraud or disguised was employed
TORTS
- Negligence of a person arising from act or
omission, independent of a contract, which
causes damage to another.
- Refers to a legal wrong committed by a
person against another
- Torts are violation of civil law caused by
failure to use care or to prevent injury.
TORTS: ELEMENTS
- There must be damage to the offended
party
- There is a legal wrong or fault arising from
an act or omission for which the offender
must account
- There is the nexus of cause and effect
between such fault and the damage
TORTS: KINDS of DAMAGES
Actual or compensatory damages

Moral damage – wounded feelings, mental

anguish, humiliation

Nominal damages

Temperate or moderate damages

TORTS: UNINTENTIONAL
Negligence – refers to the failure to observe,
for the protection of interests of another
person whereby such other person suffers
injury.
Professional Negligence – refers to the
failure of the nurse to behave or act as a
reasonable, prudent nurse who is charged
with a duty to use standard of due care and
failed to foresee harm
 TORTS: UNINTENTIONAL
Common nurses’ possible acts of negligence:
a. injury to a delirious patient
b. burns as a result of negligent
administration of hot water bags, sitz bath
c. any object left in patient’s abdomen
d. use of defective equipment
e. careless execution of doctor’s order
 TORTS: UNINTENTIONAL
Common nurses’ possible acts of negligence:
f. falling of patient from bed causing injury
g. medication errors
h. administering drug without doctors order
i. failing to report case history and
observations about the patient to the doctor
j. ignoring complaints of chest pain, causing
death
 DOCTRINES of TORTS
Res Ipsa loquitor – ‘the thing speak for itself’

Respondeat superior – ‘let the superior answer

for the act of the agent’

Force majeure – ‘irresistible or superior force’

 TORTS: UNINTENTIONAL
Malpractice – refers to any professional
misconduct, or a bad, unskillful practice, or any
practice contrary to law whereby the health of a
person is injured.
 TORTS: UNINTENTIONAL
Common nurses’ possible acts of malpractice:
a. neglect of a nurse to use the required skill
and knowledge in the treatment of a patient
b. ignorance, negligence, or unskillfulness
resulting in some injury to patient
c. failure to perform the duty properly which
devolves upon his professional relation to the
patient and which results to injury
 TORTS: INTENTIONAL

- Does damage to a client in a willful, intentional

way
 TORTS: INTENTIONAL
• Fraud
an act of dishonesty showing criminal/civil
inclination or intent.
• Deceit – a form of fraud which consists of any false
representation

• EX. Presenting false credentials for purposes of entering a

nursing school, registration or gaining license and/or
employment
 TORTS: INTENTIONAL
• Assault
– includes mental or physical threat, and/or
threatening/attempting to do violence to another

• EX. Forcing a medication or treatment to a person who

does not want it, as long as touching does not occur
 TORTS: INTENTIONAL
• Battery
– covers touching with or without the intent to do
harm.

• EX. Hitting or striking a client

 TORTS: INTENTIONAL
• Defamation
– character assassination, be it written of
spoken.
• Slander
– oral defamation
• Libel
– written defamation
 TORTS: INTENTIONAL
• Invasion of privacy/ Breach of Confidentiality
– means trespass on another’s body and or
information such as:
• Exposure of a patient’s case and body
• False imprisonment
– Detaining a patient without force or malicious intent

– EXEMPTION??
» if patient is harmful to self and others
 NEXT TOPIC
• LEGAL SAFEGUARDS ON NURSES AND
PATIENTS

• STUDY for a not so long quiz next meeting

• Assignment Patients’ Bill of Rights

 NURSING ETHICS
• ETHICS- from Greek word ethos- which means
moral duty.
• Ethics- studies how people make judgment in
regard to right and wrong.
• Morals- are specific ways of behavior or
accomplishing ethical practices.
 ETHICS
• Its about making a choice that are best for
individual or society at certain times in
particular situations and then evaluating
such choices and outcomes.
 LAW
• Define as princiciples and regulations
established in a community by some
authority and aplicable to its people
whether in the form of legislative or of
custom and policies recognized by judicial
decision.
• Criminal Law-
• Civil Law-
• Criminal Law-It proscribes conduct perceived
as threatening, harmful, or otherwise
endangering to the property, health, safety,
and moral welfare of people inclusive of one's
self.
• Civil Law- is a body of rules that defines and
protects the private rights of citizens, offers
legal remedies that may be sought in a
dispute, and covers areas of law such as
contracts, torts, property and family law
 Intentional Wrongs
A nurse may be held liable for intentional
wrongs. Intentional tortuous acts mat arise
in the performance of her duties.

Tort – is a legal wrong committed against a

person or property independent of a contract
which renders the person who commits it
liable for damages in a civil action.
 Examples of Torts
1. Assault and Battery- Assault is the
imminent threat of harmful or offensive
bodily contact.
a. Its is unjustifiable to touch another
person, or to threaten to do so in such
circumstances as to cause the other to
reasonably believe that it will be carried out.
 Assault
• Is any intentional threat to bring about
harmful or offensive contract with another
individual, no actual contact is necessary.

Ex: threatening a patient to give an injection.

Restrain a patient for an x-ray procedure

when the patient has refused consent
 Battery
• Is an intentional is an intentional,
unconsented touching of another person.