Is It Ethical to Bend the Rules for Undocumented and Other Immigrant Patients?

Physicians and other health care professionals who work in hospitals and clinics serving low-income populations will encounter undocumented immigrants as patients, family members, community members, and persons whose health-related rights can be overlooked, imperiled, or difficult to use. The routine uncertainty arising in how to provide good care to patients who are excluded from key public insurance provisions, together with the desire to be a good advocate for this patient population, can give rise to so-called workarounds as problem-solving strategies. This article explores the ethics of workarounds in the care of undocumented patients and considers how advocacy by health care professionals and organizations can assist immigrants in communities they serve.

Resources for Teaching and Learning About Immigrant Health Care in Health Professions Education.

How to provide good care to uninsured undocumented immigrants who are broadly excluded from federally funded health benefits in the United States can raise ethical challenges for clinicians. The chilling effect of current immigration enforcement policies on health care access affects other immigrant populations and US citizens in mixed-status families. In the current political environment, students in health professions, house staff and other early career professionals, and teachers and mentors in health care settings that serve low-income immigrant populations need a shared understanding of how to provide good care under changing and challenging conditions.

Workarounds Are Routinely Used by Nurses-But Are They Ethical?

: Nurses regularly circumvent work systems they perceive to be flawed to provide more efficient or better care. If kept secret, however, such workarounds become ethically questionable, even when the nurse is trying to do the right thing. In this article, the author discusses how nurses can be creative problem solvers without resorting to practices that may be ethical in intent yet potentially harmful in their consequences.

Culture and Moral Distress: What's the Connection and Why Does It Matter?

Culture is learned behavior shared among members of a group and from generation to generation within that group. In health care work, references to "culture" may also function as code for ethical uncertainty or moral distress concerning patients, families, or populations. This paper analyzes how culture can be a factor in patient-care situations that produce moral distress.

Time-out: The Professional and Organizational Ethics of Speaking Up in the OR.

Participation in patient safety is one concrete expression of a foundational principle of medical ethics: do no harm. Being an ethical professional requires taking action to prevent harm to patients in health care environments. Checklists and time-outs have become common patient safety tools in the US and other nations.