Neonatal life decisions, when to draw the line

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This is my first post on allnurses!! I have been lurking a bit on this board, and I finally signed up for an account.

As with alot of people here, I am a nursing student. I have to do a bioethical paper, and I have decided on a topic. I did not want to do one of the topics that they suggested, because it seems like they would have to read 10 papers with the same information, plus I wanted to find a topic that I was more interested in.

That being said, has anyone read any articles lately that I might be able to use in constructing this paper?? We need to site some published nursing references, and it seems as if this would be the best place to see if anyone remembers any.

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the book " core curriculum for neonatal intensive care nursing " (saunders) has a chapter on ethics.........and is one of the best overall nicu references

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There is an article titled, Resuscitation of the Extremely Preterm Infant: A Perspective from the Social Model of Disability written by Teresa A. Savage, PhD, RN and Karen Kavanaugh, PhD, RN in the June 2004 issue of Newborn and Infant Nursing Reviews , Volume 4 Number 2: 2004: pp 114-120 which is a good one. The journal is published by Elsevier, Inc and they have a web site "www.nainr.com". You can probably get a copy of the article through your school librarian via CINAHL.

This is what the Abstract of the article says:

The imminent birth of an extremely premature infant presents parents and health care professionals with difficult decisions regarding how aggressively to provide treatment for the infant. These delemmas exist because extremely premature infants are at risk for disabilities such as cerebral palsy, blindness, and other neurological disorders. Technology has facilitated improved survival rates, but outcomes are uncertain and cannot be reliably predicted. The essential questions with the birth of an extremely preterm infant are: should the infant be resuscitated, and who makes the decision to resuscitate? This paper will explore resuscitation decisions for the extremely preterm infant within the social model of disability.

I hope this information is helpful to you. If I come across some others I'll let you know. Be sure to ask your librarian about serching CINAHL for journal articles relating to your subject. Most colleges have access to them through CINAHL. (CINAHL means Cummulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature.... I think.)

Welcome to the AllNurses NICU board, and good luck with your paper!

Tiki

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