crnaethics

Hello all again! First I want to thank everyone for taking the time to respond to my posting and taking my dilemma seriously. You all had some excellent points and have helped me come to a decision on what to do about this problem. I do appreciate all of your thoughts. To answer some of your obvious questions- you might be surprised to hear this person who I helped was not my boyfriend/girlfriend, fiancé, husband/wife- just an old friend who I was helping out in a time of need. I was not expecting any form of compensation or payback from this person either. This person has not burned me in any way and I am not seeking any kind of revenge. Mostly, I think I discovered a pattern of behavior exhibited by this person that began to make me wonder about their makeup and I started having some serious regrets about my role in this whole situation. I realized after it was too late that I had made a serious mistake in helping this person out and a serious mistake in judgment. I began to pay greater attention to things this person was saying to me in passing that struck a nerve such as: he/she submits fraudulent tax returns every year b/c "they already take out too much" & "everybody does it". He/she misrepresented where she lived to her insurance company for the past two years because "I'm not telling them I live in (blank); I'm not paying those rates". He/she found it acceptable for a family friend (a doctor) to write a note for a sibling to get them out of missing an exam when the sibling wasn't even sick. These are the things I was talking about when I mentioned not being ethical in some other areas of his/her life and not considering what effect his/her actions has on other people. After trying to point out to this person that all of these things are wrong, he/she always responds with "you're crazy" or "everybody does it". Well, after reading all of your responses I think most of you will agree with me that not everybody does it. I don't live my life that way and I was able to realize what I did was wrong and I made a mistake. A mistake I will live with and consider it a lesson learned. However, after considering all of your responses I have decided I am not going to be the one to ruin another person's dreams either. I feel guilty enough for my role in this whole situation already but the guilt of destroying a person's lifelong pursuits would be greater. At this point I can only hope that the pattern of behavior exhibited in this person's personal ethical makeup will not carry over into his/her professional life. I have made an effort to try to get him/her to change and pointed out that what we did was wrong and all of those other things that I mentioned previously are wrong as well. Like one of you mentioned, if this pattern of behavior continues, hopefully eventually it will catch up to him/her- hopefully before it is too late. But I am not going to act as the moral police here. I decided to do some research into the AANA Code of Ethics and found the following interpretive statement regarding personal conviction in a previous outdated version of the Code, "each CRNA will assume responsibility for protecting patients and the profession against colleagues who may be incompetent and/or ethically deficient. A CRNA who exhibits incompetence or engages in illegal conduct, or otherwise fails to meet the principles of this Code of Ethics, should be exposed without hesitation to the proper authority." Well, in the most recent version of the Code this clause has been completely removed. Throughout the current Code there seems to be a focus on professional ethics only and behavior within of the scope of work. For example, "the CRNA takes appropriate action to protect patients form healthcare providers who...engage in illegal or unethical PRACTICE" & "CRNA is responsible for...maintaining the dignity and integrity of the PROFESSION" & "CRNA's maintain ethical BUSINESS PRACTICES in dealing with patients, colleagues, institutions, and corporations." I was surprised to see this shift away or lack of concern for a person's overall ethical makeup and focus more towards only a person's professional conviction. Personally, I don't think you can draw a line between the two, but it appears the AANA is trying to for some reason. This has also played a role in my decision here. So again, I want to thank you all for your outstanding responses and thoughts, and for taking my dilemma seriously. I know some of you will strongly disagree with my decision to just let it go and I understand your points about not wanting to be associated with a person like this in your profession. I would feel the same way. But there are people like this who slip through the cracks in every profession and we all just have to hope we get lucky and never end up having to deal with them. Unfortunately, I do understand that the outcome in your profession could be a little more serious. Thanks again! I do appreciate it! PS- where is this Old-Gas- Passers web-site? I would like to see some of the responses posted there.

Hello all! I am currently having an ethical dilemma and am in need of some opinions/advice from current nurses, CRNA students, and practicing CRNAs. I found this board and thought it would be a perfect place to get some feedback. It is important to note, I am NOT a nurse, CRNA, or CRNA student. This is my problem- I recently was asked by a CRNA student to assist with researching and writing a paper for one of his/her core courses in his/her CRNA/MSN program. However, I ended up doing 100 percent of this person's research and wrote about 75 percent of the paper. I should also note that this was a major research paper and took a great amount of time to both research and write and totaled about 25 pages when complete. The student ended up with the highest grade in his/her class and I believe the paper constituted the majority of his/her grade. The student asked for my help because he/she chose to take a vacation immediately prior to the end of the semester and could not complete all of the work he/she needed to by the end of the semester. I agreed to help out because I thought I was helping out a friend. I have come to regret helping out for various reasons, but mostly I have realized that this may have been unethical on my part and unfair to other students. I have also began to sincerely question the honesty and integrity of the individual who I helped out since after getting to know him/her a little better I have come to learn that he/she is not the most ethical person in the world in most areas of his/her life. In fact, he/she never stops to think if what he/she is doing is wrong or what effect his/her actions might have on others. In a way, I was thinking of coming forward to satisfy my own guilt, but also to teach this person a lesson. However, I don't want to ruin his/her life and have no idea if something like this could potentially get him/her kicked out of school. So since I have absolutely no experience in your field, have no idea on the amount of emphasis on ethical behavior in your field, or the type of colleagues you all deal with on a daily basis I just wanted to get some feedback on what you would want to happen in this situation. -Would you care if your classmate cheated? -Is ethical makeup and personal integrity even a consideration in your field? -If this was one of your classmates would you want them exposed? -If I come forward, will this get him/her kicked out of the program- how seriously is this type of violation taken in a CRNA program? Thanks