Legal Ramifications for exceeding one's duties - Essay Example

Legal Ramifications for Exceeding One’s Duties al Affiliation The present healthcare facilities are becoming dangerous according to aresearch done worldwide and most casualties have no confidence in their attending physicians and nurses due to various malpractices that have been reported. It is for this reason that the medical field should get a clean-up starting with the slightest medical errors since they are the ones that cause thousands of deaths of patients (Gwilym Siôn, 2008). Although most medical errors result from technical failures of machines, some also occur due to individual recklessness of their job e.g. for the case of Maggie.

Despite having been in the field for quite some time, action should be taken upon her for the slightest evidence of malpractice hence enhance the safety of other patients.In the medical field particularly nursing, there are regulations set aside that govern the mode of conduct of physicians and nurses, which Maggie must be aware of. Negligence of duty is one of them and it illustrates that they should be cautious enough while executing their duties to reduce any emotional or physical damage to their patients.

However the substantial proof for negligence lies with the patient, their family or whoever was looking on (Jamnik, 2011). With the evidence of the deep laceration on the patient, Maggie can be sued in court because the patient might bleed profusely and can even die. On the other hand, being sued does not mean that the nurse was actually negligent in duty since she can come out with arguments that support her act and receive a fair jurisdiction. For example she may use one of the four elements of malpractice which is damage to justify her total innocence.

When evaluating a malpractice in the nursing field, the jury will consider whether the deep laceration caused harm to the patient or not. If not, then that would be a different case of poor patient management and medical malpractice. With such arguments, the supervisor should be well armed with a good medical lawyer to support the damage done to the patient and also ascertain the drift from normal care of patients as stipulated in the medical laws (Kassim, Alias & Muhammad, 2014).On the other hand, the physician will face charges according to the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labour Act (EMTALA) board since it stipulates some physician regulations of which he breached.

According to this law the on-call physicians must be ready and willing all the time whenever they are called to come and administer help to a patient requiring emergency help without delay. In this case, the physician must have delayed to come hence Maggie was forced to commence examinations on the patient. This can be a great threat to patients because EMTALA provides specifications for the type of screens a hospital can perform, of which the nurse is not aware therefore the physician should be charged with neglect of duty (Jamnik, 2011).

Individual responsibilities should be taken as early as possible to prevent greater penalties to the hospital at large whereby it can even cause the hospital operations to be stopped by the EMTALA. The hospital can aid the delivery of evidence through the supervising nurse hence save it from the penalty of cessation of service. Such an open hospital can provide the best healthcare since all the practitioners will be responsible enough, knowing their obligations (Gwilym Siôn, 2008). ReferencesGwilym Siôn, a. G. (2008).

A user evaluation of a local air ambulance service in north wales. International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, 21(6), 585-97. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/09526860810900736 Jamnik, A. (2011). ETHICAL CODE IN THE PUBLIC ACCOUNTING PROFESSION. Journal of International Business Ethics, 4(2), 17-29, 70. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1015121823?accountid=45049 Kassim, P. N. J., Alias, F., & Muhammad, R. W. (2014). THE GROWTH OF PATIENT AUTONOMY IN MODERN MEDICAL PRACTICE AND THE DEFINED LIMITATIONS UNDER THE SHARIAH.

IIUM Law Journal, 22(2), 213-247. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1643120984?accountid=45049