Q & A Legal Advice with Elizabeth Rudolph
Featured Author:
Elizabeth Rudolph, JD, MSN, RN
Elizabeth Rudolph is an attorney and nurse with 19 years experience practicing health care law. She is a renowned speaker on legal issues in nursing and legal nurse consulting. Having obtained her Bachelors in Nursing, Masters in Nursing and law degree from Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee. Elizabeth has authored numerous publications on legal and nursing issues, many of which are available in books, courses and CDs. She has been the subject of many published articles and featured in network television programming. Elizabeth Rudolph is the founder and president of the National Center for Legal Nurse Consulting, LegalNurseLocator.com, which provides two-day professional legal nurse consulting certification (PLNC).
More articles from this author:
Elizabeth Randolph
July 23, 2008
NOTE: The information in this column is not to be construed as legal advice. Please see an attorney if you need legal assistance. This is for informational purposes only.
Q: As a nurse, what is the single, most important legal issue I must be aware of as I take care of my patients?
A: Today’s nurse must manage complex situations both in inpatient and outpatient settings. Add to this the phenomenal advances taking place in technology and the delivery of health care and the nurse takes on an extra, demanding burden. Plus, society expects nurses to be competent, compassionate and available. Although nursing professionals spend years learning their profession and are well trained, they are not prepared for the legal issues they face. Chief among these is being sued for nursing malpractice.
Q: What exactly is nursing malpractice, and how does a nurse get entangled in nursing malpractice?
A: Generally speaking, malpractice may be divided into two major categories:
(1) Negligence, when a nurse fails to exercise that degree of nursing care which would be expected from another nurse in a similar clinical situation, and
(2) Informed Consent, when a nurse fails to adequately inform a patient about the pertinent risks and benefits of a nursing procedure or treatment prior to its performance.
In law, negligence has a special meaning and a much more narrow definition then the general one we often think of, such as neglecting to do a task, job, or procedure correctly.
Informed consent litigation, which occurs less frequently than being sued for negligence, presents special issues of its own, including vagueness of your specific role and the resulting consequence of taking on more than you thought.
