The ethical decision-making model is based upon three components that include moral awareness, moral judgement and ethical behavior (Capella, 2022). Moral awareness is recognizing the existence of ethical dilemma. In this case study, Dr. Kerr is facing the dilemma when Ana’s parents decide not to vaccinate their child. Once an issue is identified, moral judgement is the next step. It is an approach to reach a decision or resolution by identifying facts and specific questions related to ethical principles. Dr. Kerr explained to Smiths the importance of vaccinations and the data’s how the vaccine reduces the rate of various disease outbreak. These two components lead to the third component – ethical behavior. Dr. Kerr listened to Smiths and try to educate them more by providing useful resources. Dr. Kerr provided reliable websites that monitored by the federal government.
Effectiveness of communication approach in case study
Communication is a key element when educating clients. In the case study, Dr. Kerr actively listened to Ana’s parents and their concerns about vaccination/ immunization. Dr. Kerr’s communication to Ana’s parents was non-judgmental and informative. She discussed the benefits of receiving vaccination not only for Ana but also explained how it will be beneficial to some children who have weakened immune systems because of genetic diseases or cancer treatment. Dr. Kerr explained the vaccine adverse event reporting system program in detail hoping this ease their minds. In the article, motivational interviewing and vaccine acceptance in children: The motive study, “addressing health beliefs through patient-centered communication approaches such as motivational interviewing may improve vaccine confidence (Cole, J et.al, 2022).
Even though Dr. Kerr used effective communication skills, she was unable to convince Ana’s parents. Dr. Kerr could have used other communication techniques such as reading materials. This could have provided with information for them to review at a later time and would have given opportunity to do more research using more reliable websites.
In this case study, Dr. Kerr’s recommendation having Ana being vaccinated causes the ethical dilemma. Dr. Kerr believes the vaccine would be best for Ana whereas Ana’s parents chose to raise her naturally as possible and didn’t consent to get Ana vaccinated. To best navigate these challenges, health care workers need to follow four fundamentals of ethics -autonomy, beneficence, non- maleficence and justice. Autonomy states the patient has the right to make the decision for themselves. Beneficence means acting in the best interest of the patient. Non maleficence means do not harm intentionally, and the justice emphasizes fairness and equality among individuals. For this case study, the ethical dilemma conflicts begin with autonomy, beneficence and non-maleficence. Dr. Kerr respects Ana’s parents’ beliefs and listens to them attentively (autonomy). Even though, Dr. Kerr respects their beliefs, she tries to educate Ana’s parents about vaccination and its benefits (beneficence). Furthermore, Dr. Kerr utilizing the principle of non-maleficence when she informs Jenna and Chris that vaccine protects young children or sick children who are to unable to receive any vaccine due to their medical condition. This points out Dr. Kerr’s commitment to the welfare of the community and as well as to her other clients. Dr. Kerr, as a physician, she has to make sure no one is unfairly disadvantaged when it comes to access healthcare (Justice).
Dr. Kerr followed all the principles. Listening to Smith’s concerns during each visit and providing education during each pediatrician visit may help to resolve this issue. By implementing this approach, the parents will have more time to review and they may feel to change their decision as they do more research.
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Conclusion
Health care professionals face ethical dilemmas on a day by day basis. This issue can be handled efficiently by applying ethical principles. In this case study, the ethical dilemma was that parents declined to get their five-day old newborn get vaccinated despite of well explanation and rationale from their daughter’s pediatrician, Dr. Kerr. In order to resolve this dilemma, Dr. Kerr would have adhered to the principles of autonomy, bene
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