Nursing Ethics Competency Validation as Support for Clinical Nurses: A Pilot Study.

Abstract

Clinical nurses demonstrate wide variability in ethical competence, resulting in moral distress and turnover. A nursing professional development specialist led a team of experts in bioethics and nursing ethics to develop and pilot a Nursing Code of Ethics-based competency validation program on an inpatient surgical unit. Results demonstrate the value, and challenges, of focused efforts to support nurses' integration of Code-based ethics concepts into everyday nursing practice.