AN

Douglas
College

 

oD

DC Vision Centre 3

DLC: Opening Ceremonies 4

DLC: Open House 6

Phys Ed gets ball rolling 9
BC Benefits: New name, same goal 10

THE DOUGLAS COLLEGE NEWSLETTER & NOVEMBER 1996

 

Nursing ethics education
meets interdisciplinary

challenge

When we think of bioethics, most of us
think of the huge issues: abortion,
euthanasia, reproductive technology.

When it comes to bioethics in nursing,
hese questions loom even larger. To help
students grapple with issues such as these,
most nursing programs already offer
courses in advanced bioethics.

But what about the more frequent
ethical decisions demanded by nurses’
day-to-day lives—on the ward, dealing
with other health professionals, or with the
families of their patients? That’s where a
new interdisciplinary course offered by
Douglas College’s Philosophy and
General Nursing comes in.

“Ethics is the basis of our profession,”
says General Nursing Instructor Esther
Aneke. “We need an introductory course
to look at the daily ethical problems
students will encounter in the real world.”

Fellow Instructor Denise Hawthorne
agrees. “Beginning nurses need a
grounding in the basics, from a
philosophical standpoint. But offering the
course as part of the General Nursing
Program ensures that it will reflect our
patient-centred, caring perspective.”

It’s the balance between theory and
practice that makes the Douglas College
course unique, Hawthorne says. She and
Aneke have just returned from the

 

General Nursing’s Esther Aneke and Denise Hawthorne.

Canadian Bioethics Society Conference in
Montreal, where they co-presented the
paper Nursing Ethics Education: An
Interdisciplinary Challenge, which was
applauded for its innovative approach.

“There has been fragmentation in
interdisciplinary communication, certainly
in contemporary bioethics discourse,” she
notes. “An interdisciplinary approach is
very difficult in practice—for theorists,
educators, and health professionals—but
we need to do it. This course is a step in
that direction—we’re acting as role
models for applied ethics in nursing.”

“The transition to what we call a
‘seamless approach’ in health care
continues to be a struggle,” Aneke adds.
In fact, last spring’s nursing grads listed
communication with other disciplines and
the issue of reporting (‘whistle-blowing’ )
as top everyday concerns. In a time of
rapid change, cost constraints, and a
growing multicultural patient base, Aneke
emphasizes that “we all need to learn how
to listen to each other.”

Continued on page 9