Application of Standards of Care Discussion
Application of Standards of Care Discussion
Application of Standards of Care Discussion
Question Description
Topic 1: Application of Standards of Care and the Nurse Practice Act to Advance Practice Nurses Involved in a Legal Action.
Look at the legal malpractice case study that has been assigned to your group. (I will put it here, it’s case study # 2)
*** Beginning of case study
Case Study 2: Wrongful Death by Howard Carpenter on Behalf of Wilma Carpenter, Deceased
People Involved in Case:
Mrs. Wilma Carpenter — patient, deceased
Mr. Howard Carpenter — husband and plaintiff in wrongful death suit
Mrs. Scale, RN, MS — nursing supervisor
Elizabeth Adelman, RN — recovery room nurse
Richard Washington, MD — orthopedic surgeon
Judy Gouda, RN, NP
Joseph Alsoff, LPN — post-surgical unit nurse
Kelly Wheeler, RN — post-surgical unit nurse
David Casler, LRT
Susan Post, JD — risk manager
Amy Green — quality assurance
Michael Parks, RN, MS, CNS — education coordinator
Caring Memorial Hospital
Facts:
The plaintiff, Mrs. Carpenter, was a 55-year-old woman who underwent a total hip replacement at Caring Memorial Hospital. The physician was Richard Washington, MD. Dr. Washington is an orthopedic surgeon. His nurse practitioner is Judy Gouda, RN, NP. Dr. Washington reviewed the consent with Mrs. Carpenter prior to surgery. Joseph Alsoff, LPN, witnessed the consent and Mr. Carpenter was present. Joseph does not remember the doctor ever mentioning that death could be a result of the surgery. The recovery room nurse is Elizabeth Adelman, RN. The respiratory therapist is David Casler, LRT. The nurse on the post-surgical unit was Kelly Wheeler, RN. The supervising nurse was Mrs. Scale, RN, MS.
The patient had an epidural catheter for a post-operative pain management following an episode of hypotension in the recovery room which was treated with Ephedrine. Judy Gouda made rounds on the patient in the recovery room after the hypotensive event and vital signs were stable. The patient, Mrs. Carpenter, was placed on a medical surgical nursing unit with the epidural. The nurse, Kelly, was assigned to the patient and had not worked on that unit before, but had worked in post-acute critical care units. The nurse’s assignment was to provide patient care on the entire floor for that shift. There was also an LPN, Joseph, on the unit. It was a busy day on the unit. Mrs. Carpenter was not the only post-operative patient.
Kelly assessed the plaintiff upon admission, checked the IVs, asked if the patient was in pain, noted that the patient was responsive and understood where she was, and was stable. She then left to care for other patients.
The licensed practical nurse, Joseph Alcoff, had been working on the unit for several years. It had been rumored that Joseph was an alcoholic. There was no evidence that he had been drinking on the unit. Approximately an hour after the patient arrived on the unit, she was unable to tolerate respiratory therapy that was ordered and she became nauseated and vomited. David Casler administered the respiratory therapy. According to Kelly, the registered nurse, 10 minutes after the vomiting episode, Joseph Alcoff, the LPN, found the patient blue and unresponsive and called a code. Joseph is the only person other than the physician that carries his own liability insurance. The hospital also has malpractice insurance.
The code team responded, along with Kelly, the registered nurse. Mrs. Carpenter was intubated and cardiac resuscitation was initiated. The patient responded to resuscitative efforts and she was transferred to the intensive care unit. Subsequently, Mrs. Carpenter did not do well, was unresponsive, and declared brain dead and taken off the respirator. She did not have a DNR in place.
There is a conflict in testimony between Joseph the LPN and Kelly the RN. Joseph indicated that Kelly found the plaintiff to be unresponsive after the vomiting episode and called the code. The record is not clear as to when the vital signs and epidural site were assessed. Kelly said she did a motor and sensory level assessment and they were fine — it is not charted though. The time elapsed between the vomiting episode and finding the patient is in dispute. The final diagnosis was anoxia encephalopathy due to the time lapse between CPR being initiated. The patient was eventually extubated, breathed independently for a period of time, and then subsequently expired.
The vital signs ordered by the physician were hourly. The hypotensive episode in the recovery room had not been reported to the registered nurse.
The risk manager is Susan Post, JD, who works in collaboration with the quality assurance director Amy Green. Amy had noted when doing chart reviews over the last 3 months prior to this incident that the vital signs taken in the recovery room were not charted, not done, or not reported to the units. She was in the process of collecting data from the different units on this observation. She also noted a pattern of using float nurses to several postoperative units. Prior to this incident, the clinical nurse specialist, Michael Parks, RN, MS, CNS, was consulting with Susan Post and Amy Green about the status of staff education on these units and what types of resources and training was needed.
***End of case study
Describe the case and discuss the standard of care that the parties will be held to in this case. How will the standards of care and the Nurse Practice Act be applied in a court of law if the case is sued?
Peer review at least two colleagues’ posts and try to review students that do not have feedback. Use Chapter 16, Effective Peer Reviews, in the Kaplan Guide to Successful Writing Handbook as a guide to review.
Review pages 213–219 of (below attach document)
section4_peer_reviews_grammar_and_grading.pdf
section4_peer_reviews_gram
Application of Standards of Care Discussion
Application of Standards of Care Discussion
You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.
Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.
Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.
The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.
ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS
Discussion Questions (DQ)
Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words.
Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source.
One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words.
I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses.
Weekly Participation
Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately.
In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies.
Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work).
Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week.
APA Format and Writing Quality
Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required).
Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation.
I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition.
Use of Direct Quotes
I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly.
As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content.
It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source.
LopesWrite Policy
For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me.
Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes.
Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own?
Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score.
Late Policy
The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies.
Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances.
If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect.
I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension.
As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading.
Communication
Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me:
Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class.
Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours.
