Ethical Decision Making

Choose a case of a real patient with a potential ethical dilemma in end of life care pertaining to withholding or withdrawing life support; or euthanasia or assisted suicide in the United States (except Nancy Cruzan, Charlie Gard or Dax Cowart). There are numerous examples in the text and on the internet.

Using the Worksheet for Ethical Decision-Making Framework to guide you, complete the introduction and all 6 steps.There is a blank word document for you to use in the Supporting Documents. You do not need to use complete sentences and it does not need to be double spaced.  Also, Step 6 asks you to assess the outcomes, but you will only be able to indicate how you would assess the outcomes.

Please Note: You are viewing this end of life dilemma as if you were the Ethics Committee and you will use ethical reasoning to achieve a recommendation.  Discussions with family and patients and doctor would have already occurred. You will thoroughly examine the situation and will follow each step in the Framework for Ethical Decision Making, using the Worksheet. Your recommendation may be different than what actually occurred (for example. You may recommend keeping a patient on life support when in reality, the “real” patient was taken off life support). The purpose of the assignment is to apply ethical reasoning to a real patient dilemma at end of life.

Completed worksheet should be at least 2-3 typed, single spaced pages. College level writing is expected but complete sentences are not required; in-text citations are also not required for this assignment.  A cover page and reference page, with at least 3 scholarly references, is required. Title page and reference page do not count for the 2-3 pages of content.