Legal and Ethical Aspects of Care

This essay will be based on a case scenario (please see appendix for a copy of this) that will critically analyse the ethical dilemmas that health professionals face with regards to the implications of consent , disclosure of personal information and maintaining patients confidentiality. The legal implications of the case scenario will also be discussed with relation to the breach of confidentiality and how the Data Protection Act 1998 can conflict with other pieces of legislation to protect patient’s rights to their confidentiality being maintained. It will also identify the consequences’ of non –disclosure with the potential harms of disclosure without consent following the General Medical Council’s guidelines. It will also explain the case scenario from a utilitarian perspective and a deontological perspective.

From time to time, the obligation that health professional have to maintain their patients confidentiality can present them with an ethical or legal dilemma such as breaching their patients confidentiality. This then makes their duty towards their patient become complicated. Such as in the case scenario Dr Gomez informed Bob that he was HIV positive and advised him to inform his sexual partners of his infection status. An ethical dilemma arises when there is no clear solution to a problem (Sussex and Herne, 2009) in the case scenario Dr Gomez is concerned about the health and wellbeing of his paitent Bob’s current sexual partner Sue who is currently 7 months pregnant with his baby. Therefore Dr Gomez’s ethical dilemma is does he breach Bob’s confidentiality to protect both her and her unborn child?
Health care professionals are faced with ethical dilemmas on a daily basis and are forced to make decisions based on the best outcome for their patient taking the legal and ethical aspects of the situation into account (Sussex and Herne, 2009). For instance one of the most common dilemmas in nursing is that Jehovah’s Witnesses refuse to have blood