The impact of nurse's ethical sensitivity levels on their approaches to ethical issues spesific to intensive care

Ethical problems are the problems which have no definite solution, leaving a person in a dilemma and need to be constructed in a moral judgement. Intensive care nurses during their professional practice are confronted with ethical issues that concern individuals who have vital problems. The purpose of this studyis to determine the effect of ethical sensitivity levels of nurses who are working in intensive care units on their approach to ethical problems frequently encountered in intensive care units. 211 nurses working in the intensive care units of hospitals of a health serving in a province of İstanbul constitued the resarch universe and 161 nurses constitued the resarch sample. Research data were obtained by using the Ethical Susceptibility Scale (ADA), a Descriptive information form, and an Ethics Questionnaire survey. The data obtained from the study which are in the SPSS 22.0 package programme, were analyzed using the descriptive statistics, number, percentage and chi square, as well as the difference between the two means which is known as t test( significance test), apart from that Anova methods were conducted in the groups more than 2 patients and those who had the ratio below 0.5p were considered statistically significant. Total ADA score of nurses were found to be 95,11. The scores obtained from the sub-dimensions as follows: 21 points in the autonomy subscale, 12.88 points in the benefit subscale, 13.19 points in the holistic approach subscale, 12.51 points in the conflict subscale, 13.96 points in the application subscale, and 9.9 points in the orientation subscale. It has been defined that the educational status, the duration of employment term and the understanding of ethics education status variables have an affect on the moral sensitivity levels of the nurses. In the intensive care units, it has been observed that nurses see physicians as decision makers in need of ethical situations, and also the informed consent-a problem which is seen in intensive care unit, fair sharing of limited resources,and the approaches of nurses towards nurse's disability status in ethical situations also affects their point of stand to the required situation. In order to increase the ethical sensitivity of nurses and to support them in solving ethical problems, some multidisciplinary case examples are suggested such as increasing their professional competence, raising awareness about basic ethical principles and legal regulations, apart from that, strengthening the team and the team work understanding. Keywords: Ethical sensitivity, ethical approach, intensive care nursing, critical patient care, nursing ethics