Code of Ethics for Emergency Physicians, Essay Example

While it is unethical reporting for duty intoxicated my first reaction to this alert would be verifying the incident for myself by reporting to the emergency department and subtly investigate the report without accusing Dr. Smith of any misconduct. Next I would review the code of ethics pertaining to emergency physicians’ conduct. If there is any validity in the nurse’s suspicions the ethical thing to do in my jurisdiction as a  new administrator is create a log of the incident and contact  Dr. Smith’s supervising physician or organization and tender a report of my observations and evaluations of the incident.

Importantly, a section of the emergency physician code of ethics highlights  impaired or incompetent physicians. It re-enforces the nonmaleficence principle dictating patients’ rights ofprotection from incompetent or impaired emergency physicians. If Dr. Smith was intoxicated then it is highly likely that some degree of incompetence/impairment would prevails and pateints ought to be protected from this situation. Precisely, Emergency physicians  have a moral responsibility for executing moral and  technical excellence refraining from  any type  deception or fraud (American College of Emergency Physicians, 2014).

If at any time the physician’s competence is discovered to be distorted to the extent of compromising his/her character after a thorough appropriate peer review evaluation, it is mandatory as a moral obligation to protect patients. Also,management should assist the physician in correcting the deficiency. These could take the form internal discipline along with remedial training.  Health care institutions are responsible for protecting pateints from impaired incompetent physicians by ensuring that the necessary remedial measures are taken before the physician is reassigned duties in the department (American Medical Association, 2014)

References

American College of Emergency Physicians (2014). Code of Ethics for Emergency Physicians, Retrieved on June 15^th, 2014 from http://www.acep.org/content.aspx?id=29144

American Medical Association (2014).Medical Ethics. Retrieved on June 15^th, 2014 from http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/physician-resources/medical-ethics.page