BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN NURSING:

BIOETHICS
COURSE MODULE COURSE UNIT WEEK
1 1 1

Introduction to Bioethics

ü Understand the course and unit objectives

ü Study the entire module prior to class attendance
ü Research and comprehend required learning resources; refer to unit
terminologies for jargons
ü Engage in classroom discussions
ü Participate in weekly discussion board (Canvas)
ü Answer and submit course unit tasks

At the end of this unit, the students are expected to:

Cognitive:
1. Discuss and identify the concept of Bioethics and other related terminologies
2. Recognize the importance of bioethics in the field of nursing
Affective:
1. Demonstrate self-awareness and therapeutic use of self whenever encountered in a state of
confusing in nursing field Participate during class discussion
2. Appreciate and value the feelings of the client
3. Be sensitive with every ethical issues in the practice of profession.
Psychomotor:

1. Apply learned ethical concepts in order to clarify ethical issues and dilemma
2. Follow class rules and netiquettes
3. Participate during class discussion
4. Practice effective listening during class discussion

Introduction to Bioethics
ETHICS

It is a PRACTICAL science of morality of human conduct that implies direction;

Science – deals with complete and systematic body of factual and empirical data and reasoning;
Moral – dictates of reason on how things should be
Human conduct – deliberate, free and how one person SHOULD ACT
Ethics - concerns the needs and values of human persons in all matters of human concern
including HEALTH; nothing is more human and personal than HEALTH;
Ethics is concern with the study of social morality and philosophical reflection on its norms and
practices;
Moral issues deals with respect for life, freedom, love, issues that provokes conscience; issues that
responds to ought, should, right, wrong, good, bad and complicated

BIOETHICS- is a field of study concerned with the ETHICS and philosophical implications of
certain biological and medical procedures, technologies, and treatments, as organ
transplants, genetic engineering, and care of the terminally ill.
A science that deals with the study of the morality of human conduct concerning human life in all its
aspects from the moment of its conception to its natural end.

HEALTHCARE ETHICS-is the field of applied ethics that is concerned with the vast array of moral
decision-making situations that arise in the practice of medicine in addition to the procedures and
the policies that are designed to guide such practice. Health ethics is employed to regulate human
conduct in the practice of health care so that the good may be done and evil may be avoided
thereby ensuring the purpose of health care.

NURSING ETHICS- can be defined broadly as the examination of all kinds of ethical and
bioethical issues from the perspective of nursing theory and practice which, in turn, rest on the
agreed core concepts of nursing, namely: person, culture, care, health, healing, environment and
nursing itself

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS - Is the division of ethics that relates to professional behavior

 The Human Being

The PERSON
(Biblical) Created in the image and likeness of God; differing from animals due to
possession of spiritual intelligence and free will;
God produces the human body through the cooperation of human parents; the
creation of the human soul is direct act of God;
Each person is unique and irreplaceable; and are called not only to maturity but to
eternal life

HUMAN ACTS & ACTS OF MAN

Human act is an act which proceeds from the deliberate free will of man. Man knows what he
is doing and freely chooses to do what he does;
Not all acts are Human Acts; for an act to be human it must have:
KNOWLEDGE and FREEDOM

HUMAN ACTS & ACTS OF MAN

KNOWLEDGE – of what it is about and what it means

facts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the
theoretical or practical understanding of a subject:
awareness or familiarity gained by experience of a fact or situation

FREEDOM – to do or leave it undone without coercion or constraint;

it implies voluntariness which is to rationally choose by deliberate will the object

an idea of reason that serves an indispensable practical function. Without the assumption of
freedom, reason cannot act.

CONSCIENCE – spiritual discernment;

The capacity to make practical judgement in matters involving ethical issues;
It is person’s most secret sanctuary where he/she is alone with God;
Hence the more a correct conscience prevails the more do persons and groups turn
aside from blind choice and try to be guided by the objective standards of moral
conduct (SVC 1965)
Acts of Man
- Actions beyond one’s consciousness; not dependent on the intellect and will
- Essential qualities of Acts of Man
- Done without knowledge
- Without consent
- Involuntary
 Ethical Philosophers/Bioethicists
Immanuel Kant
(1724-1804)
A German philosopher
was an opponent of utilitarianism

Our emotional preferences which provides us with values, must be checked against certain
rational standards of a PURELY formal kind;
Supreme principle of morality referred to as The Categorical Imperative (CI);
Any choices we make must be such that we would be willing for everyone else to make the
same choices (universality).
Kant’s Deontological moral theory:
1. Act done in accord with duty and act done from a sense of duty
2. Categorical Imperative

John Bordley Rawl

Born: February 21, 1921
an American moral and political
philosopher;
Professorship at Harvard University, University of Oxford;
His magnum opus, A Theory of Justice (1971
According to English philosopher Jonathan Wolff, John Rawls was the most important
political philosopher of the 20th century
Social Contract as a solution to Distributive Justice (the socially just distribution of goods in
a society);
Resultant theory known as "Justice as Fairness”:
1. Society should be structured so that the greatest possible amount of liberty is
given to its members,;
2. Inequalities either social or economic are only to be allowed only if the worst will
result under an equal distribution;
Finally, if there is such a beneficial inequality, this inequality should not make it
harder for those without resources to occupy positions of power, for instance public
office.
John Rawl’s Ethics:
1. Equal access to basic human rights and liberties of citizenship
2. Fair equality of opportunity and equal distribution of socio economic
inequalities

St. Thomas Aquinas

Born 1225; Sicily, Italy

Proclaimed Doctor of the Catholic Church
Joined the Dominican Order
(Order of Preachers – OP)
Thomas's ethics - "first principles of action.“
 Summa theologiae , he wrote:
Virtue denotes a certain perfection of a power;
Now a thing's perfection is considered chiefly in regard to its end;
But the end of power is act. Wherefore power is said to be perfect, according as it is
determinate to its act.[82]
St. Thomas Four Cardinal Virtues
Prudence
Temperance
Justice
Fortitude
The object of the theological virtues is GOD Himself, Who is the last end of all, as
surpassing the knowledge of our reason;
On the other hand, the object of the intellectual and moral virtues is something comprehensible to
human reason. Wherefore the theological virtues are specifically distinct from the moral and
intellectual virtues

Three determinants of moral action:

1. Object
- the will intends of the moral act; may be either a thing or an action
2. Circumstances
- may mitigate or aggravate the goodness or badness of a particular act
- answers the who, what, where, by what means, why, how and when
3. End of the agent
- purpose that is integral part of every moral act in either case

Aquinas Ethics:
1. double effect principles- situation in which a good and evil effect will result
2. Principle of totality

William David Ross

• Born: April 15, 1877; Thurso, Scotland

• Scottish philosopher
• Education: University of Edinburgh
• The moral order...is just as much part of the fundamental nature of the universe (and...of
any possible universe in which there are moral agents at all) as is the spatial or numerical
structure expressed in the axioms of geometry or arithmetic;
• "moral intuitionist" theory,
• According to W. D. Ross (1877-1971), there are several prima facie duties that we can use
to determine what, concretely, we ought to do.
• A prima facie duty is a duty that is binding (obligatory)
• "Unless stronger moral considerations outweigh, one ought to keep a promise made."

The prima facie duties include:

Duty of fidelity- refers to one’s loyalty to a worthy cause, telling the truth as the situation
demands it, keeping actual and implicit promises and not representing fiction as truth.
Duty of reparation – an act of making amends, righting the wrongs one has done to others
Duty of gratitude – appreciation and recognition of the services others have done for him/her
Duty of justice – equitable distribution of medical resources must be observed as far as availability or scarcity
will allow.
Duty of beneficence- to do good to others
 Duty of self-improvement- to act so as to promote one’s own good
Duty of non-maleficence- person’s duty to prevent harm to others

Ethics- Moral principles that govern a person's behavior or the conducting of an activity.
Autonomy- The capacity of an agent to act in accordance with objective morality rather than under the
influence of desires
Altruism – unselfish concern for other people

Prepare for a graded recitation of the above topics.

Burkhardt and Nathaniel (2019). Ethics Issue in Contemporary Nursing,

4th edition
Morrison and Furlong , Health Care Ethics, critical issues for the 21st
century
Timbreza, Florentino T.(2021). Bioethics and Moral Decisions, 2nd Ed.
Udan, Josie…et al (2023). Healthcare Ethics, 1st Ed.