Victoria will see voluntary assisted dying become law in June next year and nurses are still working through what the change in legislation means for their practice. And that's exactly what the Australian College of Nursing (ACN) unpacked at a ...

An increasing number of hospital and health services are collating, storing and utilising medical and nursing records in electronic databases. These databases are usually protected with individualised passwords which can be monitored and checked to preserve patients’ privacy and ensure ...

Australia is a signatory to a number of international agreements on human rights. The most important in relation to mental health patients is the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 14.1 says: State parties (including Australia) shall ensure ...

There is an obvious employer expectation and condition of employment that when nurses are at work they are awake and not sleeping. After all, the employer is paying for the time that the nurse is at work. This rule does ...

Once a patient assumes an in-patient status in a hospital, it thereby creates a duty of care concerning protection of the patient from foreseeable acts of harm. Liability is not potentially limited to acts of harm committed by staff and/or ...

The potential liability of health services, hospitals, day surgeries and clinics does not, depending on the nature of the treatment or care provided, cease upon physical discharge or a patient leaving the facility. If any treatment or care has had ...

Nurses and managers should be aware of a recent High Court of Australia decision concerning liability for the criminal acts of an employee. Vicarious liability is the legal notion of a relationship between an employer and employee (with some exceptions) ...

People who have experienced a medical injury need to be heard by clinicians and feel that the hospital is taking steps to address the issue, say researchers. Senior law lecturer at UNSW Sydney Dr Jennifer Moore said this might involve listening ...

If a nurse has an intimate, consensual relationship with a patient, it is deemed unacceptable to the profession. But what if the relationship is with a patient’s spouse? A recent hearing examined such a case. CB was an enrolled nurse ...

Directing another nurse to write inaccurate notes is a serious matter, as this case study illustrates. The making of nursing notes is an important task that nurses undertake as part of their duties. Their importance cannot be stressed enough, not ...