Abuse of Patients/Clients
Abuse of Patients/Clients
Any abuse of a patient/client is immoral and illegal. It includes but is not limited to types of abuse such as:
The CRTO is committed to the prevention of all types of abuse that might occur within the RT-patient/client therapeutic relationship.
A RT is called to perform an arterial blood gas puncture on a patient/client in the emergency department. The patient/client is verbally abusive to the RT and refuses to hold his arms still. The RT restrains the patient/client by securing his hands to the bedrails. Would this be considered to be physical abuse and what other options were available?
The ethical dilemma revolves around respecting autonomy, or the patient/client’s free will, which conflicts with the RT’s need to do good and avoid doing harm.
Most hospitals have organizational policies regarding patient/client restraints and those must be taken into consideration when choosing a course of action. Generally, healthcare providers cannot use any form of restraint without the patient/client’s consent, except in an emergency in which there is a serious threat of harm to the individual or others, and all other measures have been unsuccessful. One of the risks of restraining the patient is that it could be considered to be physical abuse because the patient/client has not consented to either the procedure or to being restrained.
For more information, please see the CRTO’s Abuse Awareness & Prevention Professional Practice Guidelines (PPG) at: crto.on.ca/pdf/PPG/abuse.pdf.