Leading through Ethical Relationships Essay
Social justice is the fair and equitable division of a society or institution’s resources, opportunities, and privileges. According to Hunter and Murray (2019), healthcare institutions have some social injustices, which means some patients have unequal healthcare resources and privileges. Being a leader in practice settings, the DNP-prepared nurse is responsible for leading and guiding social justice reforms in their capacity. In this discussion, I will select a health inequity in my healthcare setting and propose a way of using the attributes of an effective leader in guiding a healthcare team to address the selected health inequity.
Health inequity is the avoidable differences in health between groups resulting from unfair systems that negatively affect an individual’s living conditions, access to healthcare services, and health status (Zhao et al., 2019). The selected health inequity in my healthcare setting is the difficulty of accessing healthcare services for some groups/populations in the community. Various minority groups face prejudice, bias, and discrimination, which mostly contributes to delays in health services, including diagnosis and treatment.
As a leader, I can use my skills, strengths, and attributes to address the issue by educating healthcare professionals on the impact of inequity on the care they provide to patients, thus discouraging discrimination, bias, and prejudice among certain groups of people, especially minority groups. One of the attributes of an effective leader in healthcare teams is leading by example (Heinen et al., 2019). In this case, I can begin by demonstrating fairness and acting unprejudiced, unbiased, and impartially to all patients regardless of their group or definitive characteristics.
Health inequity significantly affects individual patients and populations. It is essential to address these inequities by leading and participating in healthcare reforms. Advocating for equitable distribution of healthcare resources is also vital in addressing social injustices in the healthcare setting, populations, and society.
References
Heinen, M., van Oostveen, C., Peters, J., Vermeulen, H., & Huis, A. (2019). An integrative review of leadership competencies and attributes in advanced nursing practice. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 75(11), 2378-2392. https://doi.org/10.1111/jan.14092
Hunter, B. M., & Murray, S. F. (2019). Deconstructing the financialization of healthcare. Development and Change, 50(5), 1263–1287. https://doi.org/10.1111/dech.12517
Zhao, M., Liu, B., Shan, L., Li, C., Wu, Q., Hao, Y., Chen, S., Lan, L., Khan, Z., Lian, L., Ning, N. & Jiao, M. (2019). Can integration reduce inequity in healthcare utilization? Evidence and hurdles in China. BMC Health Services Research, 19(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-019-4480-8
Leading Through Ethical Relationships
Discussion
Purpose
The purpose of this discussion is to prepare the DNP-prepared nurse leader to guide social justice reform.
Instructions
For this discussion, address the following:
Identify a health inequity in your healthcare setting, community, or population.
Propose how you could address this identified healthcare inequity describing attributes of an effective leader guiding a healthcare team.
Construct your responses using the CARE Plan method.
Please click on the following link to review the DNP Discussion Guidelines on the Student Resource Center program page:
Link (webpage): DNP Discussion GuidelinesLinks to an external site.
Program Competencies
This discussion enables the student to meet the following program competences:
Applies organizational and system leadership skills to affect systemic changes in corporate culture and to promote continuous improvement in clinical outcomes. (PO 6)
Appraises current information systems and technologies to improve health care. (POs 6, 7)
Creates a supportive organizational culture for flourishing collaborative teams to facilitate clinical disease prevention and promote population health at all system levels. (PO 8)
Course Outcomes
This discussion enables the student to meet the following course outcomes:
Investigate the role of advanced nursing practice in innovation and transformation to propose solutions impacting healthcare systems. (PCs 2, 4; PO 6)
Differentiate attributes of effective leaders and followers in influencing healthcare. (PCs 2, 4; PO 6)
Formulate selected strategies for leadership and influence across healthcare systems. (PC 6; PO 8)