Legal implications of standard setting in nursing.
Patients are increasingly holding health professionals to account for their care. The practice of standard setting has important legal implications. Standard setting can be seen to aid the communication process in healthcare and can therefore help avoid expensive litigation. Standard setting can improve the quality of patient care. Standard documentation could be disclosed in a medical/nursing negligence case. Standards should not be automatically applied. Standard setting can be patchy, misdirected and irrelevant to actual problems. Standards can create unreal patient expectations of care. Patient care may suffer if unrealistic or unreasonable standards are in place. Standard setting can show that there is a controlled environment of care.
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D004282:Documentation; D006801:Humans; D008318:Malpractice / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D009729:Nursing / Q000592:standards*; D009731:Nursing Audit / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D009732:Nursing Care / Q000592:standards*; D009740:Nursing Staff / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D017060:Patient Satisfaction / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D006113:United Kingdom