title: Abandonment of patients by home health nursing agencies: an ethical analysis of the dilemma.
abstract: Home health care nurses are facing the ethical dilemma of discontinuing care to nonpaying needy patients or facing agency economic demise. Nurses perceive discontinuing care under such circumstances as patient abandonment. Ethical analysis of the dilemma yields two conclusions: (1) discontinuing care under non-life-threatening circumstances is not abandonment and does not violate the duty of beneficence, and (2) nurses do have an obligation to inform society of such instances so that public policy decision makers can be armed with that information when making allocation decisions.
authors.affiliation: School of Nursing, University of Kansas, Kansas City.
authors.forename: J B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Reckling
mesh_terms: D004993:Ethics, Nursing; D015276:Health Care Rationing; D006699:Home Care Services; D006801:Humans; D008489:Medical Indigency; D010360:Patient Transfer; D012935:Social Justice