An Ethical Dilemma Surrounding a Vaccination Case Study | NRSG-2003 Legalities, Standards, and Ethical Reasoning in Professional Nursing

Running head: ETHICAL DILEMMA
An Ethical Dilemma Surrounding a Vaccination Case Study
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Red River College
NRSG-2003 Legalities, Standards, and Ethical Reasoning in Professional Nursing
Instructor: Tara Roberts

Running head: ETHICAL DILEMMA
Title: Ethical dilemma surrounding frozen embryo
This paper will give an insight into the ethical dilemma faced by practitioners
regarding taking decisions related to storage or donating/discarding of frozen embryo.
The paper will extend the discussion by first reporting about an actual case of ethical
dilemma surrounding the issue. The case study is an example of real life scenario
where some names have been modified for confidentiality purpose. The study by
Gracia, Gracia and Chen (2010) reported about the case scenario. The case is about
Lisa, a 32 year old woman who was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer. She had
married recently. Before proceeding with her cancer treatment, she banked nine
embryos as part of IVF therapy. However, she died a year later. Her husband was left
with the choice of deciding what to do with the embryo. He did not wished to continue
paying for the storage nor did he wished to give it to another couple. He did not paid
storage fees for six months and now his clinic is unable to reach him. The ethical
dilemmas will be explained further by the use of ethical principles, the Code of Ethics
and the Ethical Decision Making Framework.
Ethical principle
The above case study presents the ethical dilemmas related to deciding whether
the frozen embryo should be discarded or it should be stored even now. Although
earlier it was fair for Lisa to preserve her embryo based on her hope of having biological
children in the future, however going with the decision of preservation when Lisa has
died needs to be considered because this may be an unwise method of utilizing
resources as the embryo will never be used again. Hence, some ethical principles

Running head: ETHICAL DILEMMA
linked to the ethical dilemma include the principle of autonomy, justice and beneficence.
The principle of patient autonomy is an obligation to respect the autonomy of other
person during decision making (McDermott-Levy, Leffers & Mayaka, 2018). This applies
to the case scenario as the decision to discard or store the embryo needs to be taken
by Lisa’s husband. However, his unavailability and the clinic’al staffs discussion to
discard the embryo because of his absence may violate the principle of autonomy. Clark
(2014) highlights that if parents do not voluntarily agree to dispossession of embryo,
then discarding the embryo may lead to violation of the autonomy of patient.
Another ethical principle linked to the ethical conflict in the scenario is that of
principle of beneficence. This principle is based on the notion that no individual should
be harmed and all actions should be taken to promote good of patient (Grace,
2017). This principle applies to the scenario of storing frozen embryos or donation of
embryos too. The action of storing embryo is an act of beneficence as by storing the
embryo, it provides the option of saving the lives of vulnerable at-risk embryos (). This
could lead to well-being of couples who are expecting child in the future as they will
have to suffer from less hardship involved in treatment for fertility related issues. Lisa’s
decision of storing the embryo in an act of proactive beneficence. However, the ethical
issue surrounding the same is that destruction of embryos brings the question whether
the embryo has any moral status or not.
Code of ethics
The scenario also brings the question regarding the permissible duration for embryo
cryopreservation. In the case scenario, Lisa opted for cryopreservation before her