Confidentiality in Nursing for Mental Patients

Confidentiality in
Nursing for mental
patients

Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
BODY OF ESSAY .........................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................................5
REFRENCES...................................................................................................................................7
Books and Journal........................................................................................................................7
APPENDIX.....................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
It is vital to maintain confidentiality of a patient as he person has right to privacy and the
information that is related to patient should not be shared without his permission. It is duty of
nursing department to ensure confidentiality of information. The choose article is “Legal and
Ethical Aspects of Mental Health Care” as it will justify the role of nurses of mental health
patients and importance of maintaining confidentiality. The nurses of mental health patients have
ethical responsibility to and legal duty to respect the privacy of the patient. To build relations
with patients there is need to develop trust and that is built through keeping their information
safe and not sharing that with anyone else without the consent of patient. If it is important for
treatment of the patient then the data should be shared by keeping the ethics and principles in
mind (Barnable, Cunning and Parcon, 2018). Below is an academic essay based of
confidentiality that is maintained by mental health nursing department and why that it important
to be maintained. Also there is discussion about the relation of confidentiality with different
people and situation like Mental Health, Adult, Child or Learning Disabilities. In mental health
services it is complex to maintain confidentiality as the family is concerned and the patient is not
in condition of taking the decisions. It is important to share all the information that is required for
the treatment with the patient and to maintain confidentiality by not sharing the data with others.
It is important to maintain records and share only the information that is essential to be shared.
BODY OF ESSAY
As per The Human Rights Act 1998 the patients have right to confidentiality and privacy
that needs to be maintained by all the nurses of mental health patients. Also Data Protection Act
1998 says that it is the right of individual to safeguard the data and have access to all the data
that is related to him and the data should not be communicated to others without the permission
of the person (Surmiak, 2018, September). All the necessary data and information that is
required should be shared with nurses of mental health patients as they have right to know each
and every information. The treatment will only be successful when the nurses of mental health
patients are aware about the problem in a described manner. The patients should express their
emotions in a manner that the doctor is able to understand and take actions and treat the person
accordingly. A patient comes with a hope to nurses and then becomes responsibility of nursing
department. They have to treat him in a way that the person is comfortable in and take care of the