Conference Description
When we enter a room for the first time – whether it is the hospital, clinic, or the patient’s own home – we have an opportunity to connect with a patient in a critical way. In those first moments, we can utilize an ethic of care and intentionality to build trust. That encounter not only impacts the relationship, but it also extends out into the world, and we become known as a profession of those who are worthy of trust.
Trust relationally communicates our commitment to beneficence, integrity, and respect for persons. It can be established without a word being said or destroyed by an attitude or gesture. It is exquisitely close to the concept of privacy; in sharing one’s nakedness or vulnerability, the nurse is entrusted knowing that confidentiality is the underpinning of the relationship. All interactions in health care necessitate a core of trust, whether between team members, leaders, researchers, administration, or the community. We have seen how deeply it has been compromised in recent years, for a multitude of reasons – whether scientific knowledge being challenged, social injustices, or stressed practice environments – which makes the building of trust essential.
The National Nursing Ethics Conference (NNEC) this year will focus on the critical importance of trust. Clarity will come through an exploration of the history and meaning of nursing ethics as an entity unto itself, the concepts of why the integrity of nurses’ matter, and how preventive ethics can move us from the struggle of moral distress into moral strength and imagination that supports our vital ethical commitments. A panel introduction of this year’s revised American Nurses Association’s Code of Ethics for Nurses will bring to light how our fundamental obligations and values can provide a structure which reinforces ethical agency within our profession, as well as our standing within our institutions. In this way, we remain close to our calling, bringing forth our expertise in addressing health and wellbeing in our patients, families, and communities by inspiring milieus for healing.
Conference Objectives
- Describe the role that trust plays in everyday ethical decision-making.
- Discuss trustworthiness as a key component of fidelity, a virtue expected of nursing and the health professions.
- Explore the new 2025 ANA Code of Ethics for Nurses, and how it supports our values, and validates agency as a fundamental ethical obligation.
- Identify strategies to mitigate moral distress and to act in response to value-laden conflict in the clinical space.
- Illustrate how trust can strengthen unity in our communities.
- Value how the meaning of words and language can reinforce and rebuild relationships and trust at the individual, system, and societal levels.