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Accountability of Nursing Professionals

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Introduction This paper explain the Accountability of a nursing professional based on an evidence report from Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Assessment(AHRQ) , the report is " Closing the Quality Gap: A Critical Analysis of Quality Improvement Strategies (Vol. 6: Prevention of Healthcare–Associated Infections)" under the head Quality Improvement and Patient Safety What is Accountability? In Fundamentals of Nursing it says “The ability and willingness to assume responsibility for ones’ actions and accepting the consequences of one's behavior.” Accountability of nursing professional is a legal obligation; for a professional nurse it is relating to ethics and moral responsibility. Within the kingdom of professional accountability, there are many factors. The American Nursing Association (ANA) states in its code that the nurse will assume accountability for nursing judgment and actions. A professional nurse has the responsibility to take decisions and practice within the scope of care, calling upon his/her information and skills to make judgments in favor of the patient. A professional nurse is accountable to their profession, their patients, employer, and other health care team members and to themselves. Nurses are accountable to provide safest care for their patient based on evidence based practice and safe nursing interventions. Nursing profession as a whole is build up on accountability, unselfishness, integrity and social justice. A professional nurse who take decisions and practice on the basis of those ethical values will always be in favor of the patient, no matter what is his/her professional level.

Methods The Healthcare-associated infections. In a patient care situation as a nursing professional I would like to share how a nursing professional can change the nursing practice to meet the requirements that is specified in

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