Nurses Legal Handbook

This reference tells how to avoid legal risks when off duty, what happens to an incident report, definitions of legal terms, and explanations of how the legal system works. Readers learn how to uphold living wills, ensure patient privacy, use restraints, understand employment contracts, and deal with ethical problems, to name a few. Dozens of actual court cases give practical advice. An added chapter addresses nursing's responsibilities under managed care. Contents cover contributors (including 11 nurse attorneys), foreword, nursing practice and the law, patient rights, legal risks and responsibilities on the job, legal risks while off duty, malpractice liability, legal aspects of documentation, nurses' rights as employees, ethical decision making, ethical conflicts in clinical practice, ethical conflicts in professional practice, nursing in a changing health care marketplace, glossary, appendices (types of law, understanding the judicial process, and how to interpret legal citations) court case citation index, and general index.