Update : We are aware of the significant challenge that COVID 19 is bringing to all aspects of patient care.
Our ethical framework remains applicable to patient centred decision making especially when there are external constraints. We have created a series of hypothetical COVID 19 case examples. We hope they prove helpful. Key resources for understanding and using the MORAL Balance ethical framework.
Struggle to make decisions at the bedside?
Are you ever worried you can't make the right choices with patients and their families in clinical practise? Do your cinical ethical choices leave you feeling conflicted, or cause controversy or conflict with patients, families and your collegaues?
You're not alone. Studies show that many clinicians find making ethical decisions difficult, the results often disappointing, and such experiences are a potent cause of stress and burnout. It is not a suprise that many doctors and nurses find this hard, ethical decison making is suprisingly absent from many training programs.
This website is designed with one aim - to help you make better ethcial decisions at the bedside. It will teach you a little ethical theory together with a lot of ethical practice, and give you a framework to help analyse, balance and communicate ethical decisions.
Explore, learn and give it a go in practise. If you find it helpful, drop us a line and let us know. If you don't, drop us aline and tell us why it's not working for you and we'll do our best to improve it.
(We're developing it as fast as we can - please bear with us and check back soon)
Who are we
Drs Dan Harvey & Dale Gardiner are Critical Care Consultants at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, UK. The MORAL Balance framework was developed as part of the National Deceased Donation Simulation Course, run by NHS Blood & Transplant to teach ICM trainee doctors about Organ Donation, but is widely applicable for all clinical ethical decision making.
Credits and Reproduction
We encourage you to use the resources within this website in your practice and teaching, but ask you to credit this source please. Please reference either this website, or cite Harvey, D. J. R., & Gardiner, D. (2019). `MORAL balance' decision-making in critical care. BJA Education, 19(3), 68–73. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.bjae.2018.11.006