Ethical Attitude Levels of Surgical Nurses in Nursing Care: A Cross-sectional Study

"Background: Surgical nurses have several ethical responsibilities, and it is important to examine the ethical attitudes of nurses to determine the existing ethical attitude level and to minimize possible ethical problems.
Aim: This study aimed to determine the ethical attitude levels of surgical nurses in nursing care.
Methods: This descriptive and cross-sectional study was carried out with 143 nurses who were working at surgical units of a university hospital between October 15, 2021 and January 17, 2022. Data were collected using the “Ethical Attitude Scale in Nursing Care” instruments. The descriptive statistics, the Mann–Whitney U-test, the Kruskal–Wallis H test, and Spearman’s correlation test were used for data analysis.
Results: Among the nurses, 65% were working in surgical wards, and 72% had received training on ethics as a lesson in educational processes and/or as in-service training. The ethical attitude level of nurses was found to be over the moderate level. Nurses who received training on ethics had statistically significantly higher ethical attitude scores than those who did not (U = 1594.000, P =.036). A statistically significant correlation was found between ethical attitude score and clinical experience duration (r =.207, P =.013).
Conclusion: Among surgical nurses working in many specific surgical units (surgical wards, intensive care units, and operating room), their ethical attitude levels in nursing care are influenced by having longer clinical experience duration and receiving training on ethics. Therefore, ethics education is beneficial in dealing with ethical problems and should be carried out with different programs during or after nursing education."