Dario Diaz

FCNS 415 LAB

9/03/2015

Lab 1: FCNS Ethics Exercise

1. When considering the case of a nutrition practitioner advocating and advertising a supplement for financial gain, the rules outlined in the code of ethics should be considered. According to 1st principle, dieticians must be honest and fair with their clients meaning this professional should advise potential supplement buyers that he or she is benefitting from the sale of these supplements. Nonetheless, the professional may be subconsciously biased to support this supplement; to avoid this, the 6th principle of avoiding giving any false or misleading information should be followed. Finally, the 18th principle should also be considered since this specific instance can be interpreted as a situation in which the professional is receiving a gift for his or her services which could lead to a biased or dissonant opinion.

2. In this case, a professional is assisting a client who resorts to the use of many supplements and medications to maintain her health; the debate arises when the dietician sees her as a potential case study and informs her internship director about the situation. In this case, the 2nd principle of the code of ethics is questioned since the professional is not only at fault, but the director is responsible for reporting their violations to the ADA and CDR. The 12th principle is put into question as the use of so many medications and supplements may not be supported by current science and the professional is responsible for advising her case on a proper regiment of supplements instead of continuing to observe a client for her potentially unsafe behavior. The 10th principle is put into question since the professional disclosed the clients’ information with the director without informing the client or asking for the client’s permission. Finally, the 5th principle may have been violated due to the professional researching the client out of interest instead of keeping the goal of maintaining her health as her foremost goal.

3. Alternatively to the previous cases, this case revolves around the moral dilemma of whether a person should be kept of total parenteral feeding and whether this issue is to be considered a dietician’s decision. Ultimately, the final decision should be left to the patient’s family, but the responsibility of the dietician and the medical staff should consist of giving the family the information necessary to make the decision themselves. As part of the staff involved in keeping the patient alive specifically through nutritional means, the dietician’s responsibility lies in informing the family that feeding can keep the patient alive, however, he or she should also inform them that this would leave the patient in a permanent vegetative state meaning that the patient isn’t fully conscious of the environment and has little to no hope of recovery. Ideally, the patient’s written will should indicate whether she wants to continue on tube feeding or not, presumably

however, this is not the case. The family should not only consider the mental state of the patient, but also the financial cost of maintaining the patient in the hospital for an unspecified amount of time. In this case, nutrition being used to maintain life and health of a client may not necessarily be the priority of the dietician since this dilemma puts into question if the vegetative state should be considered alive, leaves the client’s consent unknown, puts the family in a financial dilemma, and doesn’t ultimately leave the decision in the hands of the dietician. In my personal opinion, I would not want to be kept alive in a permanent vegetative state.

4. In choosing who receives an organ, policies dictate the person who should receive it first is the person who is most sick and the person who is the best genetic match. In the case of the liver, the genetic factors are not mentioned and this liver can be cut to accommodate for younger clients. For patient 1, the patient suffers liver failure due to alcoholism and drug abuse so it is likely that he may revert to this behavior again, additionally, he is the second oldest potential recipient. Patient 2 was healthy and suffered liver damage at an accident, however, she is the oldest potential recipient. Patient 3 is morbidly obese and also suffered liver failure in an accident; however, having eaten poisonous mushrooms could mean other organs in his or her body may have also been damaged. Patient 4 is only 2 years old, but his or her condition of sclerosering cholangitis is advised against being treated with liver transplant as this will only allow for a few more years of life. Finally, patient 5 is only 15 and suffered liver failure after a suicide attempt; despite this, I see patient 5 as the first priority. This is because a suicide attempt should not be counted as a factor against the patient, but rather, as a psychological issue which should be treated with proper counseling; additionally, the patient’s age works in their favor and there are no additional health concerns that may jeopardize the transplant or indicate future premature death.