Main description:

Legal Aspects of Nursing is your indispensible guide to the law for the nursing and health-care professions. It covers everything you need to know, from outlining how the legal system works and general legal issues relating to medicine, right through to specialist areas of nursing, such as working with children or the elderly.

Contents:

Part I    General principles affecting all nurses                                                                   

1. Introduction: four arenas of accountability, the legal system and human rights          

2. Actions in the criminal courts and defences to criminal charges                              

3. Liability in a civil court case for negligence                                                            

4. Specific problem areas in civil liability: personal liability of the nurse, vicarious liability of the employer and managerial issues                                                                                                

5. Statutory functions and management of the NHS                                                   

6. Progress of a civil claim: defences and compensation                                             

7. Consent to treatment and informing the patient                                                      

8. Data protection: confidentiality and access                                                            

9. Record keeping, statements and evidence in court                                                 

10. The nurse and employment law                                                                            

11. The nurse as a registered professional                                                                  

12. Health and safety and the nurse                                                                           

Part II    Specialist areas                                                                                                   

13. Children and young persons                                                                                  

14. Midwifery                                                                                                           

15. The nurse on the gynaecology ward                                                                      

16. Acute care                                                                                                          

17. Learning disabilities                                                                                             

18. Nurse educator and researcher                                                                            

19. Legal aspects of the care of older people                                                              

20.Nursing the mentally disordered                                                                            

21. Accident and emergency, outpatients, genito-urinary departments and day surgery  

22. Human fertility and genetics                                                                                 

23.Community and primary care nursing                                                                    

24. Scope of professional practice, clinical nurse specialist and consultant nurse            

Part III   General areas                                                                                                      

25. Legal aspects of property                                                                                     

26. Legal aspects of AIDS and other infectious diseases                                             

27. Handling complaints                                                                                             

28. Legal aspects of medicines                                                                                  

29.End of Life Care and death                                                                                  

30. Complementary and alternative therapies

31. The future