Significance and Implications of Research Ethics to Nursing Essay

Significance and Implications of Research Ethics to Nursing - Essay Example Research ethics plays an important role in the nursing management and leadership. Since leaders and managers of healthcare institutions should abide by the highest ethical standards, they can guarantee ethical nursing practice only through research ethics. Both qualitative and quantitative research provides evidence that nurses can use to treat their patients or prevent specific medical conditions. Leaders and managers in nursing depend heavily on nursing research to provide effective directions and decisions that nurses can prefer in their medical undertakings. It implies that research ethics merits objectivity in nursing management through the provision of concrete results. Effective nursing management entails nursing practice and decision-making that is anchored on concrete evidence from research. Such research could either be qualitative or quantitative but either way, it must embrace ethical principles. Burns, Grove, and Gray list consequentialism, principlism, virtue ethics, an d deontology as four major nursing ethical theories that concern research ethics. These ethical theories inspire the thinking of leaders and managers in healthcare institutions to make ethical decisions in nursing practice. With regard to consequentialism, the outcome of nursing research determines the morality of the research. It means that the response in connection with certain medical undertakings can only be valid if they are positive irrespective of the decision-making process or the ethical principles applied to the research.