Assignment on Nanotechnology and Bioethical Issues

Q1: Research question

How can healthcare organizations safely harness nanotechnology’s benefits of improved data processing, data storage, and health information exchange with ethical and legal considerations of fundamental intellectual property and bioethics?

Q2: Case Study

The use of nanotechnology to monitor glucose in real-time by tattoos right under the skin can improve the patient’s quality of life and transform diabetic care. However, nano tattoos also involve multiple ethical issues, including the potential exacerbation of some health problems, additional viral infections, and the implications of system design issues, fundamental intellectual property, and bioethics (National Nanotechnology Initiative, n.d.). The bioethical checklist recommended by Bennett & Naranja (2013) can be used to analyze when, what and how to use tattoos for real-time monitoring of a patient’s blood glucose and the management of diabetes. The proposed checklist incorporates a list of major factors related to bioethical, legal considerations, and system design issues. The checklist factors include patent scope, thicket potential, and system design. Bennet & Naranja (2013) proposes that nano tattoo patents are narrowly tailored and have limited commercial use to avoid the risk of inventors raising legal issues related to increased commercialization and patent rights ownership of their blood glucose monitoring technology.

Another equally important checklist factor in nanoink tattoo related to diabetic care is the patient’s informed and independence during decision making. A patient diagnosed with diabetes should be informed about the benefits and risks of using the technology, as well as alternatives to the treatment. Benefits to highlight can include the technology’s ability to detect changes in their blood glucose level and in-time. The practice should involve informing the patient about the risks associated with device configuration, potential exacerbation of some health problems, and nano-related infections (Bennett & Naranja, 2013). Also, the patient should learn about the ethical implications of trade secrets and nanotechnology-based patents. This information will enable the patient to decide whether to use the technology or not, as highlighted under the ethical nursing principle of autonomy and the patient’s right to self-determination.

The proposed checklist can also be used to promote the ethical principles of nursing, including promoting justice and beneficence, as well as protecting the patient’s safety and security of information related to health technology. Justice in nursing involves promoting socio-economic justice, distributive justice, and environmental justice while using nanotechnology in diabetic care (Bennett & Naranja, 2013). This involves ensuring that all patients with diabetes have equal access to medical technology and are treated fairly and justly, regardless of an individual’s social class, race, gender, or other factors related to a person’s demographical background. Privacy involves protecting the patient’s health information and a controlled framework for the disclosure of health data generated from the nano tattoos. Equally important, using nanotechnology in healthcare should integrate research.

Continuous evaluation and analysis of results are required to ensure evidence-based practice and promote continuous improvement of the patient/population’s health. For example, although innovations in health/medical care like nanotechnology provide a significant opportunity to use medical implants and miniature technological tools to detect, prevent and even cure some illnesses, they are associated with various risks, and the results or patient’s health outcomes can be unpredictable (Bennett & Naranja, 2013). Consequently, stakeholders within healthcare organizations should conduct continuous assessments and synthesis of the evidence to continuously improve practice and medical methods in diabetic care. Bennet & Naranja (2013) states that although nano tattoos have demonstrated their ability to improve the patient’s quality of life (QoL) and life expectancy, they must be clinically confirmed to assure beneficence. Conversely, in system design, Bennet & Naranja (2013) proposes analyzing nano tattoos in terms of their costs versus benefits for users and society at large to continuously improve the design and take advantage of its beneficial outcomes.

Q3: What ethical principles are at play within this scenario?

As mentioned earlier, the proposed checklist by Bennet & Naranja (2013) integrates the four main ethical principles of nursing practice and behavior, including autonomy, beneficence, justice, and non-maleficence. Autonomy refers to the patient being able to make independent decisions regarding their care. This does not exclude the role of healthcare professionals, such as nurses, clinicians, and even administrators, in the patient’s autonomous decision-making about nanotechnology in medicine and care. For example, healthcare professionals should inform the patient about the benefits and risks of the technology as well as provide alternative treatments to enable the patient to make informed decisions (Bennett & Naranja, 2013). In other words, providers must ensure the patients are educated and have all the needed information about the technology to make independent decisions about their care without duress or coercion by the provider.

Beneficence is an ethical principle that requires providers to protect patients from harm while demonstrating kindness and charity. Healthcare professionals should ensure nano tattoos improve the patient’s QoL and increase their life expectancy by conducting clinical trials to assess the health outcomes of patients (Bennet & Naranja, 2013). The information from the user and quality of care evidence can be used to inform the system’s design or improve health policy to ensure patients are treated ethically and protected from harm. The ethical principle of non-maleficence in healthcare holds that healthcare professionals and organizations have an obligation not to harm others. In the nano tattoo scenario, non-maleficent applies to protecting the privacy of patients’ health information and promoting data security. It also involves beneficence, which includes an obligation to minimize all risks by providing standard care procedures and improving medical competence. Other factors of non-maleficence nanotechnology include continuous improvement of the system design and evidence-based utility of the systems and health information technologies.

The Justice principle in healthcare refers to the patient’s right to be treated fairly and impartially, regardless of their personality or characteristics. Bennet & Naranja (2013) identifies at least three key areas of the meaning of the principle of justice: socio-economic justice, distributive justice, and environmental justice. Socio-economic justice refers to the fair and just treatment of individuals, distributive justice refers to the equal sharing of costs and benefits by everyone, and environmental justice refers to the management of the ecosystems, the surroundings, and the wellness of individuals within their communities. The principle of justice can be applied to ensure that the healthcare benefits and the environmental costs of health information technology and innovations like nanotechnology are fairly and impartially shared by entire communities or societies. For example, this can involve using the technology’s capability to analyze data and identify the most impacted population by the environmental costs of developing and deploying these technologies while responding to their health and wellness needs.

Q4: How might you educate the patient on what nanotechnology is and how it works to alleviate concerns?

Nanotechnology is a nanoscale science, engineering, and technology contribution from various scientific fields that has revolutionized the healthcare environment. Health technology allows medical providers to harness their expertise with the benefits of research and development in medical imaging, measuring, and manipulating very small details in cells, human tissues, and even health information to improve healthcare practice and quality health outcomes. Current evidence demonstrates that nanotechnology provides many benefits to patients and the healthcare systems, particularly improving the quality of life and increasing the life expectancy of patients with diabetes, as well as the management of other chronic conditions. Health information technology is often utilized based on the ethical framework and principles, such as ensuring the patients practice their right to make independent, non-coerced decisions and protecting the safety of a patient’s health information and their privacy. Currently, nanotechnology focuses on integrating continuous research and development to advance the practices within the medical field, improve patient’s outcomes and promote quality public health.

Q5: What common treatments for smoking cessation and cardiac disease might you use to compare the tattoo treatment to and to explain how nanotechnology works?

The special nano tattoos that are implanted in the skin provide continuous and reliable glucose detection for people with diabetes are similar to nicotine patches interventions for smoking cessation or nanoparticle-mediated drug delivery systems in the treatment of cardiovascular diseases (Zhao et al., 2017). The miniature medical devices inserted in the human body act as multifunctional agents for diagnosing, treating, and preventing severe health conditions (Johnson, 2009). The nano-materials have the capacity to improve the healthcare processes by removing unwanted, harmful materials in the human body or vital organs and even repairing and healing the damaged tissues.