Safe Harbor free essay sample

The Texas Board of Nursing (BON) implemented Safe Harbor for nurses to have a formal procedure to object to an unsafe situation in the workplace. The nurse’s duty is always to the patient! The BON (2013) refers to the duty of a nurse â€Å"always advocate for patient safety, including any nursing action necessary to comply with the standards of nursing practice and to avoid engaging in unprofessional conduct. This includes administrative decisions directly affecting a nurses ability to comply with that duty. † If a nurse is put in a position where they feel that safe harbor should be implemented the steps afforded to them must be followed explicitly. The BON offers an abbreviated version of the form for safe harbor that can be filled out quickly, but the comprehensive version of the safe harbor form must be filled out before the end of the work period. According the BON (2013) â€Å"a nurse invoking Safe Harbor may engage in the requested assignment or conduct while awaiting peer review determination unless the conduct or assignment is one that would constitute unprofessional or criminal conduct, or the nurse lacks the basic knowledge, skills and abilities necessary to competently perform the assignment. We will write a custom essay sample on Safe Harbor or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page † Another step in the Safe Harbor process according to the BON (2013) â€Å"the supervisor should sign the form and the nurse’s copy and submit the form to the Peer Review Chairperson since a peer review meeting to review the request must be set within 14 days of the nurse invoking Safe Harbor. † Marshall and Zolierek (2012) state â€Å"the Texas Nurse Practice Act requires organizations that employ 10 or more nurses to establish a nursing peer review committee for the purpose of reviewing practice incidents that potentially meet conditions for reporting to the Board of Nursing and to review nurses requests for â€Å"safe harbor† in situations where the nurse believes she/he was in a practice situation with potential risk for violating a duty to the patient† (p. 36). The Peer Review Committee will then proceed to, according to the BON (2013), fact-finding, analysis, and study of events by nurses in a climate of collegial problem solving focused on obtaining all relevant information about an event. After reviewing the information pertaining to the incident the committee will make a recommendation to the employer. The Texas Board of Nursing has provisions in place to protect nurses that feel they are in an unsafe situation. The Safe Harbor and Peer Review process allow nurses a great deal of comfort in their practice by assuring a procedural manner for objecting to unsafe practices. It is important to remember that the Safe Harbor laws are not to protect nurses. One of the BON (2013) stated purposes for Safe Harbor is to provide guidance to the peer review committee in making its determination of the nurses’ duty to the patient. While protections are offered to the nurse to prevent retaliation or termination for protecting patients by objecting to unsafe care, the underlying message is that the BON is protecting the patients not the nurse. If the nurse files Safe Harbor and the reason is to prevent unsafe care for patients’ then the nurse should theoretically be safe from retaliation, but if the nurse is only protecting themselves or their license then the BON will offer little protection from consequences at their facility.