Table Manners: Ethics and Building a Feeding Team.

Course description and overview

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As the face of service delivery in feeding and dysphagia changes to accommodate payor considerations, legal stipulations, and staffing constraints, we are constantly challenged to find ways to work together with other professions to provide integrated top-notch therapy to the individuals we serve while maintaining our ethical, legal, and occupational integrity. But often we’re not sure which lines are okay to cross, which ones to blur, and which are etched in stone.

How do we build a team that includes the caregivers and other allied health practitioners, without compromising our ethical standards or licensed scope of practice? We need a firm grasp of the foundations of medical and therapy-based ethics and how to apply them to the novel and changing situations that we are encountering. We also need to hone our interpersonal skills to be able to apply these ethical principles in such a way that we build collaboration rather than alienation. And nowhere is this more crucial than when dealing with dysphagia assessment and treatment where lapses can lead to life-threatening consequences.

 

Using Powerpoint presentation, lecture, and discussion, this course will explore these issues providing guidelines and references to help guide our decisions in what seem to be gray areas. Participants will explore various scenarios using guidelines discussed in the course, practicing and clarifying their application in real-life examples via group discussion with the opportunity to ask both general questions and ones receiving assistance with specific situations they may be facing.

 

Objectives:

As a result of this presentation, the participant will be able to

1. Explain 4 foundational ethical philosophies and 5 key ethical principles as they relate to the practice of dysphagia management.
2. Outline the scope of practice and areas of responsibility as it relates to Feeding and Dysphagia for SLP, OT, PT, Nutrition, Medicine, and the Parent/Caregiver.
3. Differentiate Ethical standards versus Practice standards.
4. Apply these ethical principles to specific case study questions discussed during the presentation.
5. List 3 or more avenues to use in instances of professional disagreement in a Team environment in order to maintain ethical behavior and service delivery.

 

Agenda:

Ethics FOR Practice – Foundational ethical philosophies and principles

• Theoretical Foundations for ethical decision-making
  • Social Contract, Utilitarianism, Ethical Intuitionism, Ethical Egoism, Virtue Ethics
• Ethical Principles in medically-oriented disciplines
  • From APTA ASHA, AOTA, , AMA

 

Ethics AND Practice: Purpose of the Team, Roles/Scope/Practice Acts of the Members

• Purpose; Definition of Collaboration
• Therapy Members (SLP, OT, PT, RD)
• Medical (MD, Nurse)
• Patient/Family & Caregivers
• Assistants (SLP, OT, PT, Nursing)
• Legal Standards of Behavior for each discipline

 

Ethics VERSUS Practice – Where are they different and where do they overlap?

 

Ethics IN Practice: Applying Ethical Principles to Specific Issues, Scenarios, and Case Studies

• Legal Standards of Behavior vs. Ethical Standards (Where do they overlap and where are they different?)
• Evidence-Based Practice
• Cross-training
• Safe Amount of Aspiration?
• Screening vs. Bedside Exam
• When is Instrumental Exam indicated?
• Do you HAVE to follow the recommendations from an instrumental exam?
• Social Media

 

Ethics IN Practice: What to Do When We Disagree – How to do it Ethically

• Written Communication in a digital age
• Crucial Conversations Model
• What an Apology really looks like

 

Instruction Method:

Lecture, Powerpoint presentation, Case Study Analysis.
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