The restraints are used in the intensive care unit as a way to restrict the movement of the whole body or part of the body for the safety of the patient, such as maintaining medical equipment, preventing falls and patient self tube removal through regulating the patient's behavior. However, the physical restraints are used for the physical safety of the patient, but that is cause a variety of physical and psychological complications. Thus, nurses in intensive care units who apply restraint on face an ethical dilemma in the confrontation between the nurse's duty to improve the patient's health and protect the patient's safety and the value of the patient's autonomy and dignity. We have two examples are proposed to identify the ethical dilemma situation faced by nurses, to induce an active attitude towards elimination by establishing exactly restraint - removal criteria. In addition, it is proposed to seek a balance of individual values through active communication between the patient and the medical staff regarding the application of the restraint.
With the enforcement of the “Act on decisions on life-sustaining treatment for patients at the end of life” in February 2018, discussion on advanced care planning (ACP) has increased. However, as decisions on life-sustaining treatments are still made in the intensive care unit, deaths related to the suspension of life-sustaining treatment account for a large proportion of deaths in the intensive care unit. The nurses encounter challenges in supporting the patient's dignified death; they experience an ethical dilemma in the ambiguity due to a lack of guidance on legal responsibilities regarding decisions on life-sustaining treatment. In order for the nurses to perform as a supporter providing care to the patients and as a advocate during the process of decision-making on life-sustaining treatment, there should be a systemic change to ensure the nurses' participation. In addition, an open and continuous discussion should be proposed to cultivate nurses’ ethical sensitivity and moral courage. This paper reports two ethical examples related to the decisions on life-sustaining treatment occurred in intensive care units of a tertiary hospital.
For 26 soil series distributed more than 1% among 63 soil series in Jeju Island, natural uncultivated soil samples were collected. For these soils, the chemical speciation of eight heavy metals (Cd, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb, V, and Zn) was examined. Further, the Plant Bioavailability (PB) and Mobility Factor (MF) of these heavy metals were evaluated using Tessier’s 5-step sequential extraction method (exchangeable, carbonate, reducible (bound to Fe/Mn oxides), oxidizable (bound to organic matter), and residual fraction). The main form present was residual fraction for Cd and Zn; residual and oxidizable fractions for Cr, Cu, Ni, and Pb; reducible fraction for Mn; and carbonate fraction for V. The average plant availability and average mobility factor were found to be V (57.37%) > Zn (12.49%) > Cd (11.76%) > Cu (11.19%) > Pb (9.37%) > Cr (9.09%) > Mn (3.13%) > Ni (2.63%), and Mn (61.04%) > V (59.94%) > Zn (31.54%) > Cd (17.65%) > Cr (15.66%) > Ni (13.89%) > Pb (13.80%) > Cu (13.53%), respectively.
For 63 soil series distributed in Jeju Island, natural uncultivated soils in each soil series were collected, and their physicochemical properties and their concentrations of 19 heavy metals including 8 heavy metals which are regulated by Korean Soil Environment Conservation Law, were analyzed. Moreover, the correlations between physicochemical properties and heavy metal concentrations, and between heavy metal concentrations were analyzed. The heavy metals distributed in the higher concentrations and the lower concentrations with arithmetric mean value, were Mn(730 mg/kg) and Ba(493 mg/kg), and Hg(0.146 mg/kg) and Tl(0.096 mg/kg), respectively. The correlations between pH(H2O) and heavy metals(Hg, Ni, Co, Se), between pH(NaF) and heavy metals(Hg, Ba, Se, Tl), and between organic matter content and heavy metals(Hg, Tl) were significant at the 0.01 level. From the correlations between heavy metal concentrations, there were 22 where there were significant at the 0.01 level and they showed positive correlation. Among those, the heavy metals showing the correlation higher than r=0.5, were Sb-V(0.878), Mo-Sn(0.867), Co-V(0.654), Co-Sb(0.648), Be-Sn(0.546), and Sn-Tl(0.528).