Communication is the essence of nursing care. 2: Ethical foundations

This is the second of two articles analysing the communication themes that emerged from a role play situation in the classroom where a group of MSc nursing students carried out a nursing role play. Feedback from the entire group of 19 students was obtained and discussed openly following the presentation of the scenario. The first article examined the following communication issues: breaking bad news; giving information through exploring, questioning, and reassurance; touch; and empathy and humanism (Vol 9(14): 931-8). Attempts were made to give examples of how these key issues could be applied to nursing practice. This second article involves the examination of the ethical issues of truth-telling and autonomy that emerged in the role play and again attempts to integrate the theoretical underpinnings with nursing practice in the knowledge that the arguments advanced are neither right nor wrong. This deduction is based on the fact that each human being is unique; therefore, each interaction that occurs between two people is also unique. Nursing can strive to provide better, more effective and more sensitive communication because ethical communication is, it is argued, the realm in which nurses toll.