[The research and the ethical dilemmas of nursing work]

This paper is a reflection on research and the ethical dilemmas of nursing work, with the primary objective of providing subsidies to help thinking about care, according to professional practice in the field of education, research, and particularly of assistance. We rely on authors who deal about ethics, labor and human condition, finding a link between this knowledge and nursing's doing in its daily practice. We conclude that given the reality of health, amid so many adversities with which we are faced in day-to-day practice, whether in teaching, research or nursing care, to think and to act ethically is a structuring condition, which humanizes and ennobles the profession giving meaning to the actions of its professionals.