[Exactly what is ethical nursing care? the perspective of the clinical humanities]

As Taiwan enters the post-modern era of professional medical care, a host of issues relating to nursing care are becoming increasingly pressing. On the one hand, the wide range of ailments of body and mind requiring treatment is placing a major financial burden on the national health care system. On the other hand, few hospitals are able to provide "comprehensive care of body and mind." In addition to primary prevention, the most effective way to reduce the overall cost of medical care is to effectively bring volunteer caregivers (those who have an "ethical connection" with the patient, i.e., family, friends, neighbors, volunteers, etc.) into all levels of the caregiving process. Moreover, as medical ethics becomes increasingly focused on the well-being of the patient, more attention is being given to the healing relationship itself. Due to its ability to swiftly relieve a wide variety of ailments, the Western medical model has become widely accepted in Asia. Yet, a patient may feel a greater sense of healing when treatment is based on the principles of ethical caregiving. For example, in the way it quickly relieves the prevailing symptoms, psychiatric medication is like a freeway. By contrast, volunteer caregiving is more like a local road, which may be slower, but eventually takes one all the way home. Thus, making nursing care more person-centered and indigenized gives the patient a sense of not only being cured, but also being "cared for." However, for a long time the theory and practice of nursing education in Taiwan has been based on the Western model of nursing. In this model nursing is treated as a branch of the biological sciences, an overall approach quite different from the traditional view of caregiving in Asian societies. Nonetheless, recent research and clinical practice indicates that an indigenized form of nursing care may be a more suitable approach to comprehensive care, and that such an approach has much potential for widespread application in Taiwan and other Chinese societies.