Ethical Dilemmas Encountered by Community-based Occupational Therapists in Home Care Settings

The purpose of the study was to investigate the ethical dilemmas community-based occupational therapists report encountering in home settings. Data was collected from 23 community-based occupational therapists, each of whom provided 1 or 2 narratives, including some ethical dilemmas associated with rehabilitation in home care settings (a total of 40 dilemmas.) The dilemmas were analysed by content analysis, a method of handling qualitative material. The analysis of each dilemma was based on the following questions: "What was the problem?" "Who were the actors?" "What kind of relationship existed between them?" and "What social frameworks or laws shaped their options?" The outcome of these analyses gave rise to six qualitative categories: Category 1. Ethics in home settings. Category 2. Provider-patient relationship. Category 3. Provider-family members relationship. Category 4. Rehabilitation professionals' inter-relationship. Category 5. Law and ethics. Category 6. Allocation of resources. This study, in which some of the ethical dilemmas investigated have been reported in the past and some are new (such as the home setting itself causing problems), showed that ethical problems are indeed likely to occur when rehabilitation takes place in home settings.