Difference between revisions of "Health Care Consent in Residential Care"

As the traditional nursing tasks have increasingly become delegated or transferred to care workers, the lines between “health care “ tasks involving informed consent and other kinds of care that residents might receive, have become increasingly blurred. The matter of health care is sometimes becoming less about what is being done, than who is doing it.  

   

As noted, the Health Care (Consent) and Care Facility (Admission) Act sets out the requirements for health care providers to follow to ensure that a capable resident (or their substitute decisionmaker when the resident is incapable) provides consent before health care is given. However family members of residents with dementia often find a resident has been given an antipsychotic or other medication without the resident’s or substitute decisionmakers’ knowledge or informed consent. This is in spite of the fact that the family may be the legally recognized health care decisionmaker for the mentally incapable resident.