NURS FPX 6080 Assessment 2 Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

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Capella university

NURS-FPX6080 MSN Practicum: Professionalism in Person-Centered Care and the Workplace Environment

Prof. Name

Date

Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

Nursing practice is based on ethical principles, values, and professional identity to inform clinical judgment and leadership. Individual practice is defined by core values of integrity, compassion and liability, which shape the culture of teams and healthcare systems. Professional associations and evidence-based plans enhance the leadership potential of nurses regarding ethics and equity (Grace et al., 2024). This paper emphasizes how integrating ethical standards into daily practice strengthens professional identity and improves patient-centered outcomes.

Reflection on My Professional Identity and Nursing Core Values

I consider scientific competence, ethical responsibility, and relational presence as a combination of the professional identity of a nurse. The American Nurses Association (ANA) states that a professional identity in nursing is founded on ethics, support, and life-long learning (American Nurses Association, 2025). Respecting human dignity and patient rights, and serving as an advocate between bedside realities and systems change.

In my role as an advanced practice clinician, I will have to make complex decisions clearly and collaborate with patients and teams. I strive to live nursing’s core values in distinct ways. Integrity through honest consent debates, accurate records, and error retention. Altruism by prioritizing needs, mentoring peers, and covering difficult cases for continuity. Moreover, inclusivity is achieved by using chosen names and professional interpreters rather than family members. Compassion through trauma-informed communication, active listening, and providing comfort. Courage by speaking up about unsafe orders, escalating concerns, and requesting ethics consults (Mohamed & Abdelrahman, 2025).

NURS FPX 6080 Assessment 2 Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

Humility by naming ambiguity, seeking feedback, and inviting second opinions. Advocacy by addressing social drivers like transport, cost, housing and directing appeals. Caring through timely analgesia, repositioning, and education with teach-back. Autonomy by presenting balanced options and informed refusal without coercion. Humanity involves seeing whole persons beyond diagnoses and maintaining health to remain present (Mohamed & Abdelrahman, 2025). Social justice is achieved by pushing for fair services and unbiased workflows. 

My strengths are ethical clarity, safety support, and cultural awareness. As part of my everyday Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) patient commitments, I avoid interpreter services, align health literacy and language to education, employ structured tools to reduce bias, integrate cultural preferences into care plans, and warm handoffs to community resources (Morrison et al., 2021). To my coworkers, I foster a culture of mental safety, inclusive language, and equitable opportunity sharing. Americans with Disabilities Act, lactation, prayer spaces, flexible scheduling, and micro-inequity intervention using dutiful eyewitness scripts. Such measures are an indicator of caring with ethical action so that DEI are academic ideas (Morrison et al., 2021). The reality supports my professional identity and the upgrading outcomes.

Professional Organizations that Reflect Nursing Values

Professional organizations such as the ANA, Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing (Sigma), the International Council of Nurses (ICN), and the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) reflect the nurse’s professional identity and personal core values. The ANA’s mission to advance nursing for the health of all, along with its Code of Ethics, aligns with values of integrity, advocacy, social justice, autonomy, and humanity (American Nurses Association, 2025). Similarly, Sigma’s emphasis on leadership and service reinforces altruism, humility, inclusivity, and a dedication to evidence-based caring (Sigma Global Nursing Excellence, 2025). The ICN and AANP extend this position by promoting advanced practice roles, equitable access to care, and global standards, supporting values of compassion, courage, and accountability.

These organizational missions and values connect with personal nursing values such as integrity, compassion, equity, and lifelong learning. By upholding these standards, nurses are reminded that professional identity is about individual actions and contributing to ethical, patient-centered care at a systems level. Membership in such organizations strengthens personal practice by offering moral guidance, policy toolkits, and standards that support clinical decision-making. Moreover, access to Continuing Education (CE) credits, professional conferences, research databases, and leadership opportunities promotes personal growth. Mentorship networks and DEI resources reinforce collaborative practice (Morrison et al., 2021). Professional organizations mirror the nurse’s values and provide resources that enhance clinical competence, leadership development, and the ability to drive ethical, evidence-based change in healthcare.

Reflection on Modeling Ethical Behavior in Nursing Practice and Leadership

The ethics of nursing are grounded in beneficence, nonmaleficence, respect for autonomy, justice, fidelity, privacy, and accountability, forming the foundation of professional identity. The nurse demonstrates these values in everyday practice by communicating openly, engaging in informed-consent discussions, and maintaining accurate documentation. Patient safety, confidentiality, and the ability to admit and learn from mistakes are emphasized as crucial elements (Cheraghi et al., 2023). As a leader, the nurse applies ethics to practice by establishing clear expectations, reporting safety issues promptly, and coaching others to make informed decisions. This facilitates shared governance to ensure that staff voices influence practice. Humility is modeled by seeking second opinions and crediting the team in public, thereby normalizing ethical practice throughout the care team.

When unethical behavior is observed, I act decisively to protect patients and restore trust. My first step is to ensure immediate patient safety by intervening in and pausing unsafe actions. It is followed by objective documentation of facts and the use of structured communication, such as SBAR (Situation, Background, Assessment, Recommendation), to escalate concerns to the appropriate supervisor (Noh & Park, 2021).

If the issue persists and is systemic, I file an incident report, request an ethics consult, or involve risk management review, while supporting affected patients and staff with transparent updates and emotional safety. I use restorative and educational responses, such as private feedback conversations, guided reflection, and targeted training to repair harm and prevent recurrence. Advocating for policy changes and system-level remedies such as staffing changes, workflow redesign, or just-culture practices. Finally, I follow up on outcomes, share lessons learned in team debriefs, and incorporate improvements into unit protocols so corrective action becomes part of quality improvement rather than a one-time fix.

Reflection on Mentoring for Professional Growth and Accountability

I have been a mentor to colleagues and new nurses during orientation, bedside practice, simulation, and quality-improvement projects through a purposeful, learner-centered process. I start with the co-construction of a personalized learning plan with SMART goals and a competency checklist. I demonstrate clinical skills at the bedside through short simulations or role-plays of high-risk situations and provide immediate, specific feedback using the “observe, describe, and coach” technique.

I focus on psychological safety, which involves welcoming questions, normalizing mistakes as learning tools, and modeling accountability by recording near-misses and attending just-culture debriefs. In leadership mentoring, I mentor professional conduct, documentation promptly, escalation using SBAR, shared-governance engagement, and ethical decision-making through case discussion and guided reflection (Noh & Park, 2021). 

NURS FPX 6080 Assessment 2 Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

The tangible results of concrete actions had a positive influence on mentees. These include scaffolded bedside coaching that transitioned a new hire dependent on performing medication administration and competency sign-off during orientation. This facilitates a quality improvement mini-project where a mentee led a Plan-Do-Study-Act intervention and later presented unit outcomes, building confidence (Kay et al., 2022).

A peer study group that has allowed several colleagues to seek certification and report higher clinical confidence on pre/post surveys, and helped a nurse through a respectful incident-report debrief that has led to better documentation of handoffs and a departmental workflow change. These effects were monitored using competency checklists, supervisor ratings, and self-reported confidence scales (Gates et al., 2021). It was found that the highly focused mentorship, which comprises skill demonstration, reflective feedback, leadership experiences, improves professional growth.

Evaluation of Strategies and Methods for Effective Peer Review

Structured checklists, instructions, competency tools, direct observation, such as mini-clinical evaluation exercises, bedside coaching, chart and audit review, simulation-based debriefing, team feedback, and blinded review are crucial for effective peer review. Electronic peer-review platforms that monitor action and outcomes are effective for peer review in nursing (Bagheri et al., 2025). Techniques that complement include formative mentorship, standardized feedback models such as Situation-Behavior-Impact, reviewer calibration sessions, and aligning with Quality-Improvement (QI) metrics to transform raw observation into educational opportunities and system-wide learning (Morrison et al., 2021).

The strengths of each of the strategies are evident. Structured tools and rubrics enhance reliability and minimize subjective variability, so assessments are simpler to justify and to convert to focused learning plans. Direct observation and simulation provide tangible behavioral evidence and a risk-free practice area for skill development. Chart audits help identify system weaknesses, leading to process improvements (Bagheri et al., 2025). Moreover, feedback reveals teamwork and communication issues that single-source reviews overlook. Electronic systems accelerate documentation, facilitate trend analysis, and complete the feedback loop by associating review results with QI projects. Nevertheless, there are limitations, and they should be addressed.

Peer review is time-consuming and resource-consuming, and when used punitively, causes defensiveness, under-reporting, and loss of psychological safety. Blinded reviews can miss some clinical context (Bagheri et al., 2025). Feedback can be influenced by interpersonal bias. Checklists can turn to box-checking rather than thoughtful judgment. To address these risks, enact a blended solution. Insulate formative coaching from punitive human resource procedures, provide training and calibration for reviewers, deploy behavior-based feedback models, uphold confidentiality, and promote a just-culture approach (Grace et al., 2024). This provides dedicated time to review activities and requires follow-up such that feedback results in measurable improvement and is not just criticism. 

Reflection on Evaluating Care Team Members and Their Impact

In a four-week program on our medical-surgical unit, I engaged in the systematic assessment of interprofessional handoffs. We used direct observation combined with a short rubric on SBAR, two-chart mini-audits after shifts, and micro-debriefs on the same day. I followed two nurses, a junior resident, and a pharmacist through evening transitions, documenting strengths and gaps. This includes inconsistent allergy checks and missed read-backs. I provided behavior-specific feedback, demonstrated a 60-second SBAR handoff with read-back, and conducted a mini skills refresher on one patient, one message to decrease fragmented updates (Kay et al., 2022). In my own experience, this experience refined my capacity to give and take feedback without defensiveness.

The evaluation resulted in quantifiable improvements to the care team. Handoffs were more succinct and comprehensive, and post-report clarification calls were less frequent (Gates et al., 2021). Interpreter services were solicited earlier, and pharmacists did not experience as many surprises with medication reconciliation at the first dose. New employees were more comfortable speaking out. The nursing team integrated the wins into daily practice by incorporating the SBAR pocket card into onboarding, and leaders reinforced coordinated care by revisiting the checklist during monthly huddles.

Conclusion

The reflection on nursing ethical standards, mentorship, and care team evaluations highlights that professional identity is shaped through individual actions and collective practice. Engaging with professional organizations and evidence-based outlines reinforces this identity, ensuring that ethical practice, inclusivity, and continuous learning remain central to nursing leadership. Ethics and reflective practice in daily nursing actions enhance growth and drive sustainable improvements in patient outcomes and team flexibility.

References

American Nurses Association. (2025). Ethics and human rights. https://www.nursingworld.org/practice-policy/nursing-excellence/ethics/

Bagheri, S., Sedigh, A., Zarei, Z., Kazemzadeh, M., & Sharifi, N. (2025). Comparison of a mini-clinical evaluation exercise with the routine logbook in assessing clinical competence of operating room trainees: A parallel randomized controlled trial. BioMed Central Medical Education, 25(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-025-07560-6

Cheraghi, R., Valizadeh, L., Zamanzadeh, V., Hassankhani, H., & Jafarzadeh, A. (2023). Clarification of ethical principle of the beneficence in nursing care: An integrative review. BioMed Central Nursing, 22(89), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-023-01246-4

Gates, C., Goff, L., & Thomas, L. (2021). Reinventing the handoff process: Bringing standardized bedside report to perioperative services. Journal of PeriAnesthesia Nursing, 36(4), e12–e13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jopan.2021.06.041

NURS FPX 6080 Assessment 2 Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

Grace, P. J., Peter, E., Lachman, V. D., Johnson, N. L., Kenny, D. J., & Wocial, L. D. (2024). Professional responsibility, nurses, and conscientious objection: A framework for ethical evaluation. Nursing Ethics, 31(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/09697330231180749

Kay, S., Unroe, K. T., Lieb, K. M., Kaehr, E. W., Blackburn, J., Stump, T. E., Evans, R., Klepfer, S., & Carnahan, J. L. (2022). Improving communication in nursing homes using Plan-Do-Study-Act cycles of an SBAR training program. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 42(2), 194–204. https://doi.org/10.1177/07334648221131469

Mohamed, H., & Abdelrahman, M. (2025). Professional competency and moral courage among staff nurses. BioMed Central Nursing, 24, 2-11. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-025-03197-4  

Morrison, V., Hauch, R. R., Perez, E., Bates, M., Sepe, P., & Dans, M. (2021). Diversity, equity, and inclusion in nursing: The pathway to excellence framework alignment. Nursing Administration Quarterly, 45(4), 311–323. https://doi.org/10.1097/naq.0000000000000494

NURS FPX 6080 Assessment 2 Reflection on Nursing Core Values and Ethical Standards

Noh, G. O., & Park, M. J. (2021). Effectiveness of incorporating Situation-Background-Assessment-Recommendation (SBAR) methods into simulation-based education for nursing students: A quasi-experimental study. Nurse Education Today, 109(109), 105252. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2021.105252

Sigma Global Nursing Excellence. (2025). Home. https://www.sigmanursing.org/