What are the key problems for the practitioner in this case?
Kylie seems a concerned and accountable health practitioner by taking the effort of reminding her customer Jim concerning the appointment.
The health practitioner is additionally equipped with the skills of attractive with her client via the new technological inventions, such as twitter and facebook.
The Health practitioner failed to preserve the professional boundary by permitting her relationship with Jim go beyond that of practitioner-client relationship.
What are the key issues for the purchasers in this case?
The clients contemplate the significance of using social media platforms in enticing with their health practitioners.
The clients have not knowledge concerning the element of establishing a boundary between themselves with the health practitioner.
Compare and contrast the views of the academic articles in relation to the issues raised by the case study.
According to an article that was published by the Australian Association of Social Workers, the health practitioners, over their careers, are likely to encounter diverse workmates and clients. When working in such a way, it is always common for some clients to develop feelings for the practitioner, and these feelings can be diverse, ranging from trust towards the practitioner, personally liking the practitioner, a feeling for respect, loving the practitioner or even disliking him or her (Australia Association of Social Workers, 2017). Apparently, as a code of ethics dictates, a health practitioner, not his or her client, is mandated to set and maintain clear and necessary professional boundaries in all forms of communication. These sentiments were also echoed by Koocher and Keith-Spienfel (2017), who argued that there are numerous boundaries between the health practitioner and his or her client, and crossing over them has numerous potential effects. They also added that crossing the boundary can stimulate client`s aspect of undermining the therapy, cause harm to the client or even disrupt the therapist-patient relationship. In contrast, Dundas (2015) hails for the establishment of a dual relationship in order to encourage clients to open up concerning their economic activities, environmental health, healthy behaviors as well as his or her close partners.
The practitioner's ethical responsibilities with regards to social media technology boundaries
The code's expectation of health practitioners is that it is their duty (not the duty of their clients) to set and maintain precise and important professional boundaries in regard to communication. It is the duty of the health professional to weight up the ethical considerations for whether to denial social client's social media invitation or accept. This is due to the fact that there are some circumstances where interacting with clients via social media platforms may be important, such as having a work profile page that does not disclose the health practitioner's personal life and if the health practitioner provides social work services such as counseling (Australia Association of Social Workers, 2017). Moreover, the health practitioner has the role of evaluating the impact of accepting client's invitation to the social media platforms. Precisely, the client maybe negative impacted or experience rejection and this may hinder him or her from complying from the various medications that are prescribed to him or her by the practitioner.
The impact of e-technology for health practitioners today
The e-technology has helped practitioners to enhance their communication with their clients. Precisely, this mode of communication is cheaper compared to the conventional methods, and it provides added advantages such as video calling, which can enable the health practitioner to assess the progress of the client at his or her comfort zone. Consecutively, e-technology has enabled health practitioners to access the medical history of patients with ease (Rauv, 2017). Initially, the cases of medical errors used to be high especially in situations where patients have attended different health care facilities and health practitioners. Precisely, most clients are liable to forget their medical histories, or even opt to deliberately not to disclose his or her full medical history. Currently, the presence of electronic medical records has helped in curbing this trend. In addition, the presence of mobile applications has simplified everything starting with patients accessing their test results at home and accessing general medical information without having to book for appointments with the health practitioner. This has helped in reducing the workload of health practitioners in the long run.
'Slippery slope' argument
The slippery slope argument entails a situation where a trend of an action is rejected with little or no evidence; due to the fact it may stimulate a chain of reactions that may lead to undesirable outcomes (Hanks, 2014). Precisely, the use of e-technology can be widely allowed in the health care facilities in order to enhance the practitioner-client relationship with the hope that it will not be abused but either party. Alternatively, the use of e-technology can be banned due to future anticipations that it may hinder health practitioners from setting and maintaining their professional boundaries with their clients.
References
Australia Association of Social Workers, (2017). Professional Boundaries and Dual Relationships. Retrieved from, https:\/\/www.aasw.asn.au\/document\/item\/2354
Dundas C., (2015). Professional Boundaries in Health-Care Relationships. Retrieved from, http:\/\/www.yoursocialworker.com\/boundaries.htm
Hanks C., (2014). Slippery Slope. Retrieved from, http:\/\/www.txstate.edu\/philosophy\/resources\/fallacy-definitions\/Slippery-Slope.html
Koocher G., & Keith-Spiegel P., (2017). Boundary Crossing and the Ethics of Multiple Role Relationships. Retrieved from, http:\/\/www.continuingedcourses.net\/active\/courses\/course066.php
Rauv S., (2017). The Impact of Technology in Healthcare. Retrieved from, https:\/\/www.elcomcms.com\/resources\/blog\/the-impact-of-technology-in-healthcare-trends-benefits-examples
