OFF THE PRESS

Nurses are experts in patient care; however, their responsibilities don't end there. In order to ensure a long and successful nursing career, it is vital to understand the legal issues that might present themselves when you least expect it and the best way to handle them. Attorney Michele Mathes and Chief Nursing Officer JoAnne Reifsnyder have combined their decades of judicial and nursing experience to create a user-friendly, practical guidebook for practicing nurses. In "Nurse's Law: Legal Questions & Answers for the Practicing Nurse," published by the Honor Society of Nursing, Sigma Theta Tau International (STTI), Mathes and Reifsnyder help nurses not only follow the nonnegotiable standards to meet their ethical, practical, and legal obligations, but to also understand the basis of these laws and the legal relationship with their patients. "Practicing in such a high-stakes endeavor as health care, nurses must do more than follow legal and regulatory guidance - they must understand the legal basis for practice and their legal relationship with patients and strive to provide for [the] right thing to always be done," Mathes and Reifsnyder said. The question-and-answer format and case studies make this book a simple read for practicing nurses and nursing students alike. With chapters ranging from negligence and confidentiality to surrogate decision making and end-of-life care, the comprehensive text explores issues nurses experience on a daily basis. "Nurse's Law: Legal Questions & Answers for the Practicing Nurse" costs $39.95 and is available at www.nursingknowledge.org/sttibooks. Published: Wed, Jul 09, 2014