Ethical Principles In A Midwife's Story Of Penny Armstrong
Penny Armstrong with no doubt was an incredible midwife. Although she suffered a tremendous professional preconception, she always upheld her profession at a high standard, and always think of the well being of her patients. It seems like there was a rivalry between doctors and her. She mentions that doctors considered nurse-midwifery not so well trained to deliver babies. Although Penny states that doctors were trained to think they are gods. Personally, I think their knowledge is indispensable, in the medical field, it is impossible to work as a loner.
Reading the book, Penny faces lots of ethical dilemmas and issues, but one caught my attention. She mentions a delivery, in which the mother would be giving birth in a lithotomy position, which is convenient for medical intervention, but not necessarily good. She describes how mechanically the doctor was. Penny is against this method. She says that this position works against physics and physiology of childbirth and women can seldom push effectively. Penny states that “Because she cannot use gravity, because her labor is tempered by immobility, because she hasn’t anything to eat and her blood sugar is low, because she can’t her body follow it’s unique musculoskeletal formula, because she assumes that she is not delivering this child, but that the doctor and hospital are doing it for her- for all of these reasons, her body does not labor well as it might”. Because deontological theory holds that acts are morally obligatory regardless of their consequences for human welfare, I recognized that this doctor used the deontology theory to deliver this baby. In this case, the doctor’s duty is above the welfare of his patient. Penny faces moral distress, an ethical issue, and she cannot do much; she is only a midwife. She must respect the role boundaries. She knows that that is not the right way.
According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, researchers do not support lithotomy position. She knew that the mediolateral episiotomy was an aggression. The doctor did not even explain to the patients what was going on. According to Stanford Children’s Health website, then it is the provider’s duty to inform the patient when performing an episiotomy. Penny states that the doctor did not even touch her, except to put a needle in her perennial area. She knows that that lithotomy position could increase the likelihood of a surgical intervention. But still, striving, she applies the ethical principle of beneficence from beginning to end of Susie’s labor experience. While caring for the patient, Penny says to her: “Let’s get on your knee. We need to take some pressure off those veins and give those bones the best chance to spread for the baby’s head”. Penny also mentions that she washes Susie up and places bottles with warm water in around her legs, covering her with quilts and giving her some apple juice to replenish the sugar supply lost.
For Penny, Susie’s well-being was above anything else. I am sure that because of Penny’s ethical principle of beneficence, she will always be remembered and cherished as that midwife that made a difference that day.
