Is there a professional responsibility to adopt a healthy lifestyle?

Snelling, Paul ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9781-0784 (2017) Is there a professional responsibility to adopt a healthy lifestyle? In: Revisiting the philosophy and practice of nursing research and scholarship, 31 August - 2nd September 2017, University of Worcester. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

Recently released documents consulting on a new pre-registration curriculum in the UK contain the following clause:
At the point of registration, the registered nurse will understand the professional responsibility for adopting a healthy lifestyle…
The document falls short of requiring that students do actually adopt the prescribed lifestyle, but requiring understanding in this manner only makes sense if there is such a responsibility. In this sense, and regardless of the outcome of the consultation this clause is significant: The professional regulator in the UK claims that nurses have a responsibility – that is an obligation – to adopt a healthy lifestyle.
This presentation challenges this claim. Responsibilities in this context have three component parts: the actor, obligation and consequences, and each of these are problematic in this context. Generally, the notion of ‘professional responsibility’ is difficult outside the boundaries of a code of conduct. Specifically, the notion of a professional (moral) responsibility to adopt a healthy lifestyle is challenged by examining arguments in favour, which are a mixture of the normative and empirical. It is concluded that there is no such responsibility, professional or otherwise.

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