Lao-Tzu once said, “Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from opposite sides.” While the safety of patients lives hang by a thread in the hand of a nurse anesthetist who only have a nursing degree in anesthetics, these certified registered nurse anesthetist’s (CRNA) are training hard, studying extra hours, and being shoved deeper into debt to be able to handle any anesthesia case with expertise. Nurse anesthetist should be allowed to practice without the supervision of a physician or anesthesiologist. There have been a number of court cases against the unsupervised practice of CRNA, and they were all dismissed in favor of the nurses. Nurse anesthetist is one of the oldest nursing specialties in the United States, and the schooling …show more content…
They are professionals under the law. Therefore, the rules that govern their liability are the exact same as the legal rules that state the liability for nurse anesthetists. The liability is the same for nurse anesthetist as for the ones that work with the nurse anesthetist. Since being a nurse anesthetist is such a unique type of practice, being fixed in between a registered nurse and an anesthesiologist, nurses and students are held to the regular care of anesthesia. Even though things can go wrong in anesthesia without anyone being in the wrong, for certified registered nurse anesthetist and students alike, the rule at hand is the liability for all that goes wrong unless given specific directions by a physician or doctor in the time of critical …show more content…
On the other hand, in “Supervision of Nurse Anesthetist Sought” Lovern, the author, discusses the decision of the government’s federal law that allows certified nurse anesthetist to practice without the supervision of a physician. He wrote that the president of the American Society of Anesthesiologist stated “Outrageous action” when commenting on the issue. A big contender to why some physicians and anesthesiologist do not want to allow the nurse anesthetist to practice without supervision is that if their patient is to become injured, the responsibility and liability falls directly onto the physicians and anesthesiologist. In some instances, the nurses that administered the drugs were not even sued, but the surgeon or anesthesiologist over the CRNA were taken to court. So, where do we draw the line? The Association of nurse anesthetist stated, “This issue has never been about quality of care but about access to care." This was a huge win for the more rural hospitals who depend greatly on the work of nurse anesthetist and need flexibility in their staff. In places like Montana where the population is minimal, nurse anesthetists play a huge role in the operating room. They are able to think independently thanks to the “care rule”, but if these professionals had to take orders from an anesthesiologist before every