Moral Integrity for Nurses

Abstract

Concern for one's moral integrity is often a part of discussions about moral conflicts in health care. The presumption is that moral integrity is good, even though the full meaning of the concept and its relative worth are not completely understood.The word “integrity” comes from the Latin integritas, which referred to a state of completeness or wholeness and a quality of purity. The subject of integritas included all of life. More recent understandings of integrity are limited in scope to specific areas of life, though the early meaning of an unimpaired condition has survived. But the scope of integrity is commonly limited to a firm adherence to a code of moral standards.