Registered Nurse/Licensed Practical Nurse
Philosophy of Discipline

The Nebraska Board of Nursing recognizes and accepts its obligation to protect the consumers of nursing services from unsafe, incompetent or substandard nursing care.

The Board believes that the discipline of nurses should be fair, prompt and based on facts. The Board carefully considers the totality of the facts and circumstances in each individual case, with the safety of the public being paramount. The Board will recommend remedial measures such as probation and/or limitation of a license if evidence exists that the nurse has, or can acquire under supervision, the knowledge, skills and abilities to practice safely. The Board will recommend denial, suspension or revocation of a license when there is evidence that the public's health, safety, or welfare continues to be in danger or when no remedial purpose would be served by probation and/or limitation.

The Board believes that nurses who acknowledge they are chemically dependent or have other disabilities that affect nursing practice and who actively practice recognized recovery methods do not represent a threat to the public and should be allowed to continue practicing nursing. However, in order to assure the public safety, such nurses should be carefully monitored. Monitoring provision should be designed to support recovery methods and prevention of relapse. Individuals are responsible for their own choices and behavior. Consequences should be applied to relapsing behavior.

Nurses, as health care professionals, have a code of ethics and standards of care which guides their practice. Evidence that a nurse has failed to conform to accepted ethical and practice standards should result in disciplinary sanctions on the nurse's license to practice.

Adopted: August 10, 1995
Effective Date: August 10, 1995
Revised: November 14, 2002