Ethical decision making and mandatory reporting in cases of suspected child abuse.

This article presents a unique approach to analyzing the issue of mandatory reporting suspected child abuse from an ethical decision-making perspective with a nursing model. Sometimes nurses confront this problem in their own families or in their neighborhoods or social groups. Clearly, deciding to intervene is a challenging and difficult process. Yet reporting is mandated by law. A model of ethical decision-making may guide the clinician in this process.