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In the context of relationships between health care providers and patients, this is simply "doing no harm". The golden rules of medicine are "first do no harm, then do good wherever possible". Non-maleficence changes depending on the situation. Consider a patient with terminal cancer... while it would be beneficial to prescribe analgesia to ease their pain, non-malefience might suggest we should not prescribe too much pain killer in order to avoid overdose or interaction with other drugs. It's a pretty weak example but the four pillars of ethics (these two and "autonomy" and "justice") must be closely examined in clinical decision making, assuming you're asking about a medical context.

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15y ago

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In layman's terms, nonmalficence means "first, do no harm". It is often used as a medical term, so people like doctors and nurses do not hurt patients intentionally.

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11y ago
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to do no harm or avoiding harm

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12y ago
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Q: What are the ethical principles of non maleficence?
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