Your patient’s family brought too many boxes of candy, and the patient wants you to take the unopened one. How do you handle this scenario?

Nurses are highly respected as ethical professionals and have been voted the most ethical profession for 15 years in a row. It's not an ethical practice to accept gifts from patients, no matter how small or tasty. Nurses have to uphold ethical boundaries and maintain that trust. The patient is vulnerable and in the nurses' care, so the nurse should not accept personal gifts. The best way to handle the situation is to have the ethical standard to thank the patient for the thought, and to decline the offer, with the explanation that it would not be ethical to accept. The family or patient could offer it to the nursing manager of the floor for all the nurses to enjoy, but that would be a management decision on the nurse manager's part.