Public Health
A. Based on the nurse biographies you read this week in The Neighborhood, do you see each nurse's role as a public health or community nurse? Explain.
According to Stanhope and Lancaster (2004) the primary role of public health nurses is to provide managed care, primary care, and health education to families and individuals who are categorized as high risk and vulnerable population. The nurse biographies provide insightful life experiences of public health nurses and challenges undergo when providing health care to high-risk communities and vulnerable population. For example, Kate Williams, a 57-year-old geriatric nurse provides counseling services to the aged in her community after she noticed an increase in number of aged patients to lack of extra curriculum activity, which is fundamental in promoting health in a community and supervises students learning in the hospital.
The nurse’s biographies bring out the roles of public health nurses, which include the ability to include skills in community involvement, knowledge about the population in general, and clinical information about health issues and experiences affecting individuals and families. Carol Ramsey, a 51-year-old certified nurse works four days a week at the Neighborhood Women’s Health Specialists (NWHS). In addition, she works one afternoon providing health education and primary care to a variety of patients seeking contraception, treatment and screening for sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy testing to a variety of patient in the community at the Neighborhood Community Health Department.
Finally the nurses biographies bring our a fundamental role of public health nurses which is prevention of illness, promotion of health by educating the masses on health issues affecting them and maintenance of health for families and individuals. Violet Brinkworth, a forty one year old nurse working at the neighborhood Public School system attends to all students’ needs at the elementary, middle and high level. Although the schools are close to each other workload is a bit overhelming, which affects her effectiveness as a nurse. She attends to a variety of, needs, which include giving basic health education and primary care to the students.
B. How does the nurse's knowledge of the community relate to evidence -based practice? Why is it important?
According to Stanhope and Lancaster (2004) evidence based practice is highly reliant on the nurses’ knowledge about a community in which they serve. Each community has specific risk factors, which makes the members of the community more susceptible to certain health problem. Knowledge about the community will help a nurses integrate knowledge, clinical knowledge, and information about the community when educating, providing managed care, and primary care to the masses. Theatrical knowledge is critical but nurses require patient education in order to successfully translate information on the given population and relate to a particular family or individual in practice. A nurse’s knowledge of a community helps her or him to narrow down on issues likely to affect an individual from that community when providing managed or primary care to members of the community.
Is it expedient to include cultural assessment in community or public health care with vulnerable populations? Explain.
Cultural assessment in communities with vulnerable populations is fundamental for public health nurses because it forms the basis of community knowledge. According to Stanhope and Lancaster (2004) through culturalassessment, the public health care provider will be able to establish behavioral risk factors that are major contributing factors to diseases, injuries disabilities, and deaths in a given community. Through cultural assessment public health, care providers will also know which diseases are likely to be prevalent in given community. Understanding of the culture of community will also help public health care providers a community health improvement program that will suit a particular community. In addition, cultural assessment helps public health providers know how to communicate and relate with individuals and families from a given community in order to promote and maintain health in the community. Finally, the cultural assessment will help public health care providers to come up with a community health profile that shows the health status of the community and recourses available to address the health needs of the members of the community.
Reference
Stanhope, M. & Lancaster, J. (2004).Community and public health nursing. St. Louis; Missouri: Mosby Publishers.
