Prevention of Chronic Diseases and Improving Public Health Reforms - Essay Example

Reaction to Health Care Reforms: (Prevention of Chronic Diseases and Improving Public Health Reforms) affiliation: Reaction toHealth Care Reforms: (Prevention of Chronic Diseases and Improving Public Health Reforms) Introduction The Affordable Care Act addresses wellness while simultaneously advocating for prevention and enlightening of the public on various health issues and challenges. It addresses the funding reforms and creation of a national strategy to prevent diseases and promote health care in the most successful and effective means. The primary objective of the reforms is to better/improve Americans health status, and thus reduce cases of preventable illnesses and their resulting disability. Additionally, the Act aims to empower American families through the provision of tools which will enable them to find out Science-based information that suits their lifestyles. Also, the Act gives priority to screenings and prevention through issuance of payment waivers on Medicare to the elderly. The Secretary is bestowed with the authority to work with other departments so as to come up with development strategies and prevention methods which will improve the health status of the American citizens. As such, the paper will address and explore health care reforms in the Affordable Care Act of the United States of America. Body The element of interest chosen from this Act is the prevention of chronic diseases and improving public health care. The section that addresses this aspect gives detail on how the reforms will be used to reduce incidences of chronic diseases, such as diabetes and Alzheimer disease. The chronic illnesses are more prevalent in older citizens than in the younger generation or age group (Harris & Lloyd, 2012). The number of older citizens is huge and their frequency to the hospitals is quiet high. Consequently, government resources are strained in providing constant care to this group (Huntington et al, 2011). Therefore, there was a great need to formulate reforms to address how the government and health sectors can develop strategies to prevent prevalence of chronic diseases and provide adequate medical cover to the affected patients. Improving public health aims at providing affordable and quality services to all citizens despite their social or economic status. This aspect of preventing chronic illnesses and improving health care is a very basic element that affects all nurses in their practice. The nurses in most cases find themselves in hard or complex situations where they have a patient with a chronic disease yet the patient lacks enough money to afford Medicare. The Act addresses this problem by availing affordable Medicare to all citizens as a way of improving the public health and wellness (U.S Department Of Health And Human Services, n.a). The aspect of prevention of chronic diseases will address the gap of inability for health systems to conclusively serve the huge number of patients with chronic illnesses and no resources to access proper medical care. By implementing prevention strategies, the frequency of patients to hospitals will gradually decrease. This way, the government is able to properly plan and provide adequate funds to acquire resources necessary for treatment of chronic illnesses. Additionally, prevention of chronic illnesses will reduce incidences of health problems among citizens. This will improve their health. As a result, the citizens are able to engage in economic activities that will enable them to generate income and thus eliminate overdependence on the government to provide health care services. Improving the health care aspect will address the current shortages in health delivery systems. These shortages include; shortage of medical resources to address various diseases such as cancer, shortage of health care staff and inadequate medical insurance for patients (Grol et al, 2013). The reforms will increase government funds for health services and increase the insurance covers for citizens to avoid limiting the scope for medical coverage. This gap of lack of adequate resources will specifically be addressed by initiatives to educate the public on preventive measures, provision of clinical prevention services in the communities, increase in access to prevention services and erecting school based health clinics in all communities. This will promote the importance of prevention and avail avenues where affected members can get information or data concerning the prevention of chronic illnesses and on healthy living. The nurses need education and nursing considerations to effectively prevent chronic diseases and improve health care. Every nurse involved in this reform initiative should have adequate education and experience in dealing with chronic illnesses. Vast knowledge of the most prevalent chronic diseases is a must for all nurses for them to be effective in implementing the reforms. The nurses must understand the cycle of the chronic illnesses, the impact on the people especially the elderly and the lifestyles that accelerate chronic diseases. They must be equipped with sufficient experience to diagnose these illnesses and educate the patients on preventive measures. The nurses must understand their patients’ patterns of learning, their attitude to learning preventive measures and must use their work experience to implement the best strategy to train their patients on preventive measures rather than constant treatment. The nursing consideration needed, according to an article by Canadian Nursing Association is a sound background of dealing with chronic diseases. Nurses who have experience with social psychology are more preferred. This is because they are able to understand their patients’ psychology and device the best strategies to influence the patients to adopt preventive measures rather than constantly seeking for treatment. Mark Harris, author of a journal article on the role of primary health in preventing chronic diseases argues that nurses who have studied psychology can be critical in influencing changes in public policies that are oriented on adopting preventive measures and improving public health. A concrete background in chronic illnesses provides the nurses with experience and vast knowledge of treatment and prevention of chronic illnesses. Another consideration for nurses is good communication and interpersonal skills. The nurses mainly communicate with patients in addition to working with other people in the health care systems to implement preventive measures and strategies to improve health care. The rationale behind every nurse acquiring an education is very basic. As a nurse, it will be impossible to implement change if you don’t comprehend that change. To effectively implement the reforms, nurses must therefore have vast training and experience with handling chronic diseases so that they can educate their patients and the community of preventive measures. Additionally, the nurses must have experience in public health issues so as to identify areas that need improvement such as inadequacy of insurance covers amongst patients (Orszag & Emanuel, 2010). This way, they will be instrumental in influencing the policies and government strategies that will give priority to more urgent public healthcare needs. A concrete background is important to enable the nurses to understand issues surrounding chronic diseases such as harmful lifestyles, treatment of chronic diseases and patients’ attitude to preventive measures. By understanding these aspects, nurses will be more effective in formulating implementation strategies that are suitable to various categories of patients. Communication and good interpersonal skills are a necessity and thus are required since the initiative aims at working with people to implement change. The nurses must therefore have the ability to communicate and interact with people for them to effectively implement the initiative to the communities. The initiative will lead to a sound and efficient future health care system. This will be achieved through modernizing the prevention and public health programs to address the needs of all patients in the most effective means that addresses patients’ specific needs. Education and outreach campaigns on the initiative will revolutionize the health systems and involve patients in finding solutions to the health problems they face. According to Reinhard & Hassmiller (2012) authors of The Future of Nursing; the nursing profession plays a major role in influencing public policies aimed at improving the efficiency of the health systems. Susan stresses on the importance of nurses to work with other disciplines to influence changes in the health system. For instance, the nursing organizations must work with the government to formulate policies that best address patients’ needs. Furthermore, the nurses must work with other doctors and medical personnel to implement policies aimed at revolutionizing the health systems (Jacobs & Skocpol, 2012). Moreover, nurses must work with educators to devise the best way to teach patients on ways to improve their health. Additionally, nurses must work closely with psychologists to find the best ways of influencing patients to adopt changes in the health care systems. References Canadian nurses association. (n.a). Chronic Disease Prevention and Management. Retrieved fromhttp://www.cna-aiic.ca/en/on-the-issues/better-health/chronic-disease-prevention-and-management Grol, R., Wensing, M., Eccles, M., & Davis, D. (Eds.). (2013). Improving patient care: the implementation of change in health care. John Wiley & Sons. Harris, M., & Lloyd, J. (2012). The role of Australian primary health care in the prevention of chronic disease. Australian National Preventive Health Agency. Australian Government. Huntington, W. V., Covington, L. A., Center, P. P., Covington, L. A., & Manchikanti, L. (2011). Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010: Reforming the health care reform for the new decade. Pain Physician, 14(1), E35-E67. Jacobs, L. R., & Skocpol, T. (2012). Health care reform and American politics: What everyone needs to know. Oxford University Press. Orszag, P. R., & Emanuel, E. J. (2010). Health care reform and cost control. New England Journal of Medicine, 363(7), 601-603. Reinhard, S., & Hassmiller, S. (2012). The future of nursing: Transforming health care. The Journal, AARP, http://journal. aarpinternational. org/a/b/2012/02/The-Future-of-Nursing-Transforming-Health-Care, accessed October, 9. U.S Department of Health and Human Services. (n.a ). About the Law. Retrieved from http://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/rights/index.html Read More