Exploring Community Health Nursing - Assignment Example

? Exploring Community Health Nursing Insert Semester In the modern day world there has been tremendous advancement in the nursing practice especially as regards patient health and care. Community health nursing (CHN) is one of the diverse ways through which medical care is offered to the larger community by health care professionals. In the broader perspective, a community is defined as group of people who share a common important feature in their lives and are subject to use some common institutions and agencies. Community health nursing provides health care to such groups in the society. On the other hand, the concept of health is broadly defines as a state of well being that results from the harmonious interactions of the body, soul and the mind. Therefore the term community health is defined by meeting the particular needs and wants of a community by identifying the problems they face and managing the interactions within the community (Cradduck, 2000). The community health nurses are generally primary health care providers in various places often working in an expanded role in conjunction with other medical care professionals. In addition to homecare, public and community health care service, community health nurses provide treatment and emergency care services, x-rays and crisis management within the community. Their main purpose is to provide community health promotion services in a specific community in accordance with the philosophy and objectives of the authority and to promote the prevention of diseases, maintain health and the overall health as well as wellbeing of the community. This paper therefore seeks to have an insight on the nature, scope and role of community health nursing, and an analysis of the impact of Public Health Care and the Canadian Community Health Nursing Standards. Community health nurses play a pivotal role in the community as far as health provision is concerned. They may extend these services to within the health centre, schools, community halls or in patient homes, especially the elderly and are intended to provide a healthy way of living whilst reducing the incidences of death and diseases significantly. Community health nursing services may be provided either on an individual basis or a multi disciplinary team. Mostly they work in cross boundary teams to effectively provide sufficient health care to the society. They work with individuals, families, populations, groups, systems and/or society, with the focus being the health of a person or community and from which motivations nursing actions flow. The nursing standards of practice are applied in different settings where people work, live, play, learn and even worship (Warren et al, 2012). This involves working with a diverse array of people who have different backgrounds. For example, they may work with children (infants, school age and adolescents), children with long term disabilities, families, pregnant women, elderly people whose health is deteriorating, individuals with chronic diseases, disadvantages individuals or groups as well as community organizations such as schools, churches and social services agencies. Community health nurses therefore need to have a broad perspective of the roles they play within the community as regards health provision and promotion. In order to perform their tasks in the most professional way CHN need to posses some characteristics and attributes that are useful especially in the field. These attributes assist the nurses to identify and manage any health hazards while containing problems that are existent. Therefore they need to be very flexible and be highly adaptable to the different environments. This is because the environments keep changing as well as the pandemics that strike. This calls for nurses with physical and emotional stamina, good communication skills, problem solving skills as well as critical thinking abilities (Goottschalk, 2000). Another characteristic that is crucial is the ability to motivate as well as supervise paraprofessional and non-professional staffs. This enables community health nurses to react swiftly and effectively to unusual and often unexpected situations. It encompasses the ability of a community health worker to work well with individuals, families and organizations from diverse social and cultural backgrounds. In the field, community health nurses face the same occupational hazards faced by other nurses such as exposure to dangerous chemicals and diseases, back injuries and muscle strains from moving patients in need of health care. This means that community health workers need to work relatively independently and deal with issues of own safety since they work out of a controlled hospital environment. Community health nurses have various responsibilities to take care of in the community. The focus of community nursing includes not only the individual, but as well the family and the community, meeting these numerous needs require multiple roles.  Their responsibilities vary depending on the scenarios that present themselves but all in all it all goes down the perspective of health provision. These responsibilities include; Care provider Community health nurses provide direct nursing health care to patients by use of a problem solving approach which is accordance with the stipulated standards, guidance and appropriate scope of expanded nursing practice to facilitate good health care of patients. Educator They provide detailed community health programs that are in tandem with the international standards. This is in an effort to protect, prevent and consequentially reduce the incidences of communicable diseases and to promote a healthy lifestyle which decreases the death incidences and instances of long term disabilities to the community. Leader Community health nurses serve as leaders in the communities that they serve. They facilitate, implement and sometimes modify patients’ and family education/training. This is purely based on the particular needs of the patient because they are different and therefore require special attention each. Manager They are tasked with the responsibility of advocating practice environments that have the organization and resource allocation that is necessary for safe, competent and ethical nursing health care. They also manage resources in emergency and disaster situations that arise. Researcher Community health nurses are more often on the field and thus have the task of developing and implementing chronic disease management programs. They also are in a position to assess the needs of individuals, families, groups and organizations throughout the lifespan. Acute care arises where a patient is in need of active but short term for a severe injury or an urgent medical development that requires urgent medical checkup. Due to the sensitivity required for acute care patients, a team of health care professionals are set up to deliver under the tight circumstances that surround a scenario (Cradduck, 2000). There are fundamental differences between acute care and community health nursing. Some of the most profound differences are that treatment under acute care is retrospective as opposed to community health care where it prompts risks. This means that acute care arises as a curative means where as the latter comes as a preventive mechanism to the community. Another difference is that acute care is provided by teams within the hospital. This can range from medical doctors to surgical specialties. Majorly the teams are constituted and carry out the duties within the hospital environment. In rare circumstances like when disasters occur is when they work in the field. Nevertheless, they discharge duties to patients with critical health complications. On the other hand community health nurses mainly work autonomously since they are serving patients that do not necessarily need a lot of medical attention. They deal with patients that need guidance and are majorly on the recovery process. Community health nurses occasionally work in cross boundary teams to discharge their duties effectively (Warren et al, 2012). In regards to acute care, the level of specialization required is often high. This is because the chances of committing medical errors are narrow and the life of the patient is normally dependent on the medical attention accorded. On the contrary, community health nurses are required to be conversant and familiar with the several conditions. This is necessary as they spend majority of their time with the patients, and therefore need to be aware of the necessary intervention activities to perform in order to safeguard a patient’s life. Therefore as much as both community health nurses and acute care providers have the sole responsibility of ensuring patient safety, they have their underlying differences which have been discussed above. In the execution of their daily nursing activities to the community, nurses often face ethical challenges or dilemmas irrespective of where and when they practice. No matter where nurses practice, they encounter ethical decisions that have an impact on them or their patients. It can be vividly be postulated that there is no ‘right’ solution in an ethical dilemma situation. Thus ethical challenges are challenging scenarios that don’t have a satisfactory resolution. The importance of ethical decision making in nursing lays in the fact that different ethical scenarios regarding the same ethical dilemma can be reached with neither decision being ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ (Leesberg et al, 2004 ). In broad sense, ethics means doing well in every sense. There are several ethical issues that community health nurses can encounter during practice. These may include quality or quantity of life, freedom versus control, pro- choice against pro- life, and empirical knowledge versus personal beliefs. Quantity in this case refers to the length of time a person lives or perhaps the number of people affected by the decision. Quality on the other hand pertains as to how ‘good’ a life an individual may have which is relative. For example, how does a community health nurse support a patient deciding between therapeutic processes that will prolong life but on the other hand compromise the quality of life? The patient may live longer but may undergo serious side effects as a result of the therapy. A few of the ethical dilemma s are discussed as below; Freedom versus control This inquires if a patient does have the right to make a choice that brings harm to them or should the nurse prevent the choice. For example, a patient makes a choice not to eat and the nurse know the harm that results from a patient not eating. Should the nurse force the patient to eat? Truth telling versus deception Nurses have to deal with this issue especially where the family is reluctant to disclose the medical condition of a patient. What is a nurse supposed to do when a family insists that disclosing the patient the prognosis will bring harm? Is the patient supposed to know? Empirical knowledge versus personal beliefs In such scenarios, research based knowledge in nursing is often contrasted to personal beliefs gained from religion. For example, what is nurse supposed to do where a patient desperately needs transfusion to live but believes that transfusions are not accepted? The nurse understands the need for the transfusion. How does that nurse deal with the patient’s family who hold up the family member’s preference and still be helpful of the patient’s and family’s right to this resolution?  As health care is fast shifting from the traditional hospital based to community based, community health nurses are affected directly. The public health security brings forth a new dimension to the community health nurses’ role. It highlights community health nursing as a core pivot in emergency response plans that provide mass prophylaxis, contain and manage biochemical threats (Warren et al, 2012). They are considered first responders to where they organize and administer immediate care. These are the major trends that are engulfing the old community health practice that is subjected to peripheral patient care activities to more involving and life saving activities. In conclusion, community health nursing plays a vital role in the provision of primary care with an expanded role that is significant to other health care professionals. Community health nurses are tasked with various responsibilities which are all aimed at ensuring patient safety as well as ethical nursing care. It is tasked with the management and advocating of proper practicing environments for nursing care whilst providing a comprehensive community health program according to the international standards. Community health nursing broadly encompasses provision of health care services to patient s that need care and on the larger extent prevent incidences of communicable diseases thus keeping a society safe. On the contrary there is an aspect of patients that require prompt medical attention. Such patients are accorded acute care which is normally provided by a team of specialists and treatment mainly occurs within the hospital premises. Just as any profession, community health nurses are often faced with ethical dilemmas in the course of their practice. These are situations that put the nurse under a tight position as regards making a decision over a scenario. They generally include making decisions that are ‘good’ for the sake of the patient’s health and well being. Nevertheless, decisions have to be made despite the challenges faces. The effects of the challenges bring impact to the patient and sometimes the nurses. This calls for nurses to be decisive in reaching at conclusions on patient safety and alternatives to health care. There is advancement in community health nursing with the improvement in technology in the modern day world. Nurses are able to reach out to remote areas of society to provide health care to the community. Tasks have also shifted from the mainstream function of community health nurses majorly practicing out in the field to the modern environment where they can execute their duties within the hospitals. The sole purpose of this trend is to ensure patient safety as well as saving lives. Further studies can be conducted on community health nurses’ roles to demystify the adage that they entirely should practice in the remote areas. References Anderson, E. T & McFarlane, J. M. (2001). Community as Partner: Theory and Practice in Nursing (3rd ed,). Philadelphia:Lippincott. Community Health Nurses of Canada www.chnc.ca Cradduck, G. (2000). Primary health care practice. In M. Stewart (Ed.). Community nursing: Gottschalk, J & Baker, S.S (2000). Primary health care: The foundation. Toronto, ON: Pearson Canada. Leesberg, L. S. & Yiu, L. (2007). Community Health Nursing: A Canadian Perspective (3rd Edition.). Toronto, ON: Pearson Education. Promoting Canadians’ Health (2nd ed., pp. 352-369).Toronto, Ontario, Canada:WB Saunders. Warren, E., Heale, R., Haugh, E.B., & Yiu, L. (2012). Nursing Roles, Functions, and Practice Settings. Toronto, ON: Pearson Canada. Read More