Health Promotions in Nursing Practice - Essay Example

Health Promotions in Nursing Practice Health Promotions in Nursing Practice Health promotion is a deliberate act of enabling the populace understand their health and thus control the occurrence of various illnesses. The central player in health promotion is nurses. Nurses have the responsibility of enhancing health in primary, secondary and tertiary care settings. Nursing encompasses health education and health promotion aimed at improving the general health of the public. The increasing development of health promotion, coupled with its importance in reducing the incidences and impact of diseases, has increased the roles of nurses. Nurses are best placed to promote health due to their proximity to patients and the community. Importance of Health Promotion Nurses educate vulnerable people on possible conditions and ways to avoid or reduce their impact. Nurses are in close contact with the community and able to understand the problems (Valera, Vigues, Andres, Peral, Berenguera, 2014). As such, nurses have a personal touch in the community thereby enhancing the benefits that the community reaps from health promotion. Advising the population professionally about the various ways through which diseases are avoided amounts to successful health promotion. Health promotion reduces the severity of the condition since the patients have the information how to deal with particular health issues that affect them. In this regard, health promotion acts as a way of empowering people to be responsible for their health. People are empowered to understand their body and thus can detect a change easily for timely action. Health promotion done by nurses is practically efficient since they have the expert knowledge and experience in tackling illness and caring for the sick. The importance of health promotion in nursing practice is indispensable since they are in constant touch with patients at hospital beds or home. It follows that nurses have a positive influence on patients actions and decisions since they exist in a friendly setup (Rubio-Valera et al., 2014). Patients tend to trust nurses on health issues thus making nursing the best avenue for health promotion. Nurses apply various medically approved interventions meant to avert health crises for the general welfare of patients Changing Roles of Nurses The roles of nurses have been changing gradually. Today, nursing practice entails health education, health promotion and patient care. Nurses are increasingly getting interested in the lives of patients besides the hospital bed. They are interested in how patients maintain a healthy life to reduce the severity of illness or avoid it altogether. As such, the roles of nurses have slowly changed from bedside care to include health promotion. Nursing roles have become much complex as the practice now requires nurses to possess skills to pass health information to the populace. Nurse-managed wellness programs represent one of the changes in health promotion. Nursing is integrating personal and behavioral factors in addressing health issues. The roles of nursing have evolved to include individual understanding of people and their lifestyle issues that may affect their health. Health promotion has thus moved from a clinical setting to a social setting where nurses have to pin-point issues affecting a society and addressing them. Such issues include physical activity and environmental factors. The current health promotion strategies cut across the sociopolitical divide. The strategy does not consider individual but the whole community. The community is empowered to manage the health situation by considering the determinants of health in a particular setting (Lee, Kim, Ahn, Ko &Cho, 2009)). The statement implies that the roles of nurses are becoming wider. The nurses are now assuming more community-based care rather than caring for patients in the wards. The aim is to disburse health information directly to the community. Nurses are now more conspicuous in health promotion activities than in patient care settings. Implementation of Health Promotion Implementation of health promotion relies on several strategies. The strategies include: enabling, creation of good environment to support health, and creating essential conditions for a healthy living. Enabling individual to be the masters of their health and is done through health education. It helps people understand their health and detect changes. Health promotion helps patients avoid diseases or detect them early enough for an intervention. Creation of a conducive environment that is supportive of health is another implementation strategy used in healthcare promotion. In this plan, health promotion aims to reduce hazards and condition that may cause harm to the population. The strategy can merge with creation of the essential conditions for healthy living. Healthy living requires condition such as physical fitness, clean environment and good diet. Comparison of Three Levels of Healthcare Promotion Heath promotion in primary care allows people live healthily. Health promotion in primary care bases on healthy eating, hygiene and other issues that minimize exposure of people to illnesses (Valera et al., 2014). Nurses possess professional knowledge and thus their advice is valid to ensure a healthy society. Equally important, health promotion ensures that people stick to good and healthy habits that can reduce the occurrence of diseases. Since the dissipated knowledge stays with the persons who then practice, it means that the general health of the community is improved. Ease of access to health facts and information empowers people to mind own health thus reducing clinical visits and hospital admissions. Health promotion thus relieves the already overwhelmed healthcare facilities. Health promotion in the secondary care setting concerns how individuals control their health to avoid illness. This implies that nurses in secondary care promote health by advising the patients on how the condition can be prevented or reduce the effects. In this scenario, health promotion reduces the severity of illness. In tertiary care, health promotion is critical in reducing the severity of the condition. Tertiary care often concerns patients who require specialized care that may take a long time. Patients with chronic illnesses often require tertiary level care. Nurses are responsible for tendering to patients and ensuring that patients are in good health. The aim is to reduce the toll that the diseases take on the health of patients by advocating a diet and physical fitness among other things (Lee et. al, 2009). Health promotion in the setting thus reduces the incidence of the conditions by advising patients on aspects such as diet and social intervention that may reduce the impact of the disease. Conclusion Health promotion is a sure way of reducing illnesses in the society. As noted above, people are empowered to understand their health and thus act according to the health sanctions imposed by qualified health practitioners. The overall health of the population increases when nurses do health promotion efficiently. References Chambers D. & Thompson S. (2009) Empowerment and its application in health promotion in acute care settings: nurses’ perceptions. Journal of Advanced Nursing. 65(1), 130–138 DOI: 10.1111/J.1365-2648.2008.04851.X Lee Y., Kim S., Ahn H., Ko S., & Cho H. (2009). Development of a community health promotion center based on the World Health Organization’s Ottawa Charter health promotion strategies. Japan Journal of Nursing Science, 6, 83-90. DOI:10.1111/J.1742-7924.2009.00125.X Rubio-Valera M, Pons-Vigues M, Martınez-Andres M, Moreno-Peral P, Berenguera A. (2014) Barriers and Facilitators for the Implementation of Primary Prevention and Health Promotion Activities in Primary Care: A Synthesis through Meta-Ethnography. PLoS ONE 9(2): e89554. DOI:10.1371/JOURNAL.PONE.008955 Read More