Community Health Nursing Case Study

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Community Health Nursing

The contribution that a community healthcare unit can make towards enhancing population health and minimizing inequalities is strengthened by international law. Primary healthcare has demonstrated to have an independent impact on improving the status of health within the community. It also affects the reduction of health inequalities and the achievement of improved health outcomes at a relatively low cost and making the healthcare system sustainable. There is substantial evidence that a solid primary health care framework guarantees an effective healthcare delivery. In this case, it will solve the lack of responsiveness and continuity in the overall healthcare. This study has focused on the contribution of a community health nurse to the orientation of the framework towards population health promotion, primary health care and health promotion.

The Need

It is timely to assess apparent arrangements, propose an optimal healthcare framework and identify areas of change. It is vital that amendments are not considered in isolation, as system reforms must address major structural barriers simultaneously. In the pursuit to improve primary healthcare within this community, it is imperative to acknowledge the impacts of the curative and preventive aspects of the health system on the population health status. Appropriate use and access to services such as dental services, public health, pharmaceuticals and hospitals are integral elements in connection to health outcomes (Basford & Slevin, 2013). Moreover, it is impossible for the primary health system to respond to all aspects of individual health care needs. Thus, an efficient and effective primary care system must facilitate equitable and appropriate access to broader health and human services are required. The core principle of partnerships underpins an optimal primary healthcare framework as well as the need to incorporate more than the traditional inter-professional set of relationships. We must consider reforms in the primary healthcare systems in terms of its societal effect on well-being and health than exclusively on presumed cost savings.

Evidence-Based Population Health Promotion

The Alberta health unit will operate from a caseload of philosophies focusing on well-being and quality of life. It remains to be a community leader in the promotion of population health. The unit will embrace an approach of permitting people to have an upper hand to improve and control their health. As an alternative to the lifestyle-based prevention efforts, population promotion seeks to facilitate community and individual empowerment (Carroll, 2009). This is with the defined goal of allowing people, both well and ill to accomplish a great sense of control over the sophisticated factors affecting their health. Effective health prevention and promotion efforts are more beneficial than establishing linkages with healthcare consumers in the community.

This population health and promotion strategy will work to improve the prevailing conditions of peoples' lives by enabling them to be healthy. This approach seeks to minimize inequalities within the living and health conditions in Alberta community. These conditions have placed some members at a disadvantage in the maintenance of optimal health. By identifying environmental conditions and risk, behaviors of community members and population groups, this approach will work deter problems before they occur (Ervin, 2012). Since we have seen that fatigue, anemia, and susceptibility to respiratory infections are rampant in this community, this approach will, therefore, avoid such issues from recurring. The ideal outcome is an improved sense of quality life and health for families and individuals in the rural Alberta Community.

Continuously improving performance and quality

Members of this community form the primary consumers of healthcare services. They have a right to high quality, safe and appropriate healthcare. Similarly, they have a right to dialogue with clinicians in setting goals and making informed decisions about their healthcare after receiving information. Enhancing the quality of primary healthcare is a progressive process of improvement, which demands commitment from service providers including Alberta health unit. Community participation in service development, planning, and reviewing are crucial in the development of a solid individual-centered system of primary health care (Carroll, 2009). Embedding practices and improving capacity that support this participation must be built into these activities at all levels of the Alberta health unit.

Strengthening the evidence-base of the primary health care

An accumulating body of evidence points that an effective primary healthcare system can minimize health system costs and inequalities. It would be beneficial to translate existing research into meaningful evidence to be used by other providers. This would advance the access of testing effective models, most of which are apparently being enacted in community health units. Such models include effective integrated population health and promotion models, enhanced collaboration with population groups and relevant service models.

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The interrelated and broad scope of intervention makes it challenging to evaluate primary healthcare within this community (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2011). This presents a dire need to develop and test new strategies to capture the usefulness of multisectoral and multidisciplinary approaches in primary healthcare. The evaluation and development of result-focused service methodologies will help in better understanding the complex nature of primary healthcare. It is imperative to evaluate new initiatives to improve and develop the evidence base as a community health nurse.

The Initiation of strong relationships between Alberta health unit and education institutions like universities will enable the primary health sector to improve the transferability and evaluation of research into practice. Emphasis will be given to research and enhancing the effectiveness of the practice and system. If health staff participates in research, it will broaden workplace skills, experience and satisfaction while encouraging research opportunities to improve the evaluation of primary healthcare services. The development of the capacity of research financed care services requires leadership from the organization and the government. This will be supported by organizational reforms and government policies as well as partnerships with educational institutions (Ervin, 2012).

Proposed configurations for healthcare in the community

This study proposes a two way service for nursing within the Alberta health unit. This approach is designed to stimulate a consensus for the future integration of community nursing services in Alberta. The two-way traffic considers issues such as the lack of career pathways for nurses working within this community. This study proposes for industrial relations and human resource issues in this pathway. The rising demand for nursing services in the community coupled with an inevitable extension of service delivery will need a review of the working conditions and pay for nurses in the community (Gofin & Gofin, 2011). Thus, the Alberta health unit recommends the creation of a separate pay structure for all nurses serving the community. This pay structure must interlink and run parallel with the current nursing structures and scales.

This study supports two approaches: a leadership approach and a clinically focused approach. Nurses will begin by career progression founded on professional development, experience and academic achievement. Alberta health unit proposes that the role and scope of all the nursing posts proposed below will be developed in consultation with various stakeholders.

Nursing care plans

The Alberta health unit will introduce a program where all service users sent for referrals will be assessed at a registered community health nurse. In most situations, this will be conducted by a community health nurse with the general knowledge that the specialists will recognize the relevance of another community health unit to conduct the initial assessment. An approach of collaborating with recipients will support the philosophy as an element of the overall plan of healthcare. This will be accompanied by family health assessments. An initial nursing action plan will be created and a community nurse team identified. A date will be set for evaluation and review (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2011). When the planned program is implemented, recipients will facilitate assessment and profiling as members of the population and community. Individuals who are vulnerable will remain in the active domain for targeted health promotions and review activities.

The Alberta health unit is currently the only community service provided geographically in this area. Its evolution from a public health nursing unit to a community health unit will take time and will need skilled leadership and management. This will be the team leader's responsibility at the community level (Basford & Slevin, 2013).

How the community and the nurse will handle this case scenario

My role as a community health nurse at Alberta health unit will focus on fatigue, anemia, and susceptibility to respiratory infections in family members of all ages. At the community level, I must serve as a dual practitioner where my role will be expected to double as per the demand. As a general community health unit, community nurses in this area will be the first contact point for community members. Community health nurses will work in designated geographical locations and spend a percentage of their time interacting with community members to educate them on the health benefits of adequate diets. Managing nursing needs and a team of nurses will enable a community health nurse to delegate responsibilities and tasks for various aspects of clinical care. The community will collaborate with nurses to identify affordable sources of balanced diet (Gofin & Gofin, 2011). Thus, this will….....

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