Reflection Post- May 8th, 2013

It’s hard to imagine that it is already almost the end of another semester. We have made it through our first year of nursing school, congratulations everyone!!! I have learned a lot in this course throughout the semester and it has changed my view on the nursing profession. One of the things I really liked about this class was that it opened my eyes to the vast number of opportunities for nurses to be involved in. Sometimes when people think about the career of a nurse they only focus on the typical hospital setting and a nurse caring for sick individuals, but nursing is SO much more than that. Nurses have the opportunity to work with all different types of populations, and in countless settings and scenarios. The amount of possibilities for nurses is amazing. Just think back on all the things we discussed during the semester...community health care, disasters, hazards, injuries, school nurses, communicable diseases, vaccinations, public health, child and family health…nurses play a critical role in all of these fields and others! It is very exciting to me when I think about the abundant possibilities for us as we enter the nursing field. I find it encouraging that if you go into your career as a nurse in one specific field and find that this field doesn’t really suit you, its alright, there are many other fields of nursing to experience. With so many diverse fields of nursing available we are able to tailor our careers to our individual preferences and hopefully love the career we ultimately find ourselves in.

In this course we spent a lot of time working with the public health wheel. I think that this is a great example of how nurses work in collaboration with individuals, families, health care professionals and community agencies. Some of the interventions on the wheel, like case management and health teaching, can be done on an individual level or with families. Interventions such as outreach and screenings are more community based and may involve other health care professionals. Nursing is a multifaceted field that provides different levels of care for various populations while collaborating with others. The care of an individual person is a complex task that takes into account many contributing factors. At the onset of care a nurse may be able to focus solely on the individual and their acute condition, but as care progresses the nurse must focus on other outside forces affecting the patient. For an example let’s take the situation of an overweight child. At first, the nurse may focus on only the individual child and any problems they may be experiencing due to being overweight. Next, the nurse may move to the child’s family situation and identify factors, such as poverty, that may be playing a role. Finally, the nurse could assess the child’s community. The community may be the child’s school, which may not offer healthy mealtime options, or the area where the child lives, which may not have access to fresh fruits and vegetables. If the family had poor access to healthy food options the nurse could offer assistance by connecting them with food bank agencies in their community. Additionally, if the nurse concluded from the assessment that the cause was not poor nutrition he/she could refer the child to another health care professional who may discover an underlying medical condition to explain the obesity. To provide the best care the nurse must take all aspects of the situation into account and collaborate with others to find the best solution.

One issue that I discussed in one of my blogs was the affect of poverty on the health of individuals, families and the community. This is another example of how health care is so multifaceted. We don’t often think of poverty as something that we would need to consider in nursing care, but it does have an effect on health. Individuals and families living in poverty do not have access to healthy food options, medical attention and infection control practices. These habits may have an impact on the community’s health by spreading disease due to lack of cleanliness or limited access to vaccinations. As nurses we must be aware of all the aspects that play into the health of individual patients and the community. By being aware and taking a well-rounded approach we can provide the best care for our patients and also be proactive with health care.