Community Health Nursing
Community health nursing, also called public health nursing, is geared toward teaching the population at large how to prevent common health problems. The community health nurse strives to prevent health problems in high risk groups by educating people about how to help themselves. At risk populations might need preventative education about substance abuse, sexual health, teen pregnancy, and even infectious diseases.
Public or community health nursing requires the registered nurse to have specialized training, usually a bachelor's degree. Salaries are slightly higher than hospital based registered nurses, thanks to this special training. Geographical locations do not limit the career path of community health nursing; people who live in rural area as well as big cities benefit from public health nursing. Public health nurses do not have to work in a hospital. They can work in clinics, health departments, and offices. The types of education and programs they can provide to the public are virtually limitless. They can do vaccinations for children, childhood well baby exams, and HIV and AIDS counseling and preventative teaching. They can teach child birth and Lamaze classes to expectant parents. They can also teach CPR classes to lay persons. They can initiate programs to give free or inexpensive influenza vaccines. Community health nurses can also work with school age children and teenagers to do scoliosis screening, talk about behavioral health and depression, sexual health, teen pregnancy, and do any number of screening exams. This is helpful to students and can open the door of communication between child and parent for more discussions and questions about various topics. Teachers also benefit from this type of community program; often teachers feel not able to answer student's health related questions and appreciate the help of another professional in broaching often difficult subjects. Public health nurses who work for government agencies sometimes evaluate and treat patients, but they can also do epidemiologic studies on the spread of illnesses and disease. Since a public health nurse focuses on prevention, these types of studies are crucial in determining who is being affected by a disease or illness and the best means of preventing the spread of it in this population. This is how public programs are established. Home visits are sometimes part of the community health nurse's job. She might make home visits to do patient teaching about a specific illness. She also can do home visits to evaluate an elderly person's home environment or a new baby's transition home with his or her mother. These types of visits not only are evaluations of a patient's surroundings but they are also an excellent opportunity for the community health nurse to teach the patient in the place they are most comfortable: their home.
Leadership is a big part of community health nursing. This type of nurse needs to be able to identify learning needs and implement programs to teach preventative health often to large groups of people. Program planning and implementation is important. The community health nurse often has to obtain state or federal funding for these types of programs, and has to learn to communicate with other health care professionals about what the goals for her programs include.
Most people come into contact with a public health nurse at some point during their lives. Because preventative health is constantly evolving, community health nurses always have the opportunity to educate the public about new things. Public health nursing is an integral part of the health care system.
Published: 2009-11-03
