Health Education and Community Health

Health Education and Community Health

Rapid social and economic growth in countries of the world has resulted in an increase both in the number of elderly people who are prone to degenerative and chronic diseases, and new patterns of illnesses that are brought on by social and economic factors such as occupational hazards, accidents, and environmental poisonings caused by air pollution, noise and contaminated
water. Communities are struggling with a large number of people across the lifespan, who receive minimal or no health care because they cannot afford or access services. Moreover, public concerns regarding quality, cost, access and fragmentation of health care have contributed to a shift in care from the more traditional acute care settings to the community. This has led to changes in nursing practice.
Nurses have always cared for individuals, families and communities in their practice. Recently, there has been an increase in the number of nurses working outside the hospital, primarily in community-based settings that focus on individuals and families.
There is also increasing emphasis on community focused nursing care with the community as the client. The population of ageing and chronically ill patients is increasing, and, coupled with the complex social conditions of today, has led to ill-health, which increases hospital care expenses.
Professional health services are not capable of meeting the ever-increasing demands of health care in this changing health culture Evidence suggests that increasing attention to healthy lifestyles and healthy behaviours prevents health problems and reduces health risk and threats.
Strengthening the community health-care system based on primary health care is thus the focus of health-care reform. Practically and preferably, professional nursing services focusing on providing health care and services to the entire community is an ideal solution to meeting the demands of community health care. Confronted with changing health-care systems and needs, nursing educators must now visualize nursing and nursing education from a different perspective. Students must be prepared to meet the needs of populations rather than institutions.
They must form new partnerships in the community if they are to be prepared for health care in the next century, giving health back to the home and community. In many nursing programmes, educators have tried to adjust to this change by increasing the amount of time that nursing students have to spend in the community.
Some nursing programmes have modified the course design of community health nursing education in the baccalaureate curriculum. The focus of teaching of such diverse course designs ranges from individuals, to families, to groups and populations.
As we move forward toward to ensure that knowledgeable and capable nurses work in the community health-care system, we must make efforts to strive for solutions to many tough questions in advancing nursing education.
What are the functions and areas of work of community health nursing in our community health-care system? How do educators best illustrate community health nursing functions and areas of work as learning phenomena for students? How can students be effectively educated to perform community health nursing functions competently? What are the settings in which good practices/best practices in community health nursing are implemented? How do workers develop such good practices/ best practices? What will be the mainstream knowledge that forms the basis of practice in community health nursing? How do educators develop such essential knowledge to ground education in community health nursing?