The Role of a Nurse in Health Care Promotion
Introduction
Health care promotion refers to the process of enabling individuals take more control and better care of their health. Health goes beyond physical wellbeing. It includes a situation where even the emotional and mental wellbeing are existent. Achieving of optimal health across populations is would require that all individuals be equipped appropriately to maintain their own health and that of their households. Collectively, this would translate to healthier population. Our environment is evolving, and it is very different from the way it was a century ago. The evolving process is anticipated to continue this time at a higher rate. With the changes in our environment, health determinants and dynamics also change. Health and wellbeing cannot be attributed to one single factor but rather to an interaction of several factors. Cognisant of this, an international conference on health promotion was held for the first time in 1986 at Ottawa, Canada. The main agenda was health promotion. The conference came up with five main strategies that can be used to promote health with the aim of achieving health and well being of all people by the year 2000 and beyond. The nurse plays a pivotal role in offering health care and improving the quality of living. For this reason, a nurse can be instrumental in promoting health. This essay will discuss the role of a nurse in the five main strategies of promoting health identified in the Ottawa charter for health promotion. Specifically, the role of a nurse in health promotion of cancer will be discussed. Cancer is one of the main chronic illnesses in our contemporary society. It claims many lives each year and health promotion would potentially reduce the cases of cancer (Baum, 2016).
Build Healthy Public Policy
Building healthy public policy implies a situation where the policy makers have health in mind when formulating policies. This should be done at all sectors and at all levels to ensure that policies promote health. Ensuring that health is considered when formulating policies will avoid making policies that may have negative repercussions on health. The nurse can play a great role in ensuring that public policy is healthy and promotes an environment free of cancer. One way is through advisory role. There are nurses who are directly involved in policy formulation. A nurse has great wealth of knowledge about cancer and its risk factors. For this reason, they would be able to give advice accordingly to ensure an environment that does not favour cancer. For instance, excessive consumption of sugar has been associated with development of some types of cancer. The nurse can advise that a higher tax be imposed on sugar to make it more expensive to access. This would mean that even the manufacturers of sweetened products would have to sell their products a higher cost. This is likely to lead to less consumption of sugar due to lowered purchasing power (Whitney and Rolfes, 2018). this would potentially lower the cases of cancer in the long run. A nurse can also make a recommendation through their seniors and request them to make it to the policy makers.
Create Supportive Environments
Creating supportive environment is a strategy that is cognisant of the fact that the way we interact with our environment influences our health. The environment is greatly changing. Take for example, the great technological advancement. Due to technology, it is possible for one to drive all the way to work and back, or even work at home using computers. The can contribute to creating supportive environments prevention of cancer in several ways. One is informing her clients about cancer and prevention strategies. Another is through forming and maintaining helping relationships with their cancer patients. These patients require great support and the nurse can be instrumental in empathizing with them and ensuring they have the highest attainable quality of care. The main aim through which nurses can create supportive environments for cancer is through their professionalism. There are numerous dynamics to consider when it comes to creating supportive environments for cancer. An environment that favours health diets for instance have been found to lower cancer risk. While the nurse may not have control over the entire environmental factors, they can play their part as health professionals. For instance, they may educate people on strategies for lowering the risk of cancer. This would probably shape positive health behaviours. Another great way through which nurses can create supportive environment is advocating support from peers and cancer support agencies. This involves linking persons who are suffering from cancer to community support groups.
Strengthen Community Actions
This strategy appreciates the fact that when people come together and make unanimous decision for the common good, then success is more imminent. If communities were to take actions aimed at improving their health, there are higher chances for achievement of optimal health than when this is no the case. The nurse can play a pivotal role in strengthening community actions. For instance, they may develop community outreaches and campaigns to educate the community about the risk factors and prevention for cancer. This offers the community one of the most powerful tools for health promotion (health knowledge). This knowledge has the likelihood of shaping positive health attitudes which might translate to positive practices (Naidoo and Wills, 2016). This would significantly reduce cancer cases.
Develop Personal Skills
This implies equipping individuals with skills necessary for maintenance of optimal health and wellbeing throughout the lifecycle. If individuals have these skills, the likelihood of them achieving better health is higher (Edelman, Mandle and Kudzma, 2017). The skills would also help in minimizing the probability of developing a chronic disease. Just like the previous strategy the main role of a nurse would be offering of education. This can be done mainly through the health care facilities since nurses spend most of their time there. Occasionally, the nurse could mobilise the other health care professionals to carry out a community health education campaign about cancer. As indicated in the previous section, health knowledge is a powerful tool for shaping attitudes towards health and may lead to practices that promote health. During the outreaches, the nurse should include different members of the health care team since cancer has different dimensions. For instance, going along with a dietitian would be necessary to educate the community about the diet strategies that one can use to prevent or manage cancer.
Reorient Health Services
Reorienting health services implies creating a healthcare environment that appreciates the different factors that contribute to health care and wellbeing. For instance, the culture of a community could be affecting health in a certain way. This may be positive or negative. A nurse could be very instrumental in reorienting health services. One way would be through being aware that people come from different cultures and backgrounds and that these should be respected during offering of care. In a case where such a factor as cultural is related to a higher risk of cancer, the nurse can find for kind ways of requesting the patient to change for the best interest of their health. Another way through which a nurse may contribute to reorienting health services in far as cancer is concerned, is keeping themselves updated with the most current developments in cancer research. This would enable them offer high quality care. Nurses could also engage in cancer research to help answer some cancer questions scientifically. There is a lot that is still to be uncovered about cancer and such a move would likely lead to new findings that would help in health promotion (Stewart and Wild, 2017).
Conclusion
Health promotion refers to equipping individuals with the skills necessary to maintain their health at optimum. Optimal health care goes beyond physical well being to include emotional and mental wellbeing. There are numerous factors that come together to shape health of individuals, communities and populations. Due to the changing environmental factors such as advancement in technology, factors affecting health are also changing. The first international conference on health promotion was held at Ottawa, Canada in 1986. It came up with five main strategies to promote health with the aim of achieving optimal health for all people by year 200 and beyond. Cancer is a chronic illness that involves abnormal division of cells. It claims the lives of thousands of people every year around the globe. The nurse could be instrumental in health promotion for cancer. A nurse may achieve this through advisory role in policy formulation, educating persons about risk factors and prevention strategies for cancer, keeping themselves updated with the current developments in cancer research to offer high quality care and through engaging in cancer research. Engaging in research would contribute to the body of knowledge which consequently improves the quality of care. The nurse should also appreciate the fact that several factors such as culture and personal beliefs shape the health of a person.
References
Baum, F. (2016). The new public health (No. Ed. 4). Oxford University Press.
Edelman, C. L., Mandle, C. L., & Kudzma, E. C. (2017). Health Promotion Throughout the Life Span-E-Book. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Naidoo, J., & Wills, J. (2016). Foundations for Health Promotion-E-Book. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Stewart, B. W. K. P., & Wild, C. P. (2017). World cancer report 2014. Health.
Whitney, E. N., & Rolfes, S. R. (2018). Understanding nutrition. Cengage Learning.
