Advocacy In Nursing

We live in an era of rapid technological change, and this environment, undoubtfully changes the human health. Diabetes is one of the most widespread diseases, unfortunately. Therefore, there is a pressing need to inform people about healthy ways of living and a caring approach to their health. The American Diabetes Association (ADA) is one of the organizations that try, to prevent diabetes and raise awareness on the disease in the US and around the world. Unfortunately, it has a set of weaknesses, which influence not only the work of the organization, but the general public’s opinion of it as well.

Diabetes has recently become a focal point of health care systems around the world due to its high prevalence and the severity of secondary complications caused by the disease. Over the course of my project on diabetes, I have had the opportunity to speak with a group of diabetics to understand from a patient’s perspective how diabetes is managed in a rural community. While I found that while some patients ignored treatment and refused to make any dietary changes, the majority of the patients I interviewed were well-informed and actively managing diabetes in their everyday life.

Nurses rely on personal knowledge and their professional skills to provide ethical care (Creasia & Friberg, 2011). In everyday practice, nurses must balance the needs of their patients against those of the organization, society and themselves. They strive to deliver the highest level of care for patients, but adjusting for limited organizational and personal resources often requires difficult decisions. This paper explores the following scenario suggested by Maville and Huerta: “You are a nurse providing home care to a mother, and you suspect child abuse after observing the mother’s reaction to her child” (as cited by Arizona State University, 2014). When faced with a moral dilemma, a competent nurse incorporates ethical, bioethical and legal considerations. In the proposed story, incorporating the nursing ethics of advocacy, beneficence, nonmaleficence and collaboration will guide the nurse towards an appropriate and legal course of action.

The four spheres of political action in nursing as mentioned by Mason, Leavitt, and Chaffee (2011) includes the workplace or workforce, the government, the organizations, and the community. The authors further stated that although the four spheres overlap at times, the action performed in any one of these spheres can cause a reaction in any of the others. Nurses are a part of the community in which they live and can influence health and social policy within their workplace, which can have a profound impact on the organization. Furthermore, the government can pass health care policies, which in turn causes the organization to change their policy. Thus, affecting healthcare providers in the workplace and the community at large. An example of

Several nationwide programs and incentives were administered in the last couple of decades to promote awareness of diabetes and hopefully help prevent millions of Americans from developing diabetes. Health Agencies, such as World Health Organization (WHO) and Center of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), have developed objectives to tackle diabetes. Some of these objectives include conducting surveillance and obtaining diabetes data to identify trends in the population, spreading awareness about the condition, and developing programs that will enhance diabetes care and ensure the longevity of the patients. Various programs have been developed but while some excel, others fail to benefit the lives of the patient.

The rate of diabetes in the United States is one of the highest compared to other developed countries. An estimate of 9.3% of the population have diabetes, of those with diabetes 27.8% have yet to be diagnosed (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2014). This means that approximately 8.1 million people are currently living with diabetes, but are unaware of it. As of 2012, 12.3% of people with diabetes were 20 years old or older, the largest population diagnosed with diabetes were adults 65 years old or older. 25.9% of this population lives with diabetes (CDC, 2014). On a national level, the CDC have launched initiatives that focus on prevention and disease management. The National Diabetes Prevention Program is an example of one such initiative. This program focuses on lifestyle changes,

Dominique presented on Population Health Management and Standardized Care in Type 2 Diabetes. The meeting was held November 1st at 3:00-4:00pm in the Corporate Auditorium at Centura Health Corporate Building. The concentration of her presentation was based on Figure 2 and Figure 2 maps. Figure 1 represents the increase shade of blue proportional to the increase of percentage being told they had diabetes (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,

1. In what sense is nursing a political act? How can professional nurse be activist? Discuss these questions and provide examples of political activism to illustrate your points.

The target audience at this time is business and other health care professionals as the need to have nurses recognized as assets to the fast moving execution of electronic systems in health care, soon to replace paper, is urgent. If more nurses are not involved in this process as expert consultants, there is a high risk of failure and inevitably patient safety. I will not directly target the public but indirectly as I believe once health care and business professionals view nurses as experts in our profession overall, then their perceptions and opinions will reach the public. The obstacle will be persuading those with little health care understanding just how nursing can be affective. Business leaders are all about deliverables, making sure they are provided. How the product is packaged is not of great concern; patient safety is not a term truly understood by non-clinical analysts and project managers. Within eHealth in general, the organizational structure from top down holds minimal if any clinical knowledge beyond the high level business of healthcare.

need for increased understanding of the economic, and societal seriousness of diabetes and its complications, and of the escalating costs to individuals, families, workplaces, society and governments.

Everyday nurses encounter situations in the workplace and frequently find themselves in the role for advocate for both patients and staff. Advocacy is a process used to facilitate growth in others and provide others with the information that empowers them to make their own decisions. While advocating nurses main focus remains on supporting decision making rather than making decision for others (Grand Canyon University, 2011).

My teaching on primary prevention of type II diabetes adheres to HP2020 objectives D-1 to D-16 on diabetes, specifically objective D-1 that deals with reducing the annual number of new cases of diagnosed diabetes in the population. (Target is a 10% improvement from the baseline of 8.0 new cases of diabetes per 1,000 population aged 18 to 84 years occurred in the past 12 months to the target of 7.2 new cases per 1,000 population aged 18 to 84 years). Education on the preventive measures needed to be taken by an at-risk population tackles this issue of reducing the annual number of cases.

We hear nurse’s talk about how rewarding their profession is but what they seldom talk about is how it can be very challenging as well. There seems to be many issues existing in the nursing profession. One of the most affective issues in nursing is the decreasing number of staff nurses. With inadequate staffing, nurses are demanded to have more responsibilities thus causing more stress on the nurse. This increase in responsibility causes nurses to neglect many aspects of their patients’ care. Patient care is suffering from the shortage of nurses as there is an increase in adverse patient outcomes due to the shortage. Also, there is evidence that there is a positive relationship between the number of staff and the effectiveness of their teamwork. The more staff available the more likely nurses will work together as a team. A new act is being implemented to help with the nursing shortage. This act is called the National Nursing Shortage Reform and Patient Advocacy Act. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of nursing shortage and how the National Nursing Shortage Reform and Patient Advocacy Act is an example of evidence-based practice.

Nurses work in a challenge work setting; therefore, nurses must recognize the current issues of the facility and health care system as well as comprehend and utilize the optimal advocacy strategies to be successful and accountable professionals. American Nurse Association (ANA) provides five resources for workforce advocacy programs which include:

Health objectives and campaigns are designed to set the foundation for addressing health care issues prevalent across the nation. Diabetes is a disease that affects millions of people. Due to the complications that can often go along with diabetes, public health policies are implemented to clarify issues that will improve the health of individuals. As presented in the health campaign part one, there are numerous government agencies, which exploit health information on federal, state, and local levels to develop policies and allocate resources to programs and necessary organizations. Many models and systems are used to manage diabetes and bring forth