Global Health Themes

We live in a country where all children go to school to gain an education and 25% of them will go onto receive some type of college degree. Compare this to low-income countries, in which children are 16 times as likely to die prior to their fifth birthday (Nickitas, Middaugh & Aries, 2016). Beyond the lens of our smartphones, Facebook friends and Nike sneakers is a world full of desperate people wishing to have enough food to eat for today. Many parts of the world lack sanitation, safe housing, sparse medical care and no medication. The global health issue are everyone’s problems not only for the sake of altruism but, with the increase in global travel for routine business and pleasure, dangerous pathogen are no longer confine by boarders. The Ebola outbreak four years ago, proved the necessity of a global solution to global health issues. The collaborative practice of several world health agencies and economically developed countries along with the use of volunteers, statistical updates, the latest literature and practices kept this outbreak mostly contained to its region of origin and the death toll to approximately 11,000 people (mainly in West Africa) (WHO,

“Without a lifespan view of women’s health… we are unlikely to be successful in advancing women’s health” (Woods 2009, pg. 400). A Global Health Imperative (2009) by author Nancy Fugate Woods explains the issues about health status and opportunities for the health of girl-children world-wide, which includes sex and gender disparities. Girl and women’s health is important, but just not as important as men’s health. Woods gives example of women’s health issues that are extremely serious. “Health issues or problems that occur predominantly in women are breast cancer and menopause” (Woods 2009, pg. 400). Women all over the world have the risk of getting breast cancer, HIV and Aids. Women that are affected by these diseases in some countries may

Globalization involves the movement of people, food, goods from one place to another. And in the process of countries integrating, people and goods move from one location to another. In as much as there is positive impact for people, goods and services to move from one country to another. There are chances that the people, goods and service in a county can be infected and taken across the border to another country. In the course of globalization people move from one country to another and they might have contacted diseases or the product that they are carrying across the border. Diseases such as AIDs, tuberculosis, malaria are the top among the list of the disease that is usually carried by people. But just as globalization increases the frequency and ease with which diseases can move around the world, it also can improve access to the medicines, medical information, and training that can help treat or cure these diseases. Drug companies and governments now have the ability to ship drugs to remote parts of the world affected by outbreaks of diseases. There are various options that can be used to lower the spread of global disease. Most countries usually have screening borders to check the people, food and

Why do you want to participate in this global health trip? What are your goals, both personally and for the two-week trip as well as after the trip?

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is the principal government agency in the United States working to improve the health of all Americans despite their economic, social and educational status. HHS has identified three national goals of global health, including strengthen health care, advance scientific knowledge and innovation, and advance the health, safety and well-being of Americans (Secretary, 2014). The first goal to strengthen healthcare refers to HHS's push in making health insurance affordable for all Americans. This will increase access to preventative care as well as ensuring assess to high quality, culturally competent care. This goal focuses on improving transitions in care across the continuum, which in

Canada is the second largest country by total area in the world, extending from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean and north into the Arctic Ocean. Canada has ten Provinces and three Territories, bordering the United States on the South and Northwest sides. Ottawa is Canada capital city located in Ontario. Canada became its own country July 1, 1867 with the creation of the Constitution Act. Currently, Canada is home to a little over 36 million people, ranking as the 38th most populated country in the world.

When analyzing the global health care crisis, one should pay particular attention of the problem from both the macro and micro scale. Overlooking either side of the issue wastes both valuable time and resources during an era that cannot afford such loss. Some argue that health care is a fight that politicians must win to enact change. Others say the crisis is simply another economic matter that will eventually resolve itself under the theories of supply and demand. When we look at these explanations without seriously considering the issues that arise in the microcosm, we expose ourselves to moral hazard. In Banker to the Poor (1), Nobelaureate Muhammad Yunus describes how a great deal of change can result from looking at the problem from a

The worldview an individual holds is weighted and manipulated by the experiences, morals/values, customs, and aspects individuals develop during life. Through these factors and more, a person's worldview differentiates from another. This then creates principles, questions, views, and cultures that are/can be shared by communities and society as a whole. In a simpler context of words, a person's worldview is the way they see the world, and how this perspective shapes the way a person lives. When transferring these fundamental aspects to my own life, I am then able to expand the effect in relation to how it guides my ability to work in Global Health. This established awareness then allows me to modify my attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors in order to further my acceptance of others.

Given the magnitude of health costs, both financial and in terms of human suffering, it is essential that preventive interventions be developed and/or enhanced. Nurses, physicians, and other helping professionals are in a good position, by virtue of their training, to add to such preventive efforts. Health is defined as a condition of physical, mental, and social well being and the absence of disease or other abnormal condition. It is not a static condition; constant change and adaptation to stress result in homeostasis (Mosby's Medical and Nursing Dictionary, 1994 p. 742). The fact that we can improve our health and extend our lives by changing our behaviors (i.e., eating well, exercising, not smoking, and

The world faced a stark reality at the turn of the century. Amidst unprecedented new wealth and powerful new technologies, millions were still getting sick and dying from diseases and life expectancies were actually falling. Therefore, in September 2000, 189 country representatives adopted the Millennium Development Goals to focus on time limited commitments to reduce poverty and promote human development in order to reduce child mortality, improve maternal health, combat HIV/AIDs, malaria and other disease by 2015.(WHO, 2008). The challenge for meeting this deadline of goals was perceived as emergent and had a powerful effect for transforming the long-standing problem of global public health. It was perceived that globalization was putting the social cohesiveness of many countries under stress and that the health systems as key constituents of our contemporary societies were clearly not performing as well as they could and should.

My passion for global health stems from my experiences as a child. Growing up as a child of Mexican immigrants to the United States, I had the opportunity to visit family members in southern Mexico every few years. While I savored reconnecting with relatives, my awareness of inequalities bolstered with each visit. My relatives live in rural areas where economic adversity is persistent and access to quality healthcare is sparse. Contrasting my relatives’ experiences and opportunities with my own exemplified to me how one’s life is shaped by economic conditions, healthcare access, education systems, and one’s birthplace.

Health is a complex concept, and global health adds to this complexity. When I think of health as a concept, I view it as being absent of disease. This understanding is a very biomedical approach to health and is a very narrow viewpoint of health. According to the World Health Organization (1948), health is defined as a “state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (a cited by Jacobsen p. 2). This definition does give a better understanding of what health is from a broader perspective. At the University of Victoria’s Global Health class, I have become to understand better the WHO’s definition and that it is linked to the social determinants of health. In this paper, I will reflect and analyze the learning that occurred for myself while taking the Global Health class, and how this knowledge has helped my nursing practice evolve at the local and international level.

The “Global Health Ethics for Students” reading provides different important points. What I would emphasize from this reading is that the case example must be read first, followed by the introduction and different sections of the paper. At the end, the reader must understand the case resolution and reasons why the medical student in this example decided to learn more about global health work before going to work to South Africa. The main principles discussed in this reading are humility, introspection, solidarity and social justice. How these need to be present in a medical student volunteering abroad, and how all global clinical and research health work must follow the idea of: think action, think local and think long term, for the sake of the trainee and of the patients.

foundations, with the exception of Beattie’s (1991) framework, which enables an explicit analysis of power and control in the context of the nurse-patient relationship (Naidoo and Wills, 2000)

"The failure to engage in the fight to anticipate, prevent, and ameliorate global health problems would diminish America's stature in the realm of health and jeopardize our own 
health, economy, and national security, " stated by The Institute of Medicine. Global health refers to health phenomenon that transcends across national borders. For instance, global health would address predicaments such as: infectious and insect-borne diseases that can spread from one country to another. Thus, global health should be addressed by collaborative actions and solutions. On the other hand, countries tend to focus on other essential issues that are occurring in the present day and therefore, overlook the global health issue. Some issues that countries