Normally a nurse handles one patient at a time, but public health nursing involves taking care of an entire population. By taking a different approach; getting involved in communities regarding health and safety issues, a public health nurse approaches nursing from a macro perspective instead of a micro perspective.
Just consider some of the things that these nurses do; from educating populations regarding health concerns (such as clean drinking water and contraception) to improving a community’s awareness of safety issues (such as wearing helmets when riding bicycles or how to identify homes that contain lead paint), to helping those in a particular community obtain access to health care, medicines and other necessary health related care, a nurse who takes up this particular branch of nursing definitely has their work cut out from them.
Just imagine being able to move from monitoring health trends in order to identify risk factors for a particular community, or setting priorities for local health interventions for specific communities or even designing and implementing health and education programs and campaigns that can make a significant impact on the health, safety and wellness of a community; public health nursing definitely isn’t for the faint of heart.
The ideal candidate for this job not only has a love of people and a desire to help them from a medical point of view, but they should also have a well-defined sense of justice and a desire for equality for everyone. On top of this, they should also have the kind of disposition and personality that can take on a project, break it down into small, manageable parts and see that it gets done, for many of the projects you will be faced with are long term projects that require a great deal of organization and management.
Above all, however, a nurse who chooses to work in this field needs to be able to treat each and every person that they come in contact with as deserving of their time and attention, for they will most often be required to work with low income individuals and families in under-served communities, for that is where the most need for this kind of help is.
Even for those who have no problem with working with individuals from all walks of life and ethnic backgrounds, this particular career can be the ultimate challenge. Not only are you dealing with a multitude of health issues, you also have to take into account the patients genetics, their lifestyles, even the environment that they are exposed to and required to deal with on a daily basis. The decisions for the community are made only after analyzing large segments of the population and deciding what would be the best choice for everyone concerned; what kinds of programs would offer the greatest benefit for the largest number of people.
But it isn’t all about the community; you will also be working with plenty of individuals on a personal basis. Indeed, for some communities the nurses who serve in this capacity are the only access to health care that many of them have. Sometimes they are the only one who can give these communities preventative care, screening services, immunization services or even education on health-related issues such as sex education and well-baby care.
In order to become a public health nurse one must, of course, become a registered nurse. However, instead of opting to take courses in, say, pediatrics or surgical medicine, those who want to work in these sorts of communities would take more sociology and psychology courses so as to be able to focus on issues that arise in these specific sorts of areas.
It is good to keep in mind that working conditions for this sort of job are not the best. You will be continually required to work in difficult circumstances and deal with some of the most complex issues imaginable, but for the individual who is truly dedicated to making the world a better place, public health nursing can be the challenge of a lifetime.
