Health Care and Nursing as the Medical

¶ … Health Care and Nursing

As the medical profession gains a greater understanding of the various approaches to healthcare delivery, the concept of segmenting the services proscribed to a patient into primary, secondary, and tertiary care has emerged as one of the most useful advancements in the field. The preventative measures advocated by proponents of primary health care (PHC) are designed to improve a patient's quality of life in such a way as to reduce or eliminate their prospects of becoming ill or injured. Among the fundamental precepts of PHC are the administration of immunizations to guard against viruses and other contagious infections, the development of a nutritious daily diet to improve the body's natural immune defenses, and advisements to refrain from smoking tobacco or drinking alcohol to excess. As it pertains to the nursing profession, PHC involves "the delivery of comprehensive coordinated, continuous and individualized total patient care through the professional nurse who has autonomy, accountability and authority on a 24 hours basis" (Hodgkinson, 1990). A primary nurse (PN) is thus responsible for administering capable and competent healthcare services to a group of patients throughout the duration of their inpatient care, as opposed to the team nursing concept which allows a single nurse to conduct only the predetermined set of tests and procedures to which they are assigned.

The Canadian Nurses Association recently identified a series of five guiding principles to be applied comprehensively to the PHC approach, consisting of Accessibility, Public Participation, Health Promotion, Appropriate Technology, Intersectoral Cooperation (Canadian Nurses Association, 2005). The principle of accessibility assures that a healthcare provider maintains a consistent and constant supply of equipment, medication, and other essential services which can be efficiently delivered throughout a community without unnecessary restriction from geographical or financial obstacles. Encouraging public participation is a natural extension of the relationship between healthcare provider and patient, in which both parties are equally capable of providing input that will be integrated into the overall care delivery model. One of the most important guiding principles of PHC is known as health promotion, a relatively novel concept which enables patients to exert control over their own health outcomes, through an improved diet, physical exercise, avoiding poor health habits, and other preventative measures. Utilizing appropriate technology to improve diagnostic processes and to identify risk factors is a sensible method to ensure that patients receiving PHC are afforded every modern healthcare advantage. When intersectoral cooperation is achieved throughout a health center or hospital, patients are inevitably afforded a higher chance of recovery because every segment of their inpatient care is synchronized to ensure maximum efficiency.