Community Nurse Description

Community nurses, also called public health nurses, are health care professionals who work outside of hospital settings in order to serve in communities. They focus on helping families, populations and communities by working in community clinics, schools and houses to provide health care to those outside the mainstream health care system.

History

• The first community nursing organization was founded in 1893 in New York City. The Henry Street Settlement house was founded by Lillian Wald to provide health care for the poor and working class residents of the city.

  Community nurses worked not only in settlement houses, but traveled to the tenement houses and climbed several flights of stairs to go door to door to provide health care for the poor. There service provided much-needed care in an age when few could afford health care or even had access to hospitals.

  Early community nursing programs were usually founded by women and were among the first major organization started by entrepreneurial women.

Function of Community Nursing

• Community nurses provide the basics of health care to populations outside the mainstream health care system of society. People are often uninsured and not informed about their health or access to free or low-cost health services.

  Community nurses evaluate health needs of underserved populations and work with local groups to evaluate the needs and provide information to those communities about their health care options. The community nurse provides primary care, care management and connects communities to other health care resources.

Training and Education

• A community nurse must be trained in areas beyond the basic discipline of nursing. In addition to getting their registered nursing certification, community nurses study public health with a primary focus on population level care.

Benefits to Public Health

• By taking a population wide approach to public health problem, community nurses address widespread health issues. Community nurses can address common problems in nutrition and weight, environmental health problems and substance abuse as well as notice the first signs of contagious disease outbreaks.

  By focusing on particular communities such as the poor, minority groups or the elderly, community nurses can focus limited resources to the most pressing health concerns of that population.

Limitations

• Community nurses provide health care where it might otherwise be unavailable, but limited resources prevent providing the comprehensive care a hospital system could. Limited time and resources and the broad population-wide focus mean that not all health problems can be addressed or noticed. Specialized health services must be referred out of the community nurse program, and options may be limited.