When I started my nursing course, I came across some learning objectives that would help me prepare for my nursing career. One of the course objectives was to examine the philosophy, goals, past, present, and emerging roles of community-oriented nursing practice. I met this objective through familiarizing myself with the historical development of community health nursing from the early home care practices and incorporating modern approaches to make this care effective. Educating myself about relevant legislation affecting community health was another way I achieved the objective of keeping myself up to date with emerging roles of the practice.
Another learning objective was applying a systematic approach to defining the concept of the community as a client and assessing and analyzing community health status and risks. This is an objective that I met by using quantitative and qualitative data on community health. Based on the data, I could analyze the population demographics affected, and this was helpful in the development of population-based objectives for the prevention and treatment of diseases. Using recent scholarly articles was an evidence-based practice that I also felt helped me meet the aim of analyzing community health status and potential risks. I think this would be instrumental in helping me develop a community health program.
Another course objective was to analyze family health, health risks, health promotion, and disease prevention strategies across the lifespan. I think that meeting this objective was an essential aspect that would affect the policy-making part of my nursing career. I used data-based approaches to analyze potential health risks among different population segments to meet this goal. I was also able to use this approach to identify the most at-risk groups for various physical and mental health problems. Attaining relevant data is essential, being it would be a tool used to develop a community health policy and discuss the implications of government policies on community health.
The most challenging aspect of this coursework was time. I felt that the schedules were hectic and I had limited time for other activities. Due to the nature of this course, I engaged in practical and theoretical work that was taking a lot of my time, and I ended up having minimal time for other aspects of my life. I was, however, able to face this challenge by having a better time management schedule. I also started a practice of doing activities that were of little value when I was tired. When I was energetic, I mainly focused on my coursework, which made me complete tasks faster and effectively manage my time. In addition, I timed specific activities and came up with a personal schedule. I used my phone for scheduling, and I think solving the time management challenge will help me solve problems within my future workplace using instinct and logic.
This course is instrumental in my career as a social service worker because it offers the necessary skills to assess clients. As a result of this course, I would use systemic approaches to analyze the extent of various problems in the community and create a management plan (Quinn, Ghaziri, & Knight, 2019). Knowing the past trends and the present state of health in the community would also be instrumental in helping me predict future trends. Predicting future trends will help me develop helpful community policy, which is essential in my career.
Reference
Quinn, B. L., El Ghaziri, M., & Knight, M. (2019). Incorporating social justice, community partnerships, and student engagement in community health nursing courses. Teaching and Learning in Nursing, 14(3), 183–185. Web.