Introduction
Communicable diseases pose a significant danger to public health due to the peculiarities of their transmission. It is critical to stop the inflection chain to prevent its transmission from one individual to another at any stage. Otherwise, the number of infected people increases significantly, leading to an epidemic in society.
Influenza is an example of a communicable disease, and its epidemic happens annually. Even though many people disregard the severity of influenza, thinking that it is not dangerous, the consequences of the illness are serious. In this paper, Pender’s health promotion model is applied to the analysis of the concepts of epidemiology, using the example of influenza. It is possible to state that informing the population about the peculiarities connected with the communicable nature of influenza can decrease the damage it causes.
General Description
Influenza is one of the most widespread communicable diseases that endanger community health. It is caused by the virus, which determines the symptoms and the mode of the disease transmission. In particular, the onset of influenza is always sudden, which makes it different from the common cold (Ryu & Cowling, 2021).
The typical symptoms include high temperature, coughing, headache and fatigue, muscle pain, sore throat, and runny nose (Ryu & Cowling, 2021). The first symptoms usually appear two days after exposure to the virus. In some cases, the onset of influenza can last for 8 days (Ryu & Cowling, 2021).
The critical detail is that there are severe complications of influenza, including meningitis, cardiovascular disease, lung inflammation, pneumonia, and asthma (Ryu & Cowling, 2021). The transmission type of the virus is the airway, and the inflected droplets that people produce while sneezing or coughing that remain in the air or on surfaces and objects are the source of contamination (Ryu & Cowling, 2021). Therefore, these characteristics show that influenza is a reportable disease transmitted from one person to another.
All people are susceptible to influenza, and the difference is in the ability of the particular individual to oppose the infection. The immunity level of the individual is critical in this situation, and people with immunity problems usually have severe complications (Javanian et al., 2021). There are approximately 300.000 to 650.000 deaths from influenza annually (Javanian et al., 2021).
The therapy for this disease includes antiviral drugs and medication to reduce the symptoms of the infection, including coughing or running nose (Javanian et al., 2021). The total number of people exposed to influenza annually is nearly 15% of the entire population (Javanian et al., 2021). The epidemics usually happen in winter when people’s immunity is lower (Javanian et al., 2021). In all cases, influenza is a widespread reportable disease, and people from high-risk groups, including elderly individuals, children, and people with chronic conditions, are endangered by it.
Social Determinants Connected with Influenza
Social determinants of health, including socioeconomic status and demographic characteristics, contribute to the development of influenza and its complications. Poverty and challenging living conditions lead to the inability of the person to receive timely medical help to provide themselves with the appropriate diet, which leads to a weakened immune system (Park & Ryu, 2018). These people also have low access to vaccination, which aggravates the negative consequences of influenza (Park & Ryu, 2018).
Demographic characteristics are also critical determinants in this case, as mentioned earlier. Children, older adults, and individuals with a chronic diagnosis have significantly higher risks of the adverse consequences of influenza with a high level of morbidity (Park & Ryu, 2018). In addition, demographic characteristics such as race are also connected with the higher risks of influenza. For instance, ethnic minorities tend to have a lower socioeconomic level and worse vaccination access, affecting the statistics (Park & Ryu, 2018). Social determinants of health, including the ability of the person to lead a healthy lifestyle and to afford medication and vaccination, are equally important as the immunity status of the individual.
Epidemiological Triangle
The concept of the epidemiologic triangle is the basis of understanding the mechanisms of influenza transmission. As a specific communicable disease, influenza has its host factor, which is the inflected individual; agent factor, which is the virus that causes the disease; and environmental factors, which include the factors that lead to the virus’ transmission (Nypaver et al., 2021). Understanding the elements of the epidemiological triangle allows people to avoid the most obvious ways of contamination. For example, they can avoid visiting public places, especially crowds, when their immunity is low. They can also improve their hand hygiene to avoid contamination with the virus.
The host, in the case of influenza, is the contaminated human. The virus that causes influenza has several types, ranging from A to D (Nypaver et al., 2021). The infection is replicated in the organism of the ill person, and it has an airborne way of spreading (Nypaver et al., 2021).
The environment leading to the virus’s rapid spread includes the appropriate climate. For instance, the epidemics of influenza in places where winter is cold are high due to the lower immunity level of most people in the region (Nypaver et al., 2021). Crowded places, including schools, are also a positive environment for the spread of influenza (Nypaver et al., 2021). Individuals with low immunity cannot oppose the virus in such places, which leads to their contamination and makes influenza especially dangerous for vulnerable demographic groups (Nypaver et al., 2021). Understanding these peculiarities allows people to reduce the number of people infected with influenza and save the community’s health.
Community Role
Educating the public on methods to avoid contracting influenza and care for themselves is the main responsibility of the community health nurse. Connecting this responsibility with the self-care nursing model articulated by Nola J. Pender is possible (Chen & Hsieh, 2021). In her view, the absence of adequate promotion of knowledge about the disease and the ways of its prevention leads to more cases of infection (Chen & Hsieh, 2021). It also contributes to the higher number of people who suffer from the complications of the disease because they do not know how to cope with their health state.
Pender’s health promotion model is multidimensional, which means that it not only focuses on the need to treat the disease with medication but also to increase public competency about their health (Chen & Hsieh, 2021). This perspective supposes that after the individual receives the relevant experience and knowledge, they transform their behavior to preserve their health.
Pender’s health promotion model reflects the primary duties of the community health nurse to inform people about how to prevent influenza, cope with its symptoms, and ask for timely medical help. In this situation, the community health nurse has to gather the findings, analyze them, and provide people with the necessary information (Chen & Hsieh, 2021). As a healthcare professional, the nurse has enough competencies and authority to promote knowledge about communicable diseases and the ways of their prevention.
It is also possible to integrate the Christian worldview into the work of the community health nurse when working with a population impacted by influenza. First, loving people and being patient with their weaknesses is essential. Ill people do not have the emotional resources to be kind to others, which means they can be rude to the nurse who wants to help them. The Christian healthcare professional must remember that Jesus helped ill people and did not expect gratitude from them.
Another critical idea that the community nurse can use while working with the populations affected by influenza is spreading knowledge about the disease among them. From the Christian point of view, it is part of the mission of the community nurse that saves lives. In addition, the Christian faith gives community nurses spiritual strength and hope to work in a stressful environment, and they can share their faith with their patients.
It is possible to make parallels between community health nurses’ work and those of national agencies such as the CDC. Center for Disease Control and Prevention also works on understandably informing people how to care about their health (Flu: What to do if you get sick, 2023). It is possible to find structured information about how to avoid contamination with influenza, its symptoms, complications, and the actions the individual should take if they are inflected (Flu: What to do if you get sick, 2023). It makes the knowledge about the transmission of the virus common knowledge. As a result, most people will understand that they must support proper hand hygiene in public places, stay home if infected, avoid social contact, and vaccinate against influenza. It reduces the burden on public health, decreases the number of individuals infected with influenza, and reduces the number of deaths during the epidemic.
Global Implication
Therefore, influenza is a severe communicable disease that affects public health. It has a comparatively high level of mortality, and its health complications are serious. The peculiar detail is that some countries suffer from the epidemic of influenza more than others. For example, the virus is endemic in Southeast Asia, and countries such as China have taken serious measures to prevent the spread of the infection (Park & Ryu, 2018). In addition, the population density in Chinese cities is high, which leads to the aggravation of epidemics (Park & Ryu, 2018). The measures to control the spread of influenza and public awareness about avoiding virus transmission allow China to reduce the number of incidences.
Conclusion
Influenza is a communicable disease that can lead to significant health impairment. As a result, the community nurse needs to inform people about preventing the disease, the transmission of the virus, and the actions the inflected individual should take. These responsibilities are consistent with Pender’s health promotion model, which emphasizes the importance of self-care and a high level of awareness about the disease. Discussing the epidemic concepts might decrease the severity of the influenza epidemic, which is an essential step in improving public health.
References
Chen, H. H., & Hsieh, P. L. (2021). Applying Pender’s health promotion model to identify the factors related to older adults’ participation in community-based health promotion activities. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(19), 9985. Web.
Flu: What to do if you get sick. (2023). CDC. Web.
Javanian, M., Barry, M., Ghebrehewet, S., Koppolu, V., Vasigala, V., & Ebrahimpour, S. (2021). A brief review of influenza virus infection. Journal of Medical Virology, 93(8), 4638–4646. Web.
Nypaver, C., Dehlinger, C., & Carter, C. (2021). Influenza and Influenza Vaccine: A Review. Journal of Midwifery & Women’s Health, 66(1), 45–53. Web.
Park, J. E., & Ryu, Y. (2018). Transmissibility and severity of influenza virus by subtype. Infection, Genetics, and Evolution: Journal of Molecular Epidemiology and Evolutionary Genetics in Infectious Diseases, 65, 288–292. Web.
Ryu, S., & Cowling, B. J. (2021). Human influenza epidemiology. Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Medicine, 11(12), a038356. Web.