Community Health Nursing

Introduction: Like what the age-old adage from Desiderius Erasmus states “prevention is better than cure”, population health is the approach that looks at the broader picture of developing and maintaining a realistic and culturally acceptable health plan for the Australian Aboriginal communities. Rather than merely addressing the management of diseases, population health goes deeper by aiming to manage the factors that may have caused or developed the diseases, and ensure that the World Health Organization’s (cited in Queensland Health 2012, p. 1) definition of health as “a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing” is achieved holistically. Therefore, more than just preventing diseases from recurring and spreading in the communities involved, the social, cultural and economic factors that have contributed or may contribute to future health problems in a community must be properly addressed, and thereby introducing a new specialization nursing that will provide nursing care in partnership with the concerned community group (Queensland Health, 2009) like the Aborigines and the Torres Strait Islanders. This growing specialization is called community health nursing. Community health nursing is crucial in ensuring that the correct approaches to the Aborigines’ and Torres Strait islanders’ community health, are applied and are popularly supported by the concerned indigenous groups. It is important that the community health nurses are equipped and oriented to their broader roles and responsibilities which include patient education, individual and family advocacy, case management and interdisciplinary approach (Van Loon 2008, pp. 315 - 330). Obviously, these skills are addressed minimally, or are not totally addressed in the present nursing education system. And government and community support is needed to ensure that future community health nurses acquire the skills or competencies of clinical knowledge and practice, but also that of community leadership

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