Nursing for public health, genetics, staffing principles

By Carol Lindsay, RN
December 8, 2003

The Public Health Nursing Section of the American Public Health Association Web site defines public health nurse as a nurse who integrates community involvement and knowledge about the population with clinical understanding of health and illness as it relates to individuals and their families. The site provides examples of PHN roles, and lists the American Nurses Association standards of public health nursing practice, categorized as standards of care and standards of professional performance. The PHN resources page provides links to related online journals, nursing publications and advocacy resources.

Healthy neighborhoods

The National Nursing Centers Consortium is a group of nurses working to improve community health through neighborhood-based primary health care services that are accessible, acceptable and affordable. It works to position nurse-managed health centers as recognized mainstream health care models. These centers are run by nurses, many of whom have advanced degrees and are nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, nurse-midwives or public health nurses.

The Web site provides links to programs affiliated with the consortium, such as AmeriCorps Vista, Asthma Safe Kids, Lead Safe Babies, Healthy Homes and Heart and Soul.

Nursing home care

The Nursing Home Compare page of the government Medicare site allows nurses, family members and patients to compare detailed information about nursing homes across the country. The comparable quality measures include the percentage of residents with pressure sores, percentage of residents with physical restraints, inspection results information including deficiencies and nursing staffing information broken down by the number of RN, LPN and CNA hours worked per resident per day. The hours are broken down by licensure and can be used to compare a specific nursing home's statistics to that of state and national averages. The site can be viewed in both English and Spanish.

Nurse staffing

The American Nurses Association document "Principles for Nurse Staffing" reports how staffing is critical to the delivery of quality care and discusses the problems involved in identifying and maintaining the appropriate number and mix of nursing staff. The site also lists numerous related publications and materials about nurse staffing.

DNA revolution

The Human Genome Project began in 1990 as a coordinated effort by the Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health to identify the roughly 30,000 genes in human DNA, determine the sequences of the 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA and store all this information in databases.

The project Web site includes PowerPoint presentation materials, an extensive image gallery, Webcasts and videos. Downloadable presentations include: Overview of the Project; Science Behind the Project; Benefits of Genome Research; Ethical, Legal and Social Implications of Genome Research; and Careers in Genome Research. Information about genetic disorders and pharmocogenomics can be found in the Medicine and the New Genetics section.