Custom «Caring For Jacksonville: Part III» Essay Paper Sample

The HIV infection has for the longest time cost the Jacksonville community a lot of lives. Many people in the community are infected and others are dying. Many programs have come up to assist those who are infected to live positively and live longer; the programs also counsels those who are not infected on how to stay that way and educates them on the risk factors of HIV. The rate of spread of the infection and also the number seems to have gone down because of the intervention of these programs; but I believe that the number of the infected persons would even become smaller if various nursing interventions complimented these programs.

Nurses' interventions refer to actions that are carried out by nurses so as to further the course of recovery and treatment of a patient. Creating various nursing intervention in Jacksonville would ensure that care of a higher level is given and also the health and comfort of the patients is ensured. The intervention will ensure that the risk factors that lead to AIDs are reduced. The risk factors of HIV infection are unprotected sex, use of infected needles during drug use, homosexuality, Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs), mother infant transmission, needle stick injury, blood exposure, and breastfeeding transmission, mother to infant childbirth transmission and mother to fetus transmission. The risk factors of HIV in Jacksonville are mostly unprotected sex, use of infected needles, and homosexuality. The HIV/AIDs is avertable if people are directed in the right way. In my endeavor to reduce the HIV infection and spread, I would use the counseling, patient's encouragement and performance of minor medical procedures. I believe these interventions are effective and efficient and can be used over and over again with modifications that take into account the physical, psychological, sociological and economical changes in the populations.

The counseling intervention is one of the best strategies for dealing with HIV/AIDS. Teaching people on how to avoid becoming infected with the HIV virus is very effective and has worked in many places positively. The HIV pandemic remains a very grave entrenched health problem that calls for a strong, sustained and evidence informed response. In absence of cure, HIV prevention is the only hope of reversing AIDS. Counseling offers the best course in averting the disease. This intervention would reach out to the young and old, homosexuals and heterosexuals, men and women and also the underserved populations. I would seek to involve all these people in the program because this is essential if the intervention is going to be successful. The intervention would involve the community more and would even have door to door services. One of the things that I would counsel the people on is healthy and safe sex education.

Unprotected sexual intercourse is the leading factor in causing the spread of the HIV infection in Jacksonville so educating people on safe sexual practices would come in handy with the goals of the intervention. The information on safe sexual practice would be all encompassing and would use education and information services which clearly illustrate how sexual transmission of HIV is caused by unsafe sexual practices and information on how to avert transmission of HIV. I would link HIV/AIDS with sexual and reproductive health care. By doing this I would be seeking to ensure that no point is left out on aspects of safe sex. When using this intervention I would involve the young people more because they represent the group that is most sexually active; the youth do not usually care about the outcomes of unsafe sexual practices in the name of having fun, so I should seek to counsel them more.

In a study by Kinsler et al (2004) a follow up assessment after an intervention showed that groups which acquired HIV knowledge after the intervention changed their attitudes and were more likely to use condoms than those who were in the other group. My intervention should also make use of voluntary testing so that people can know their status, I would also seek to educate women and girls more on sexual and reproductive health. This would take into account counseling mother who are infected and pregnant to avoid passing on the infection to the infant at child birth or when breastfeeding. The intervention would also seek to educate on condom use, this is one of the safest barrier methods of preventing the transmission of HIV. HIV prevention is one of the most successful HIV treatments.

Mobeen Rathore, the director UF CARES argued that HIV is one of the diseases that physicians and people have learned to control through prevention of transmission and the prevention method should be directed to more focus and energy (Czerne, 2010). There are various groups in Jacksonville that are at special risk of acquiring the infection, for instance homosexuals, drug users and the youth, in order to ensure that the intervention is effective in capturing these groups, I would make testing and counseling more attractive for them so that they can opt to be voluntarily tested and counseled. I would also counsel all the people on avoidance of stigmatization and discrimination that is associated with the disease. In a pilot intervention by Zhang et al (2010) on an intervention of HIV testing and increased condom use among the homosexuals in China, it was proved that there is an urgent need to come up with interventions that promote HIV testing and condom use. The intervention findings have had important implications for prevention of HIV in china among the homosexuals and this proves my intervention would be effective in dealing with the AIDS pandemic.

The second intervention would be to perform minor medical procedure. Computer modeling reveals that an intervention that combines both prevention and treatment is the best in (Maurer& Smith, 2004). Performing minor procedures would ensure that new infections are kept at bay and treatment is sustainable. Treatment is essential because without it prevention efforts by counseling can halt. Both the infected should have access to prevention, treatment, care and support and hence an intervention that encompasses all these factors would be very effective. By performing these minor procedures which would encompass treating various mild opportunistic diseases which arise, I would care and support the people and show them love, most infected people are usually stigmatized and hence showing them care and support and counseling them shows them that there are people who care for them and thus restore in them a positive attitude in life. Performing minor procedures on those who are affected also provides a chance of counseling them and maybe screening them for HIV if they are willing to be tested.

The third intervention would be patient's advocacy; this mostly would focus on the people who are already infected. My primary concern would be to ensure that the patients are stable enough so that they do not give up hope in life and stop taking treatment. Patient encouragement would ensure that the patients I would encourage would have hope in life again. From this intervention I would be able to evaluate the needs of the patients and decide the course of action that he or she should take. For instance in case a patient comes in with an opportunistic infection such as Tuberculosis, Pneumonia or an STD, I would help him to be secure before actual treatment is administered, I would be unafraid in calling support from other medical personnel's in case a patient condition is very complex.

My nursing practice would encompass a lot of duties in serving the people of Jacksonville. HIV is a major problem in Jacksonville and from studying it I have realized that to serve people one needs to be committed because it encompasses much. I have realized that I would be needed to counsel people because when it comes to mitigating the effect and spread of HIV, there is more to treatment than just performing medical procedures. Nursing practice also demands of one to be loving and caring to the patients because this enables the patient to gain trust in someone and hence the healing process of the patient begins.

People who are affected by the disease sometimes lose hope in life and may decide to abandon treatment or do other things which may threaten their life, this may be a challenge but showing the person love and care usually enable the person to listen to someone and also view the upside of his condition. Nurses also should be able to offer the necessary guidance and counseling skills, nursing is not restricted to performance of medical procedures, nurses should be able to conduct other practices other than those dictated by their discipline. I have realized that nursing practice has many of the physicians' characteristics. In my practice I have realized that I have to promote a healthy lifestyle by educating people on refraining from activities and substances which may make them sick. A nurse should also be able to note minor health issues to more chronic problems.

The gay population has been mostly affected by the AIDs pandemic. Afessa et al (1998) in their study found out that homosexuality is a risk factor in acquiring HIV and accounted for 34% of HIV infection. In the spectrum of the health care service I provide care for this population in offering professional assistance to them, medical checkups and also by offering them personalized services. The aspect of community health nursing that I am using in my nursing practice for this population is that of primary prevention. The homosexuals are at a very high risk of contracting the disease so the prevention aspect comes in handy so that they can be counseled on safe sex practices.

Conclusion:

Primary prevention is usually helps in promoting the health of the community members and thus counseling the homosexuals is primary prevention. Primary prevention also focuses on individuals who are at risk of developing a specific disease. Homosexuals are usually at risk of acquiring the infection hence seeking to reduce risk factors among them is primary prevention. In relating my nursing practice to the nursing intervention wheel, I would describe my practice as all encompassing because it is population based, community focused, system focused and individual focused. My practice is comprehensive and addresses all levels of protection. I also seek to cover diverse populations and diverse levels of sicknesses and diseases that come with them.