COMMUNITY HEALTH STUDY GUIDE
EXAM QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
What is the concept of community? - Answer-• Community is a collection of people who
share some important feature of their lives.
• In this text, the term community refers to a collection of people who interact with one
another and whose common interests or characteristics form the basis for a sense of
unity or belonging.
• It can be a society of people holding common rights and privileges (e.g., citizens of a
town), sharing common interests (e.g., a community of farmers), or living under the
same laws and regulations (e.g., a prison community).
• The function of any community includes its members' collective sense of belonging
and their shared identity, values, norms, communication, and common interests and
concerns
• Communities: geographic - common interest - health problem/solution community to
work together to find health solution.
How would you describe the concept of the health continuum? - Answer-• Wellness is a
relative concept, not an absolute, and illness is a state of being relatively unhealthy. The
continuum can change. Because health involves a range of degrees from optimal health
at one end to total disability or death at the other, it is often described as a continuum.
• The health continuum applies not only to individuals but also to families and
communities.
• Society suggests a polarized or "either/or" way of thinking about health: either people
are well or they are ill. Yet, wellness is a relative concept, not an absolute, and illness is
a state of being relatively unhealthy.
• The continuum is constantly changing.
Describe some primary prevention activities. - Answer-• Primary prevention activities
are those taken to keep illness or injuries from occurring.
• These include teaching about safe-sex practices, encouraging older adults to use
safety devices in the bathroom, and providing regular immunization programs for
communicable diseases.
• PRIMARY -childhood vaccinations; encouraging elderly people to install and use
safety devices (e.g., grab bars by bathtubs, hand rails on steps) to prevent injuries from
falls; teaching young adults healthy lifestyle behaviors, so that they can make them
habitual behaviors for themselves and their children; or working through a local health
department in consultation with a school district to help control and prevent
communicable diseases such as rubeola, poliomyelitis, or varicella by providing regular
immunization programs and vaccine oversight. Mental well-being. Violence free life.
• Secondary prevention - Cholesterol screening programs, skin tests for tuberculosis,
and working with a group testing water samples for contamination are examples of
secondary prevention activities.
, Community Health Nurse implement immunization program. What is the nurse's primary
job for this program? - Answer-• Working in cooperation with other team members and
coordinating services and addressing the needs of population groups are essential to
interprofessional collaboration. In doing so, the community health nurse is preventing
fragmentation and gaps thereby ensuring continuity of service.
• Community health nurses need to explain the ways in which they might contribute to
the program's objectives. They can offer to contact key community leaders, with whom
they have established relationships, to build community acceptance of the program.
• They can share their knowledge of the public's preference about times and locations
for the program. They can meet with various local agencies and organizations (e.g.,
health insurance companies, local hospitals) to gain financial support. They can help to
organize and give immunizations, and they can influence planning for follow-up
programs.
Describe some activities performed by the community health nurse. - Answer-•
Community health nurses work in every conceivable kind of community agency, from a
state public health department to a community-based advocacy group. Their duties rang
from examining infants in a well-baby clinic or teaching elderly stroke victims in their
homes to carrying out epidemiologic research or engaging in health policy analysis and
decision making.
• Teach proper nutrition or family planning, promote immunizations among preschool
children, encourage regular physical and dental checkups, assist with starting exercise
classes or physical fitness programs, and promote healthy interpersonal relationships.
• Their goal is to help the community reach its optimal level of wellness. Development of
policies to promote and protect the health of clients.
Historical events from 1970 to present influence community health nursing. What is the
most important influence in how these nurses operate? - Answer-• The numbers,
increasing variety of settings, and many nurses coming to work in the community
settings since the 1970s have contributed most significantly to the change.
• As a result, professional associations supported the broader term of community health
nursing.
• 1980 - ANA defined community health
• Increased workers in the community (social workers, educators, couselors)
• Public Health vs Community Health Nursing
• Affected by technology, immigration, consumer movement, economics / access to care
Describe district nursing. - Answer-• As the service grew, visiting nurses were assigned
to districts in the city—hence the name, district nursing. (Home Health Visiting Nursing)
• Early district nursing services founded by religious organizations that served as their
sponsors. Later sponsorship shifted to private philanthropy. Funding came from
contributions and fees charged to clients on an ability-to-pay basis. Finally, visiting
nursing began was supported by public money.
What is the public health stage of community nursing? - Answer-• The public health
nursing stage is characterized by service to the public, with the family targeted as a