Primary Healthcare Practices Essay 2022

Running head: PRIMARY HEALTH CARE NURSING
PRIMARY HEALTH CARE NURSING
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PRIMARY HEALTH CARE NURSING
Introduction
Primary healthcare comprises of a wide-ranging health service providers including
General Practitioners (GPs), healthcare professionals, pharmacists, dentists, Aboriginal health
workers, midwives and nurses (general practitioner nurses, community nurses and nurse
practitioners) who deliver primary healthcare services across private, public and non-government
health sectors (Health.gov.au, 2019). Primary healthcare service aims at providing a continuous,
comprehensive and person centred care to facilitate an enhanced and quality care to the patients
for promoting their health. Primary health care can be provided in community based settings
such as in community health, general practices, and local and non-government settings
(Health.gov.au, 2019). The services provided under the primary health care include screening
and prevention, treatment and management, early intervention and health promotion. The nurses
involved in providing primary health care practices within a wide range of settings includes
community base settings, Residential aged care, General Practice, domiciliary settings and many
more. This paper focuses on nurses roles in health promotion in the primary health care and
discusses on the importance of health promotion strategies according to the Ottawa Charter for
Health Promotion.
Discussion
The key features of the nurses in Primary Health Care focuses on the following areas-
health promotion, healthy aging, rehabilitation and palliation, population and public health,
policy development and advocacy, treatment of ill people, child and family care and illness
prevention. The recent research of Australian general practice settings suggests and identifies the

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PRIMARY HEALTH CARE NURSING
role of primary healthcare nurses as a patient carer, educator, improvement agent, quality
controller and a problem solver. Nurses must understand the health needs of the patients by
comprehensively understanding their concerns and implement the appropriate care strategies
through a patient centred and holistic approach to care (Smolowitz et al., 2015).
There is a significant difference noticed in the relationship between primary care and
primary health care. Although these two terms are used interchangeably in the clinical settings,
these two terms are different and describes two different concepts. Primary care implicates
narrower concept of family-doctor services delivered to the patients, whereas, primary health
care is considered to be a broader term derived from the core principles enunciated by the World
Health Organization. It is based on the approach taken towards health policy and service that is
delivered to individuals and population-level “Public health-type” functions (Muldoon, Hogg &
Levitt, 2006).
Primary health care is the first level of contact that focuses on protecting and promoting
public health in communities by employing socially accepted methods at a cost that can be
afforded by both the community and the country. It forms an integral part of the country’s
healthcare system by developing strategies that benefits the patient population and community as
a whole (Who.int, 2019).
The nurse role selected is the early intervention and implementing health promotion
strategies in the primary health care. This is because nurses are the first level of contact in the
primary healthcare. The nurses working in the healthcare sectors are responsible for delivering
quality services to the patients. After the patients are admitted to the hospital, nurses are
responsible to do complete analysis of the patients through assessments by monitoring the

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PRIMARY HEALTH CARE NURSING
patient’s vitals and carrying out essential and effective measures to combat with the health
concerns of the patients (Yakuwa, Neill & Mello, 2018). Disease prevention and health
promotion by early diagnosis of the physical abnormalities of the patients and monitoring the
vitals and collecting both subjective and objective data falls under the responsibility of the nurses
in the primary health care to facilitate an effective delivery of an enhanced nursing care, thereby,
improving patient’s health outcomes and increasing their satisfaction. Nurses working in the
primary health care should have adequate knowledge and possess skill set required to provide an
enhanced nursing care. The nurses must have knowledge and must be able to comprehensively
understand the interpretation of the patients vitals recorded in order to implement intervention
strategies addressing the patient’s problem (Fukada, 2018).
The services of the primary health care are directed to a particular population group like
the older people, young adolescents, maternity and child care, people who have a low socio
economic status, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and people who are from culturally
diverse groups (Health.gov.au, 2019). The target group chosen for this essay is older people. The
characteristics of the target group are accessed and it is found that the most common issue
associated with the target group is chronic diseases which have shown the maximum prevalence
among the aged population. Therefore, identifying the roles of nurses is important in the primary
healthcare to facilitate intervention strategies in the treatment plan and health promotion
intervention.
The aged adults are more susceptible to chronic diseases as age is a major risk factor in
the developing chronic illnesses like cardiac diseases, diabetes and other comorbidities (Salive,
2013). Aged adults with chronic conditions have different physical and mental needs according