Community Based Nursing for HIV and STI Prevention

Running head: COMMUNITY BASED NURSING
COMMUNITY BASED NURSING
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1COMMUNITY BASED NURSING
Introduction:
The prevalence of HIV, AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases are on the hike in and
around the remote areas (Liamputtong, 2015, p.27). This could be primarily because of the
major lacuna in spreading effective education and awareness about the fatal effect of HIV and
the negative response it is capable of eliciting in the body (Connell, Crawford, Dowsett &
Kippax, 2013, p. 47). It should also be crucially noted that the lack of education and
awareness in this field have been correlated with the reduced access to health care facilities
and avenues in order to combat the infections interlinked with the infections and disorder. It
is extremely important to substantially make the general public aware about the HIV
infection and the manner in which it can possibly be transmitted from one body to another
(Campbell et al., 2013, p. 120). This essay would deal with the factors that are responsible for
causing disorders pertaining to improper maintenance of sexual hygiene such as HIV and
AIDS. It would also focus on the role that the community nurses could play in order to ease
the access of community health care facilities and effectively reduce the ill effect of the
infectious disorders.
Discussion:
In order to maintain health and wellness of a concerned proportion of population, it is
vital to ensure that the population has adequate access to the health care facilities (White,
2015). Access to healthcare not only helps in the reduction of the incidence of the infectious
disease but also ensures prevention of premature death and at the same time helps in devising
prevention and managing the symptoms of the disease (WHO, 2016). Scientific papers have
revealed that there are three most important aspects that must be considered while providing
access to health care facilities across a wide range of population (Chang et al., 2013, p. 880).
The three vital components have been enlisted as, medical claim and insurance coverage,
accessibility to medical health facilities and the time frame that must be considered in order

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to promote speedy recovery (White, 2015). Access to health care can thus be defined as the
potential and timely utilisation of personal medical services available so as to attain positive
health outcome and maintain complete wellness. Access to health care is important in order
to stay away from the negative impact of infection and can be achieved in a step wise manner
(Allender et al., 2013, p. 70).
The negative impact of not having ease of access to the health care facilities can be
defined as the social barriers associated that hinder the accessibility (Frieden, Foti & Mermin,
2015). Some of the social barriers that can be enlisted would include, high expenditure
involved with care, unavailability of insurance coverage, major lacuna in the providence of
facilities and lack of professionals trained in cultural competency to deal with the clients
belonging to diverse cultural background (White, 2015,p.105). Literary evidences have
revealed that sexually transmitted diseases have been categorised as the most widely spread
form of infectious disease that affect people belonging to the remote areas of the city
(Shannon et al., 2015,p. 58).
HIV can be defines as the ‘Human Immuno-deficiency Virus’ that has been
categorised as a subgroup of retro virus that is primarily responsible for causing a detrimental
auto immune disorder known as the acquired immuno-deficiency disorder, most commonly
known as AIDS. Sexual transmission has been listed as the common subtype of transmitting
the infection. Once the virus affects the system of the body, it is estimated that within a time
period of a minimum 9 to 11 years the auto immune capacity of the body is destroyed and the
body becomes easily susceptible to any form of infection (WHO, 2016). Typically, it has
been stated that the infected body elicits poor immunological response or supressed
immunological response to allergies and petty cold and flu infections. Statistical evidences
have significantly pointed out that the most widespread form of sexually transmitted disease
is AIDS (Karrigan et al., 2015, p.183). It has also been stated that the major affected

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population group is the community of sex workers and drug IV users. On delving deeper into
the root cause of the hike in the incidence of AIDS among the sex workers it has been
discovered that there is a major problem associated with the maintenance of sexual health
practice among the sex workers (Lim, Brown & Jones, 2013, p.199). The frequency of
unprotected sex and not utilising methods of contraception can be considered as the factors
that make this set of population vulnerable to develop the infection (Williams et al., 2013, p.
488). The social determinants such as the lack of awareness connected with maintaining
sexual hygiene, regular use of contraceptives, indulging in unprotected sex, improper
sanitation facilities and poor social income have also been tightly linked with the cause of
infection (Wu & Li, 2013,p.40). In addition, it can also be stated that the proportion of
population, primarily the adolescence group engaging in drug IV abuse, use infected needles
to inject the drug intravenously inside the body. The main scientific explanation that has been
delivered in this regard is basically the manner in which the drug abusers use the similar
needle to inject drug inside the body. The needle might be in contact with the blood of a HIV
positive patient and blood being the universal carrier has the potential to carry the infection
from the body of a HIV infected patient to a normal and healthy patient and disrupt the
autoimmune mechanism of the healthy body and weaken the antibody expression. The
common use of syringes contaminated with the infected blood of the HIV patient leads to an
increased risk of introducing the infection in a healthy person and continue the transmission
at a rapid rate. Hence, it should be ensured on a mandatory basis that the contaminated
syringes are not reused by the people without sterilising and proper washing. Research
studies have stated that the use of the same needles must not be entertained at any cost
between two or more individuals even after proper cleansing and sterilisation. The common
standardised method that has been internationally prescribed in order to avoid the
transmission of infection through contaminated syringes is to use disposable syringes that are