Nursing Practice: Disease Prevention and Management Unit Reflection

This discussion post reflects on the unit content of "Disease Prevention and Management," focusing on the significance of this knowledge for nursing practice. The assignment covers key topics such as infectious diseases, including principles of hygiene and safe practices, and non-communicable diseases (NCDs), emphasizing prevention, patient care, and the impact of urban environments. It also addresses public health responses to emergencies and injuries. The student, a nursing officer, discusses how the unit's content extends their existing knowledge and skills, highlighting the application of these concepts in patient care, particularly in preventing the spread of infectious diseases and managing NCDs. The reflection emphasizes the importance of understanding the causes and impacts of various diseases and the ability to respond effectively to emergencies, supported by at least four references. The reflection shows how the learning will inform future practice, enhancing the ability to provide comprehensive care and improve patient outcomes.

Running head; disease prevention and management 1
Disease Prevention and Management
Student Name:
Institution Affiliation:

Disease prevention and management 2
Introduction.
Learning about infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases and public health
responses to emergencies and injuries is of great importance during practicing of nursing as it
helps in understanding of various problems while dealing with patients. Patients suffering from
infectious and non-communicable diseases require special care that needs proper knowledge on
how to deal with the them by leaning what they require during their period of pain and on how to
advise them on ways to avoid such problems. Injuries and emergencies also require a proper
response to the patients suffering affected to ensure most their lives are saved and the rate of
fatalities are reduced.
Infectious diseases.
Having the knowledge of infectious diseases learnt in class has improved the practice
while dealing with patients suffering from the diseases. The principles and practice of infectious
diseases (Bennett, Dolin, Blaser; 2014) helps in understanding how to deal with the existing
infectious diseases and also the newly emerging infectious diseases. Proper hygiene and safe
injection practices taught is very important and useful when dealing with the infectious diseases
either by treating patients who are already affected or by preventing spreading of the diseases to
other patients.
Dealing with infectious diseases requires at least a general understanding on how the
diseases affects the patients and how the prevention of the spread of the disease. Dealing with
patients suffering from infectious diseases such as cholera caused by poor hygiene requires
applying hygiene learnt in class to help the patients and also advise them how to prevent

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contacting the disease. Therefore learning about infectious diseases is very crucial to any nurse
and especially those who purely focus on the field of infectious diseases.
Non-Communicable Diseases.
Non-Communicable diseases (NDCs) have a great negative results to human beings since
most have no cure and others takes a very long time to treat. It is therefore very important for a
nurse to understand every aspect of NCDs such as how to prevent them, take care of patients
suffering from the disease and able to tell the signs and symptoms of patients suffering from the
various NCDs especially during the early stages. Most of the information about the disease is
taught in school and the same is applied to patients suffering from NCDS. Understanding the
cause of the diseases is very crucial especially if proper advice is to be given to the patients on
how to prevent being affected by the disease.
Urban settings have higher rising of spread of non-communicable diseases such as
hypertension and diabetes which are mainly caused by poor eating habits, lack of physical
exercises and the increase of substance use such as tobacco and alcohol. Franco, Bilal and Diez-
Roux (2015) explains importance of learning how urban environment leads to spread of non-
communicable diseases and the factors causing them which is taught in school and is important
in understanding the control and the spread of the various diseases. The knowledge of NDCs in
urban areas is also very important on knowing how to identify and help patients affected by a
particular disease.

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Emergencies and Injuries.
Emergent need of health care due to either a disaster, significant outbreak of an infectious
disease, a catastrophe or terrorist attack need special respond and treatment to the people
affected. Learning on how to deal with such situations is important since it requires good
understanding on how to deal with the epidemic to minimize the fatality rates and save more
lives. Hasegawa, Ohir, Yasumura, Tanigawa (2016). Education on different ways of dealing with
different emergencies is very important and should be taken seriously by the nurse students who
as they may require the specific knowledge to deal with emergencies of any kind that may occur.
Different kind of injuries are treated different and lessons on what type of treatment to a certain
injury is very important.
Hirsch, Carli, Nizard, Riou, Baroudjian, Baubet, Fontaine (2015) gives an example on
how to respond on respond to emergencies such as terrorist attack where they explain on how
patients should be treated and well cared for. Teaching such a lesson in class with examples
gives a clear view on how nurses are expected to respond to such situations.
Conclusion.
Some of the units taught are of high importance and require a great seriousness during
their study. These units are applied and practiced in nursing where learning about infectious
diseases, NCDs and emergencies is very useful especially to a practicing nurse when dealing
with different patients with such kinds of problems. It involves the use of the knowledge gained
during learning of a particular unit. Such lessons taught require more attention and seriousness
especially if one is to succeed in the field of nursing where dealing with the human lives rely on
the knowledge gained from a particular unit.

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References
Bennett, J. E., Dolin., & Blaser, M. J. (2014). Principles and practice of infectious diseases
(Vol.1). Elsevier Health Sciences.
Echouffo-Tcheugui, Justin B., & Kengne, A.P. (2011). “Chronic non-communicable diseases in
Cameroon-burden, determinants and current policies.” Globalization and health .7(1)44.
Franco, M., Bilal, U., & Diez-Roux, A. V. (2015). Preventing non-communicable diseases
through structural changes in urban environments.
Hirsch, M., Carli, P., Nizard, R., Riou, B.,Baroudjian, B., Baubet, T., …&Fontaine, J. P. (2015).
The medical response to multisite terrorist attack in Paris. The Lancet, 386, no. (10012),
2535-2538.
Hasegawa, A., Ohira, T., Maeda, M., Yasumura, S., & Tanigawa, K. (2016). Emergency
responses and health consequences after the Fukushima accident; evacuation and
relocation. Clinical Onocology, 28(4), 237-244.