Healthcare Challenges: Role of Nurses in Underdeveloped Nations

This essay delves into the critical role of nurses in addressing healthcare challenges within underdeveloped countries. It highlights the impact of poverty, illiteracy, and lack of resources on health outcomes, citing diseases like tuberculosis and malaria as significant issues. The essay explores the two major challenges of poverty and inadequate healthcare facilities, emphasizing the need for government interventions such as education and access to medical resources. It proposes strategies including providing education on health-related issues and offering free access to basic medical facilities. The essay underscores the pivotal role of nurses as mediators between governments and communities, providing essential medical assistance and health education. The essay also references relevant literature to support its arguments, underscoring the importance of nurses in improving healthcare outcomes in these vulnerable regions.

Running Head: Nursing and Healthcare
Nursing and Healthcare
Essay
System04104
12/21/2018

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Role of Nurses in Underdeveloped Countries
Providing proper healthcare and nursing service in underdeveloped countries is a
challenge for the WHO. Poverty, illiteracy, lack of health facilities and resources, ignorance,
and a bad leadership affect the health of people and produce a wide range of diseases such as
Tuberculosis, Malnutrition, Malaria, and some acute lower-respiratory infections. Another
challenge is the improper execution of health-related programs that even failed to spread
awareness among these people. Although one of the major challenges is poverty that causes
an unhygienic environment for people and that causes several diseases. For more than 1
billion people worldwide are living less than US$1 per day, and that causes the modern
medicine and healthcare facilities out of their reach (Akay & Tamura, 2015). Some African
countries such as Nigeria, Uganda, etc., and some Asian countries such as Bangladesh,
Pakistan, and Nepal etc. are the good examples of such type of countries where people are
struggling and fighting with some avoidable diseases because of their poverty, lack of
resources, and illiteracy of people about the causes of diseases (Parkash, Younis, & Ward,
2015).
Two Major Challenges
The major problems in providing healthcare services in underdeveloped countries are
poverty and lack of healthcare facilities and resources. People are suffering from lack of
resources and even they do not have any idea about any disease as well. A large number of
research papers explains that good health is only possible if the government formulate
properly execute their poverty reduction programs and provide them essential healthcare
facilities and resources. Poverty not only affects the health of people rather it also affects the
societies and economies as well. Poverty is the root cause of all health problems and diseases
(Strasser, 2010). The inequality among people in underdeveloped countries is a result of the
failure of healthcare services to reach the poor. Poverty disabled the government to launch
proper healthcare programs in those areas where people are suffering from polio,
tuberculosis, and malaria etc. (So, Cummings, de Calvo, Day, Houlahan, Nevidjon, & Were,
2016). Poverty is the major cause of illiteracy of people and lack of awareness about the
disease that can easily be avoided with sanitation and cleanliness programs. Thus, if the
underdeveloped countries want to remove these disease they should work on avoiding

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poverty and spread awareness among people about the healthcare facilities they are providing
for avoiding such diseases.
Two Strategies to Resolve Major Challenges in Healthcare
The two major strategies can be implemented by the government to resolve the
health-related challenges in underdeveloped countries is first providing education to those
people who belong to below poverty line and make them aware about the health-related
issues that how they can avoid such disease with sanity and cleanliness. The second strategy
that can be adopted by the government is to provide free access of basic medical facilities
and medicines in collaboration with private organisations and NGO’s to those people
who are unable to get these services at its cost. In the first strategy, the role of government is
so crucial that how they execute and regulate such programs in those areas where people are
suffering from poverty. The government can provide free education with the help of self-
service working volunteers who are not connected with any NGO or organisation. In the
second strategy, government can use the medical officers, workers, and employees such as
doctor and nurses to provide essential basic medical facilities to those poor people who are
unable to access it because of their poor economic conditions (Bryant‐Lukosius, Spichiger,
Martin, Stoll, Kellerhals, Fliedner, & Schwendimann, 2016). Here the role of nurses is so
crucial because they can prove themselves as the best channel between government and poor
people to fight with those diseases which arise only because of poverty and cleanliness.
Role of Nurses in providing healthcare facilities and resources in
underdeveloped countries
Nurses are the key factor between government and people to provide better health
care services, medicines, resources, and facilities in underdeveloped countries. A nurse can
serve as an agent of government who can perform multiple roles in healthcare programs in all
the underdeveloped countries. Nurses can provide basic medical assistance and necessary
medicines to those people who are suffering from disease and poverty. They can avail the
basic medicines and resources that provide by the government on free of cost. Nurses can
also work in collaboration with NGO or with some private hospitals where people need basic
medical facilities and they cannot access these medicines and resources because of their poor
conditions (Busse, Aboneh, & Tefera, 2014).
Apart from this, a nurse can educate the people about the various precautions, cures,
and symptoms of the disease. Thus, nurses can play an important role in providing medical

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assistance in underdeveloped countries and serve as a mediator between the government and
people to fight with health-related issues and help people to prevent it by providing them
healthcare education.

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References
Akay, M., & Tamura, T. (2015). Global Healthcare: Advances and Challenges [Scanning the
Issue]. Proceedings of the IEEE, 103(2), 147-149.
Bryant‐Lukosius, D., Spichiger, E., Martin, J., Stoll, H., Kellerhals, S. D., Fliedner, M., &
Schwendimann, R. (2016). Framework for evaluating the impact of advanced practice
nursing roles. Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 48(2), 201-209.
Busse, H., Aboneh, E. A., & Tefera, G. (2014). Learning from developing countries in
strengthening health systems: an evaluation of personal and professional impact
among global health volunteers at Addis Ababa University’s Tikur Anbessa
Specialized Hospital (Ethiopia). Globalization and health, 10(1), 64.
Parkash, J., Younis, M. Z., & Ward, W. (2015). Healthcare for the ageing populations of
countries of Middle East and North Africa. Ageing International, 40(1), 3-12.
So, W. K., Cummings, G. G., de Calvo, L. E. A., Day, S. W., Houlahan, K., Nevidjon, B. M.,
& Were, P. A. (2016). Enhancement of oncology nursing education in low-and
middle-income countries: Challenges and strategies. Journal of Cancer Policy, 8, 10-
16.
Strasser, R. (2010). Rural health around the world: challenges and solutions [online].
Retrieve from: https://academic.oup.com/fampra/article/20/4/457/625248