Primary Health Care Approaches: Nurse Support for Families & Children

This report discusses how primary health care approaches support nurses in partnership with families and children in remote and rural areas. It highlights the World Health Organization's embrace of primary health care as a foundation for effective health services delivery, including promotive, pre...Read More

Running head: PRIMARY HEALTH CARE APPROACHES 1
Primary health care approaches
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PRIMARY HEALTH CARE APPROACHES 2
Report on how the approaches of primary health care, supports nurses in partnership
with families and children in remote and rural areas
Introduction
The aim of the report is to discuss how the approaches of primary health care,
supports nurses in partnership with families and children in remote and rural areas. The world
health organization in the year 1978, embraced the approach of primary health care as a
foundation to achieve health services delivery that is effective. The approach forms the health
care philosophy and health services provision. The types of care included in primary health
care approach include; promotive; preventive; curative; rehabilitative; and
supportive/comforting. Additionally the report will focus on health promotion programme
such as training and support groups and health education topic such as mental behaviour or
behaviour health that have been viewed to improve the welfare of families and children in
remote and rural places. The outcomes observed are positive including educating of patients,
self-management of patients’ quality of life and adherence. Health promotion field is wide
thus more research is required.
Children and families living in rural and remote areas face different challenges in
their daily lives and thus they depend heavily on nurses to guide their daily activities since
nurses are part of huge workforce in rural and remote communities. Nurses’ role for a long
time has included the practices of clinical nursing, treatment follow up, consultation,
educating of patients and prevention of illness. This has led to improvement of healthcare
services availability, maximized cost effectiveness, minimization of chronic diseases
symptoms and lastly improved experiences of customers when healthcare services. Primary
health care approaches serves the nurses with the ability to be promotive; in this case by

PRIMARY HEALTH CARE APPROACHES 3
working together with other partnership families and individuals to dis cover the needs and
desires of families and children in order to plan care and examine services.
Findings and Discussions
Findings suggests that most nurses are seen to work in serious care hospitals,
correspondingly others work in nursing homes and health centers that are structured. Looking
at a different environments that is not medicalized, studies suggest that community nurses
especially in Australia form an important workforce in healthcare systems given the
magnitude and multiplicity of communities that live in rural and remote places (Russell,
Wakerman, & Humphreys, 2013). The health care of Australia consist of two tiers layers that
is the government and the latter that perform different tasks in health care services. The role
of nurses has changed as it was stipulated traditionally. Nurses traditionally concentrated
much in disease prevention to promote health, and also to change individual behaviour
correspondingly to their health places (Russell, Wakerman, & Humphreys, 2013). Primary
health care approaches supports nurses in rural and remote areas to serve children and
families effectively (Bennett, Jones, Brown, & Barlow, 2013).
The changes experienced in health services in rural and remote areas has contributed
greatly to changes in what the nurses in rural place perform. Thus primary health care in rural
and remote areas continues to support the nurses in taking care of children and families for
example children facing mental health issues (Fitch, Fliedner, & O’Connor, 2015). Such
children and require special attention in their daily activities because some of the mental
health issues are considered to be critical. It involves support and rehabilitation by the nurses.
Several changes has been observed in community based services, how decisions are
made and population health in partnership with rural communities. Primary health care
approaches supports nurses in partnership with rural communities for example by making the

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rural nurses to improve their practice in cases where medical and related well-being
sustenance may or may not be present on site (Kitson, Marshall, Bassett, & Zeitz, 2013).
Nurses operating in rural and remote places are not advanced because of their background of
practice, the wide nature of their role or even the level of self-sufficiency they have. Children
with mental health issues in rural areas may influence how care is provided, however this
does not endorse the nurse to a practitioner status that is advanced.
Primary health care approaches guide the rural nurses to advocate strongly for their
community, guide less knowledgeable health specialists, and dynamically take part in
interdisciplinary partnership to attain constructive health results for their clients (Macdonald,
2013). The approaches enables the rural nurses to analytically think, evaluate, reproduce,
solve problems, and relate high-level understanding that is founded on substantiation and
study to clinical connections with individuals that require the care (Mackey, Hatcher,
Happell, & Cleary, 2013). The interactions validated by rural nurses are not of low standards
thus this interactions are socially and contextually appropriate. In this case rural nurses are
responsible for their own continuing professional progress, including training. Children and
families living in rural and remote areas face different challenges in their daily lives and thus
they depend heavily on nurses to guide their daily activities since nurses are part of huge
workforce in rural and remote communities (Parker, Forrest, Ward, McCracken, Cox, &
Derrett,2013). Primary health care approaches has led among children and families in rural
and remote areas ; have improved healthcare services availability, maximized cost
effectiveness, minimization of chronic diseases symptoms and lastly improved experiences
in health services.
Nurses in rural areas live in places that are isolated for example in islands, refugee
camps and indigenous communities (MacDonald, 2012). Training and support group
continue to help children and families in rural and remote places. Nurses in rural and remote

PRIMARY HEALTH CARE APPROACHES 5
areas refer to primary health care approach to provide a special health care and support to
children and families that face mental health issues, or chronic diseases (Wakerman, &
Humphreys, 2013). This health promotion program serves a good purpose in rural
communities since the well-being of children and families is ensured. Thus the rural families
and children will be able to live a fulfilling life.
Rural children and families facing mental health issues will be able to gain skill and
knowledge through training and support, thus making them live a life that is more
independent and healthy (Macdonald, 2013). For example rural nurses in most cases try to
maintain and improve the health of a person be it physical or mental. In addition they try to
reduce barriers among the rural children to enable them live an independent life and lastly
support the person in living a life that is fulfilling.
Subsequently, nurses in remote areas provide a number of primary care support to the
communities that are isolated. They act normally as health care providers, thus they are
required to extend their skills since they are highly demandable by the community due to lack
of other health supportive personnel(Russell, Wakerman, & Humphreys, 2013). The nurses
the well-being of the community both when they ate sick or are doing well. Therefore nurses
in remote places provide care for children and families who suffer both acute and chronic
illness.
Primary health care approaches serves the nurses with the ability to be promotive; in
this case by working together with other partnership families and individuals to dis cover the
needs and desires of families and children in order to plan care and examine services
(Wakerman, Humphreys, Wells, Kuipers, Entwistle, & Jones, 2017). Additionally they
activate communication in this areas, this empowerment promotes a healthy choices to

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children and families with mental health issues. Nevertheless this approaches impact greatly
in making the quality care health service effective.
Nurses in rural areas use the best practices in treatment and management in order to
ensure that provision of diverse range of services is provided to children with mental health
issues. Primary health care enables nurses in rural and remote areas to have advanced level of
competency to handle children and families living in those areas(Mackey, Hatcher, Happell,
& Cleary, 2013).
Recommendations
The government should ensure that more rural and remote nurses are available to
children and families living in remote place because the community as a whole needs more
specialists in nursing. This will ensure that the systems of health provide greater quantity of
clinical practice that is of great level in a manner that is socially and contextually important
(Russell, Wakerman, & Humphreys, 2013). Most nurses of this capability support strongly
their communities In this case rural nurses are responsible for their own continuing
professional progress, including training which will lead to a positive health outcomes.
A common workforce challenges are faced by professions as long as rural and remote
areas are concerned. Some of this challenges are absence of enough support work visibility
and struggle in achieving professional improvement. This challenges are critical to rural and
remote nurses. The local communities should be made knowledgeable of the roles of the
nurses in their community since in most cases the nurses working with children mostly lack
time of to get away from a stressful working condition. Off among employees is necessary
since they will be able to reflect on themselves and be involved in other activities that will
promote their well-being too. Nurses in rural areas live in places that are isolated for example
in islands, refugee camps and indigenous communities. Training and support group continue

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to help children and families in rural and remote places this means that some do not get to see
their families in a long time
Nurses in rural and remote areas should work in partnership with other institutions
like universities to ensure that they are able to develop professionally in their place of work.
For example the nurses should receive funding from the government or even scholarship to
improve their professional skill (Russell, Wakerman, & Humphreys, 2013) Therefore this
will enable the rural nurses to analytically think, evaluate, reproduce, solve problems, and
relate high-level understanding that is founded on substantiation and study to clinical
connections with individuals that require the care The interactions validated by rural nurses
are not of low standards thus this interactions are socially and contextually appropriate (Fitch,
Fliedner, & O’Connor, 2015). In most cases rural nurses are responsible for their own
continuing professional progress, including training which is disadvantageous to both the
children and families in remote areas and also to the rural nurses themselves.
Conclusion
In conclusion primary health care approaches are important as they guide nurses in
rural and remote areas when handling their daily activities in ensuring the lives and health
safety of children and families in rural and remote communities is improved. From the above
discussion it’s also evidence enough that health promotion programme such as training and
support groups and health education topic such as mental behaviour or behaviour health
improve the welfare of families and children in remote and rural places bringing out positive
outcomes to patients in rural and remote places for example educating of patients, self-
management of patients’ quality of life and adherence

PRIMARY HEALTH CARE APPROACHES 8
References
Bennett, P., Jones, D., Brown, J., & Barlow, V. (2013). Supporting rural/remote primary
health care placement experiences increases undergraduate nurse confidence. Nurse
Education Today, 33(2), 166-172.
Fitch, M. I., Fliedner, M. C., & O’Connor, M. (2015). Nursing perspectives on palliative care
2015. Annals of palliative medicine, 4(3), 150-155.
Kitson, A., Marshall, A., Bassett, K., & Zeitz, K. (2013). What are the core elements of
patient‐centred care? A narrative review and synthesis of the literature from health
policy, medicine and nursing. Journal of advanced nursing, 69(1), 4-15.
MacDonald, J. (2012). Environments for health. Routledge.
Macdonald, J. J. (2013). Primary health care: medicine in its place. Routledge.
Mackey, S., Hatcher, D., Happell, B., & Cleary, M. (2013). Primary health care as a
philosophical and practical framework for nursing education: Rhetoric or reality?.
Contemporary nurse, 45(1), 79-84.
Parker, R., Forrest, L., Ward, N., McCracken, J., Cox, D., & Derrett, J. (2013). How
acceptable are primary health care nurse practitioners to Australian consumers?.
Collegian, 20(1), 35-41.
Russell, D. J., Wakerman, J., & Humphreys, J. S. (2013). What is a reasonable length of
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Wakerman, J., & Humphreys, J. S. (2013). Sustainable workforce and sustainable health
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Wakerman, J., Humphreys, J., Wells, R., Kuipers, P., Entwistle, P., & Jones, J. (2017). A
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