respond this my classmate’s post on health equity and public health nurse with additional information or support and at least 1 current journal reference.
The main focus of public health nurses is not only to provide optimal healthcare for people of all communities but also to understand what factors are the possible barriers causing the discrepancies amongst groups of people so they can be addressed or rectified. A provision within the American Nurses Association 2025 Code of Ethics states Nurses and their professional organizations work to enact and resource practices, policies and legislation to promote social justice, eliminate health inequities and facilitate human flourishing (ANA, 2025). This is exactly what public health nurses strive to do. By addressing these needs public health nurses can help to improve health equity from the individual to the system level (Hassmiller & Wakefield, 2021).
Public health nurses can help to promote health equity by identifying health disparities, addressing social determinants of health, building and supporting communities, advocating for change and most importantly delivering proper inclusive care. They identify health disparities through data and research of different communities or groups of people. An example of this would be Bergen Countys Community Health Needs Assessment which was conducted by multiple local hospitals in 2025. This consisted of a public survey given out to the communities in hopes of collecting crucial data that paints a picture of possible disparities, barriers or social determinants that could be preventing members of the community from receiving proper care across all areas of human needs. This survey concluded in July of 2025, and the data collected from this survey was then used to initiate the creation of different targeted programs in hopes of eliminating these problems thus resulting in improved access to care (Bergan County of New Jersey, 2025). Public health nurses collecting data about the community helps to gain a different perspective and truly understand what the people need. Once the data is analyzed and trends are identified, public health nurses can work to devise a plan of how to address them or different programs to rectify these barriers. Different examples of programs are food assistance programs, housing, transportation, health clinics and much more to target the areas that were shown to need improvement based on the data collected from the community.
An important task of public health nurses is also advocacy. While collecting, understanding and acting on the data that was collected about a specific community or group of people is important, without advocacy change cannot occur. These nurses work hard to advocate for those who do not have a voice and help enact change to rectify these issues across all levels of the healthcare network. Advocating and supporting the needs of the community are how these nurses make changes to protect the health and wellbeing of the community (Chiu et al., 2021)
References
Bergen County Department of Health Services and local hospitals seek community input in 2025 health survey. Bergen County, NJ Official Website. (n.d.).
Chiu, P., Cummings, G. G., Thorne, S., & Schick-Makaroff, K. (2021). Policy advocacy and nursing organizations: A scoping review. Policy, Politics, & Nursing Practice, 22(4), 276296.
Hassmiller, S. B., & Wakefield, M. K. (2022). The Future of Nursing 20202030: Charting a path to achieve health equity. Nursing Outlook, 70(6).
2025 code of ethics for nurses provision 9. 2025 Code of Ethics for Nurses. (n.d.).
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