Building the Culture of Health: Opportunities to Seek and Obstacles to Overcome

Introduction

The field of public health nursing has entered a new stage of development with the introduction of new information technology tools into regular nursing operations. However, the challenges that the global environment poses to people have also become quite numerous, with new diseases and disorders becoming the subjects of the present-day agenda. Therefore, there is a consistent need to educate people on the subject of healthcare, thus, building awareness in society. Since promoting a reasonable attitude towards health issues requires the change of the current attitudes and patterns observed among people all over the world, the necessity to build the culture of health as a tool for promoting the corresponding habits and behavioral patterns emerges.

Culture of Health in the 21st Century

The concept of the culture of health is not new; however, it has recently gained special significance due to the rapid increase in death toll among certain denizens of the world population. Particularly, the fact that the problems regarding mental health, cancer, and AIDS contraction are spiraling out of control (Alligood and Torney 625) has to be brought to attention. According to the existing definition, the phenomenon of the culture of health is the discipline that “supports collaboration” (Levy, Gentry, and Klesges 544) and interprofessional skills of nurses so that awareness regarding the current health concerns should be increased and the methods of addressing them should be improved.

Building the culture of health must be a very efficient tool for addressing the problem in question, as it will contribute to reducing the rates of ignorance concerning essential nursing issues. As a result, a drop in mortality rates is expected; additionally, it is assumed that the promotion of the culture of health will help reduce the instances of specific diseases contraction as well as help address specific disorders and, possibly, inhibit their development among the target population (Fawsett and Ellenbecker 288).

It should also be borne in mind that maintaining the culture of health and adhering to its principles is crucial to not only patients but also nurses. According to the existing taxonomy of the subject matter, the organizational culture of health helps nurses get their priorities straight and, thus, improve the quality of services by reconsidering their roles and responsibilities. The process of responsibilities distribution becomes possible once the corresponding principles of nursing ethics based on the key tenets of the virtue ethics are incorporated into the framework of nurses’ operations since the culture of health was suggested by people “deeply concerned about medical and health professional ethics in general” (Bulger 112).

The promotion of the organizational culture of health is, however, fraught with numerous problems, the issue of information transfer and the behavioral patterns of the nursing staff being the basic ones. As a recent study shows, the rates of corporate social responsibility (CSR) must be reinforced in the nursing setting so that the staff could comply with the regulations set by the organization and make ethically acceptable choices.

Conclusion

Locating the methods to promote the culture of health is essential to the wellbeing of people all over the world. Seeing that a significant number of people are unaware of the critical issues regarding health and the ways to sustain it, health culture must become an integral part of people’s lives. The means to integrate health culture into the local communities must be sought so that the rates of mortality could be brought down and nurses could help people develop the behavioral patterns that will keep them safe.

Works Cited

Alligood, Martha Raile and Ann Marriner Torney. Nursing Theorists and Their Work. Terre Haute, IN: Elsevier Health Sciences, 2013. Print.

Bulger, Roger. “Establishing a National Culture of Health and Its Values.” Journal of Thoracic Disease 7. 1(2015): 111–114. Print.

Fawsett, Jacqueline and Carol H. Ellenbecker. “A Proposed Conceptual Model of Nursing and Population Health.” Nursing Outlook 63.2 (2015): 288–289. Print.

Levy, Martin, Daniel Gentry, and Lisa M. Klesges. “Innovations in Public Health Education: Promoting Professional Development and a Culture of Health.” American Journal of Public Health 105.1 (2015): 544–545. Print.