Webcountry Assignment

NURS 456: Global Health Perspectives

Purpose of Assignment

The purpose of this assignment is to introduce the student to the major underlying determinants of poor health and their effect on the health of populations worldwide. The student will utilize these principles to create an informational webpage for the country of their choice.  

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Student Approach to Assignment

I used this assignment to explore my passion for community health in a country of my interest, the Philippines. By exploring the various aspects about the country that contributed to its population health, such as disease rates, cultural practices, religion, and environment, I learned more about how to provide nursing care to diverse populations.

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Reason for Inclusion of this Assignment in the Portfolio 

This is important to include in my portfolio because it meets many of the criteria for the first domain of the program, Knowledge for Nursing Practice. Through this assignment, I demonstrate my awareness of another cultures’ health practices, beliefs, and impacting variables within their country, which portrays my cultural competency as a nurse.

Domain 1: Knowledge for Nursing Practice 

(2) Demonstrate social responsibility as a global citizen who fosters the attainment of health equity for all.

This Webcountry project broadened my knowledge of health disparities and practices around the globe, as I discovered the various health indicators, disease rates, health improvement projects and more for many different countries. I specifically identify factors that put this population at higher health risks such as the triple burden of disease, and discuss several health improvement projects in the Philippines such as the ‘PPAN’ and 'WASH’ projects. These projects are promoted within my website in order to publicize and promote better health outcomes for this particular population.

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Domain 1: Knowledge for Nursing Practice

 (3) Articulates an understanding of how human behavior is affected by culture, race, religion, gender, lifestyle, and age.

The project expanded my knowledge of the demographics, nutrition, environment, culture, and education of the Philippines as well as several other countries through a peer review process in the class. I discuss and learn in depth how each of these countries’ characteristics impact the health of the population. For example, I highlight five common health beliefs in the Philippines that influence health practices, such as treatment for “hot and cold imbalances”, or lack of treatment for the belief that a health condition is a deserved punishment for sin.

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Domain 1: Knowledge for Nursing Practice

(5) Maintains an awareness of global environmental factors that may influence the delivery of health care services.

Similar to the second outcome, the Webcountry assignment increased my awareness of the various aspects of a country that impact the health of its citizens. A specific example of this is found in the Health and Education tab of the website, where I discuss the difficulty of clean water access and the consequential health issues in school-aged children. I also mention in this page how certain populations in the islands of the Philippines are at a geographical disadvantage to receive education, a known social determinant of health. A charity called the Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation has been implemented in 2018 to assist with transportation to school for some of these communities.

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Download a Word document of my Intro page here.

View my Webcountry on the Philippines here.