Running head: ESSENTIAL VII 1

Essential VII: Clinical Prevention and Population Health

Meghan O’Neal

Frostburg State University

ESSENTIAL VII 2

Essential VII: Clinical Prevention and Population Health

The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) provides a set of standards

and expectations for the baccalaureate level of a nursing degree. Essential VII describes the

importance of health promotion, disease, and injury prevention throughout an individual’s entire

life span. Essential VII is entitled “Clinical Prevention and Population Health” (AACN, 2008, p

23) also focuses on the overall health of a population. These essentials are in place to ensure that

each patient is receiving the best care possible from all professional members of the healthcare

team. These standards of care come from the evidence-based practice model that the nursing

profession follows. The evidence-based practice models often overlap with healthcare policy,

disease prevention, and health promotion. With healthcare policies changing each year, it is

important to remain up to date with the information presented in this essential VII reference.

Exemplar

The clinical education presentation was completed after ten weeks of clinical time in the

Western Maryland Health System (WMHS) which equaled out to be 135 clinical hours. In

addition to the clinical hours spent at WMHS 20 of those hours were spent on completing the

power point with a voice over. The amount of hours spent researching this topic is almost

unmeasurable, as it has taken many days to simply gather all of the information provided during

the time spent at WMHS combined with individual research using the research data bases. This

project best exemplifies the ideas presented in Essential VII through the population focus and

community cared based ideas that are presented with the sole purpose of disease prevention and

health promotion. The Self Sufficiency Matrix embodies the idea of health promotion through a

point and scale system that ultimately helps patients to reduce the amount of time spent within

the hospital setting.

ESSENTIAL VII 3

Reflection

Essential VII: Clinical Prevention and Population Health (AACN, 2008, p 24) provides

requirements for the baccalaureate nurse to have obtained through the work of a project. For

example, my ability to assess the health/illness beliefs, values, and ideas behind a family and/or

individual using the Self Sufficiency Matrix allowed me to help create a community care plan

that would meet their needs. This idea also correlates closely with AACN’s (2008, p 25)

statement “Collaborate with others to develop an intervention plan that takes into

account determinants of health, available resources, and the range of activities that contribute to

health and the prevention of illness, injury, disability, and premature death.” The ideas I learned

about from the community healthcare team at WMHS have reshaped my thinking regarding

community nursing and have allowed me to view this special population through a different set

of eyes. My power point explains the questions asked to patients during the initial telephonic

communication and then goes through each step that the nurse takes with these patients in the

days following. I also was able to explain how some of the resources here in my community can

be utilized and what this outcome looks like as far as the number of admissions into the WMHS.

Within this project I was also able to highlight the Center for Clinical Resources within the

WMHS which is a direct line for community care. Here the nurses, physicians, etc. work

together to provide patients with ongoing health promotion care in order to prevent readmissions

or frequent visits into the emergency department.

ESSENTIAL VII 4

References

American Association of Colleges of Nursing [AACN]. (2008). The essentials of baccalaureate

education for professional nursing practice. Washington, D.C: Author.