NUR332 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Cultural Safet

Acute health condition – choose one acute health condition (this means that your digital poster theme is not on the broad topic of acute health illness in general but align to one of the stages of growth and development of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations - you have to do some research and choose one acute health illness and focus your digital poster content on the selected topic). Acute health is reactive, episodic care that is cure focused.

Answer:

Introduction

The case study presented in the poster deals with the growing stage of a preschool aboriginal child and his developments in health conditions in the recent years. The age group of a preschool child is considered from 3 years to 6 years of age. The child presents an infectious respiratory health condition of influenza. The child is of 4 years of age and has recurring scenes of influenza. The child has also started having breathing troubles as he is exposed to passive smoking in his household. The study also presents various interventions to reduce this reoccurring condition such as proper immunization. The study also covers the topic of cultural safety which is very important to maintain while providing treatment to any patient.

Case Study

• The patient is a 4-year-old child.
• The patient belongs to the indigenous community.


The patient lives in New South Wales.
The patient lives with his parents, two other siblings and grandparents.
The patient is having a condition of reoccurring of influenza after a few days back to back.
The patient has not received proper immunization during his infancy.
The patient has severe breathing problems, diarrhea, high temperature, runny nose and cough.
The patient is on the verge of having pneumonia.
The patient is exposed to passive smoking at home, which is the main cause for influenza and the breathing problems.
If left untreated, the patient is most likely to develop asthma or some other chronic respiratory diseases.
The patient is under antiviral medication, which includes oseltamivir and zanamivir.
The patient is not under specific medication to treat diarrhea.
The patient is also taking a controlled medication of acetaminophen to deal with the body aches.
The patient is also taking cough syrups to treat the cough but it does not seem to have any action on the patient.

Topic Information

Influenza is quite common amongst the aboriginal populations across the age of 2 years to 60 years of age. Unimmunized children have the maximum chances of getting influenza. Under the National Immunization Program initiated by the Australian government, the children from six years to five years of age are eligible to get influenza vaccinations and vaccinations for other chronic diseases free of cost (Jung et al., 2017). The most common symptoms of influenza are:

• High fever
• Body ache and head aches
• Cough and cold
• Fatigue
• Diarrhea
• Breathing problems

Pneumonia is an advanced stage of influenza, which is also very common among the aboriginal populations. Although in the recent years there has been sever changes in the healthcare systems of the aboriginal people. During the span of 2000-2005, the hospitalization rate of the aboriginal children for pneumonia and severe cases of influenza have gone down from 9.0 to 7.6 per 1000 children (Borg et al., 2018). In the year 2017, the hospitalization rate of children under the age of five years was 7.6 per 1000 children. The gap between the health condition of the aboriginal and the non-aboriginal children seems comparatively small in cases of influenza, as the immunization program seems to have a positive effect on the people (Willis et al., 2018). Although the rate of children hospitalized from the demographically challenged areas is much higher than other parts of Australia.

Nursing Care Intervention

The nursing care plan for the 4-year-old influenza patient is as follows:

• Before the treatment is started the patient should be run through various tests to confirm the type of virus and the pathogens responsible for the infliction of the condition. This is very important as it deters the effectiveness of the treatment plan (Chidgzey et al., 2015).
• A complete respiratory assessment is required on the child to understand the cause for its breathing problems.
• In case of a pneumonic condition, the patient should be checked if he is hypothermic or hypothermic. In case of hypothermia, the patient should be administered antipyretics and for hyperthermia, normothermia should be administered
• The patient’s fluid balance should be restored to stop the diarrhoea. The patient can be put under an IV if oral hydration is inadequate (Doll et al., 2017).
• In case the patient is not having gas exchange properly the nurse has to encourage coughing.
• The nurse should ensure that the airway of the patient is clear and the antibiotics are provided on time (Lakhan et al., 2016).
• The nurse must maintain proper hygiene around the patient to avoid further infection.

Cultural Safety in Nursing Practice

Communication is the key method to maintain the cultural safety of the patient during the treatment. As the patient is a minor, the decisions regarding the patient are to be taken by the parents. In this case, the nurse has to take care of the cultural safety of the patient’s family as well. The nurse should be focussed on building a positive relationship with the patient’s family(Blyth at al., 2016) to avoid any conflicting situations during the treatment. The language, the vocal tone and the body language of the nurse should be sympathetic and reassuring for the parents of the child (Tuckerman et al., 2018). 

Conclusion

The case study deals with a patient with a severe condition of influenza. The topic information part of the study deals with the various information regarding the disease, its main symptoms and the health graph of the hospitalization of the aboriginal children from various age groups. The study also contains various interventions regarding the treatment of the child. The treatment must be methodical and be done under hygienic conditions to ensure no further infections. During the treatment, the nurse has to have an understanding of the cultural safety of the patient and the patient’s family.

References

Borg, K., Sutton, K., Beasley, M., Tull, F., Faulkner, N., Halliday, J., Knott, C. and Bragge, P., 2018. Communication-based interventions for increasing influenza vaccination rates among Aboriginal children: A randomised controlled trial. Vaccine, 36(45), pp.6790-6795.

Willis, G.A., Preen, D.B., Richmond, P.C., Jacoby, P., Effler, P.V., Smith, D.W., Robins, C., Borland, M.L., Levy, A., Keil, A.D. and Blyth, C.C., 2018. The impact of influenza infection on young children, their family and the health care system. Influenza and other respiratory viruses.

Doll, M.K., Winters, N., Boikos, C., Kraicer-Melamed, H., Gore, G. and Quach, C., 2017. Safety and effectiveness of neuraminidase inhibitors for influenza treatment, prophylaxis, and outbreak control: a systematic review of systematic reviews and/or meta-analyses. Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, 72(11), pp.2990-3007.

Tuckerman, J., Misan, S., Salih, S., Xavier, B.J., Crawford, N.W., Lynch, J. and Marshall, H.S., 2018. Influenza vaccination: Uptake and associations in a cross-sectional study of children with special risk medical conditions. Vaccine.

Blyth, C.C., Macartney, K.K., Hewagama, S., Senenayake, S., Friedman, N.D., Simpson, G., Upham, J., Kotsimbos, T., Kelly, P. and Cheng, A.C., 2016. Influenza epidemiology, vaccine coverage and vaccine effectiveness in children admitted to sentinel Australian hospitals in 2014: the Influenza Complications Alert Network (FluCAN). Eurosurveillance, 21(30).

Jung, J.J., Pinto, R., Zarychanski, R., Cook, D.J., Jouvet, P., Marshall, J.C., Kumar, A., Long, J., Rodin, R., Fowler, R.A. and Canadian Critical Care Trials Group H1N1 Collaborative, 2017. 2009–2010 Influenza A (H1N1)-related critical illness among Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Canadians. PloS one, 12(10), p.e0184013.

Lakhan, N., Clarke, M., Mathew, S.M. and Marshall, H., 2016. Retrospective review of factors associated with severe hospitalised community?acquired influenza in a tertiary paediatric hospital in South Australia. Influenza and other respiratory viruses, 10(6), pp.479-485.

Chidgzey, P.J., Davis, S., Williams, P. and Reeve, C., 2015. An outbreak of influenza A (H1N1) virus in a remote Aboriginal community post?pandemic: implications for pandemic planning and health service policy. Australian and New Zealand journal of public health, 39(1), pp.15-20.