Public health nursing (PHN) was founded by nurses committed to social justice and equity. Early public health nurse leaders, Lillian Wald, Margaret Sanger, and Lavinia Dock for example, addressed both individual clients’ health care needs as well as the broader social, economic, environmental, and political conditions of their lives. The words of Lillian Wald are as applicable today as in 1907. "Her (district nurse) intelligence in recording and reporting the general as well as the individual conditions that make for degradation and social iniquity are an advance from the individual to the collective interest." Public health nursing's historical commitment to social justice provides today's PHNs with guidance and direction for addressing issues critical to our clients’ increasingly complex lives. As poverty, racism, environmental degradation, and inequitable access to care continue to affect populations’ health status, the connections between social justice and PHN must be renewed. Yet, this connection is often invisible in nursing textbooks, research, and general PHN literature. Although social justice was an essential component of early PHN practice, its legacy is lost or overshadowed by market-driven initiatives, managed care, and individualistic PHN models. Social justice must resume its central position within PHN and health care in general. This paper will provide a critique of current PHN literature, including textbooks and articles, and address the consequences for nursing students, PHNs, and most importantly, our clients, when social justice remains an historical vestige rather than an active framework for nursing practice.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the presentation, the learner will be able to: 1. Identify the link between public health nursing's historical social justice roots and current PHN practice 2. Identify consequences for nurses, students, and clients when social justice is not considered a central component of PHN practice 3. List four historical social justice tenets that are applicable to current PHN practice 4. Identify four population groups that are considered “vulnerable” today and relate their conditions to those populations cared for by Wald and other PHNs committed to social justice
Keywords: Public Health Nursing, Social Justice
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.