Enhancing Public Health Nursing Practice : A Collaboration in Utah

The Pacific Public Health Training Center, one of the 11 funded HRSA Public Health Training Centers, formed a collaborative with the Utah Department of Health and the Utah Health Nursing Directors Association to design and implement statewide public health nursing orientation training in Utah. The aim was to deliver training relevant to urban, rural, and frontier-based state and local health department nurses to increase understanding of the link between public health and their nursing practice. Using a modified Delphi method, the Nursing Directors identified core training objectives and preferred teaching methods. Over the course of a week, a six-hour highly interactive training was presented at four locations throughout the state and was available via TeleHealth which allowed some participants to attend via video conference. Training topics included public health principles; recognition of public health in their current work; how to further incorporate these principals into their nursing practice; and methods to improve interaction with their target populations through application of population-based interventions. Nurses from eleven of twelve local health departments as well State Department of Health nurses attended as 51% of the Utah public health nursing workforce (180 nurses) participated. The majority strongly recommended that the training be included in new nurse employee orientation. Evaluation results indicate a high level of satisfaction and improved knowledge. An online version of this training course will be available Spring 2007.