As an industry, nursing education and indeed all of health care, has produced so many aha moments in this last year! We have been coming up with really out-of-the-box ways to advance curricula and treatment strategies. But it’s the tried and true basics, good hygiene, staying home when you're ill and masking that has had a historical impact here in Arizona.
If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that effective modern health care needs to support everyone, not just a fortunate few. This mindset forms the bedrock of Arizona State University, where we define ourselves by whom we include, not exclude. Whom do we include in our health care solutions? Do we listen to multiple stakeholders in our search for better delivery? This search for inclusion causes us to look not only to traditional providers but also to rural communities, underserved populations, and small, nonprofit organizations.
Before COVID-19, there was robust thinking and conversation about social isolation and loneliness being the next public health crisis. Research provided ominous warnings about the broad impact of the pandemic, including a finding that isolation among older adults is associated with a 50 percent increased risk of dementia.
A new year is upon us and while many of us are ready to turn the page on an incredibly tough and tragic 2020 there is much work to be done. One clear reminder of this is the need for an entire month dedicated to the prevention of slavery and human trafficking. In 2010, January was declared National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month.
What a year, eh? There are so many things that I could say about these past 11 months and I’ll get into that in a minute. But first, I want to start by expressing my sincere gratitude. Thanks to all of you who read my blog posts, to our resilient students, staff, and faculty who have moved mountains this year. 2020 has tested and stretched us all in new and uncomfortable ways and here we are, still moving forward.
When will we have a COVID-19 vaccine? The answer to that question is what everyone around the world wants to know. Surely once we have a vaccine, we can get back to our regular lives. So why not rush one out today?
In short, it’s because good, ethical clinical research takes time.
Clinical researchers across the globe are all in on trying to respond to one of the biggest challenges of our time. Their work is essential to helping the world reach the other side of the Novel Coronavirus crisis.
Health care, you would think, would be the place where the old adage about never letting a serious crisis go to waste would never apply. It’s an appalling thought on its face.
But here we are, six months into the worst public health crisis of our generation, and we are seizing opportunities wherever we can in nursing education. We must.
ASU's Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation is located in downtown Phoenix, a large city and one that has a significant population of people experiencing homelessness. Seven years ago a collaboration of students from Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University, and the University of Arizona took it on themselves to help address this issue. Their efforts led to the creation of Student Health Outreach for Wellness, or SHOW.
We’ve got a pandemic on our hands and we need to collectively wage the fight against it! I’m not talking about COVID-19. I’m talking about the pandemic of inequality.
If it wasn’t clear before, it is abundantly clear now, after weeks of uprisings in response to the death of George Floyd and others, and the clear disparities in health and socioeconomic impact of COVID-19 on people of color, that gaps in inequality are wide, unacceptable and have existed for far too long.
Our role as health educators, researchers and practitioners is to teach, investigate and care for people.
It is also our role to call out injustices and disparities and actively work on solutions that benefit the overall health of all communities.
Systemic racism is a public health crisis. Research supports this and we’ve seen it with our own eyes in our practices and most recently with the COVID-19 pandemic which has disproportionately affected Black Americans.