Question  Students are required to submit weekly journal entries throughout the course. These reflective narratives help students identify important learning events throughout the course and the practicum. In each week’s entry, students should reflect on the personal knowledge and skills gained. Population Health Concerns and Health Disparities Write a reflection journal (250-300 words) to outline what has been discovered about your professional practice, personal strengths and weaknesses, and additional resources that could be introduced in a given situation to influence optimal outcomes. Each week, a specific focus will be used in your reflection. Integrate leadership and inquiry into the current practice. Please make sure to address all areas in your writing. Topic Focus: Population Health Concerns and Health Disparities  While APA style is not required for the body of this assignment, solid academic writing is expected.

Population Health Concerns and Health Disparities 

I have discovered that people across different lifespans have individualized health concerns that should be addressed holistically. For instance, older adults are at a higher risk of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease compared to children, adolescents, youths, and middle-aged adults (Mok et al., 2020). Furthermore, older adults are more likely to have underlying comorbidities than the general population. As such, nurse practitioners should provide patient-centered care. Furthermore, health disparities exist among people of different socio-demographic backgrounds. For instance, ethnic minorities, undocumented immigrants, and members of the LGBTQ community have limited access to healthcare. Nurse practitioners should advocate for policies that promote access to healthcare services by these minority groups.

Self-evaluation revealed that I am versatile and considerate. Versatility has enabled me to perform different nursing tasks and responsibilities. Notably, I can serve people across all age groups. Furthermore, I have gained skills to work in different hospital departments such as the emergency, medical-surgical, and outpatient departments. I always think of other people’s welfare regardless of their socio-demographic background. Kindness and thoughtfulness have bolstered my interpersonal relationships with my colleagues and patients. Further evaluation revealed that my shortcoming is that I am too detail-oriented. Being detail-oriented implies a person is a perfectionist. As such, team members may consider my goals unattainable, hence laxity among the team.

Additional resources will enable nurse practitioners to address health disparities by collaborating with other stakeholders. For example, monetary resources will enable nurses to participate in advocacy by collaborating with policymakers to make policies that improve healthcare access. Also, human resources will eliminate the nursing shortage problem and promote care delivery to patients across all lifespans.

References

Mok, V. C. T., Au, L., Cordonnier, C., Gorelick, P. B., Pendlebury, S., Wong, A., Alladi, S., Bath, P. M., Biessels, G. J., Chen, C., Dichgans, M., Dominguez, J., Kim, S., Kwok, T., Greenberg, S. M., Lam, L. C. W., Yin, B., Lam, K., Lee, A. T. C., … Black, S. E. (2020). Tackling challenges in care of Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias amid the COVID-19 pandemic, now and in the future. June, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1002/alz.12143