Steve's Needs. Steve is a 20 year old male student; he lives away from home as he is in his final year at university. He doesnt exercise at all and he eats unhealthily. Steves housing is very dirty and messy therefore causing a lot of dust. This is
Health and Social Care Unit 3
Section A02-A
Steve is a 20 year old male student; he lives away from home as he is in his final year at university. Steve lives in student accommodation with 6 other male students. The area he lives in is deprived of the city and the local housing is poor quality. There are busy roads and factories surrounding the area he lives in. He smokes up to 120 cigarettes per week and binge drinks a lot. He doesn’t exercise at all and he eats unhealthily. Steve’s housing is very dirty and messy therefore causing a lot of dust. This is affecting his asthma.
Steve’s Needs
Steve has many needs to improve his PIES. Firstly for his physical health he should stop drinking so much as it will be affecting his liver. Also he should stop eating so unhealthy and get on a healthy diet and start to exercise regularly. He should also use the exercise as well as to get fit to loose weight so he is at a healthy BMI. For his emotional health he should make sure that he stays motivated to loose weight and drink less alcohol and smoke less and eventually quit. He should keep self-confidence in himself that he can loose weight and that he will look much better in the long run after all his hard work. Lastly for emotional health he should have support from people in order to help him loose weight and get healthier. People offering him support should be his friends, family and the nurse and doctors who are helping him. These could include the dietician and the community nurse. For Steve’s intellectual health he should make sure he concentrates more at university, in order to achieve a high standing grade. Also he should make sure that he gets educated on the risks of what he is doing to himself as he needs to realise what he is really doing to damage his body. Lastly for Steve’s social health needs he needs to reassess his social life and stop going out more and maybe even find more supportive friends rather than people who find it funny that he gets into a complete state. Also he should take up a hobby in order to keep himself busy rather than turning to alcohol and causing himself harm. Steve should also think about how he spends his money and that he should stop spending it on alcohol and cigarettes and he should use it in a more useful way such as joining a gym or towards a hobby he may want to take up. Steve should also make sure his housing environment is clean as it is affecting his health as it is very unhygienic.
Community Nurse
Lisa is a community nurse. She is helping Steve to get healthier and giving him advice on how he can loose weight and get healthier.
Roles
Lisa works within the community but she is based in a doctor’s surgery. A nurse acts as a teacher and counsellor primarily, but also plays an important role in preventing widespread illness and disease in the community she serves. Lisa offers a supportive role; she supports patients as well as other professionals. She does visits to schools, GPs and home visits in order to spread awareness of illness disease and also to support people in any health issues they may have. Lisa is part of the PCT (primary care trust). She offers general health care to patients and she gives out general advice. The main roles that Lisa undertakes are monitoring people’s health, providing nursing care to the sick and disabled, she is also a health teacher letting the community she serves in know about health risks and what you can do to prevent them. Also she is a councillor; giving an appropriate advice and broadening a client’s insight about a problem so that appropriate decisions are made which can lead to a positive resolution of the problem.
Tasks
One of the tasks Lisa may undertake is screening tests to find out about their health such as she could look at the height, weight, BMI and blood pressure of Steve. Also she could do tests on Steve for his cholesterol levels and test their lung functions. These screening tests can help to promote good health. This is because if there is an issue involving the Steve’s health then doing one of these screening tests Lisa may be able to notice the problem and then look at it in more detail. If the problem is noticed soon enough then Lisa will be able to inform Steve of what it is and help him sort the problem out and recommend him to a doctor or advise him on what he can do in order to retain a healthy state. Also a task Lisa may do as a community nurse is educating the community. She may give out education and advice on certain issues patients may have. These could include pregnancies, exercise, drinking, smoking, diet and contraception. A community nurse can also provide information and advice on prescribed or over-the-counter medication on medication regimens, side effects and interactions. However if Lisa thinks that the patient needs more than just her advice such as Steve may need to see a dietician in order to plan out a healthy lifestyle and diet she may advise him to go see the specialist person as she may not be able to help him as much as the dietician can. She may also advise the patient to go to a specialist support group. Such as if she thinks that Steve is showing signs of being an alcoholic she may advice him to attend an AA meetings or if she sees that Steve is overweight and needs help in loosing weight she may send him to groups that are specialised in helping people loose weight such as weightwatcher meetings. Lisa may also give out leaflets to a patient in order to help them with their health issue and for them to learn more about what it may consist of and how they can help themselves to get better health. Such as giving Steve leaflets on stopping smoking. The leaflet would contain information of what stopping smoking consists of and what different methods he can use to stop smoking. If Lisa is incapable of giving the patient the knowledge they need she may have to refer them onto someone who will have much more knowledge about the issue. Such as if Lisa found that there may be an issue with a Steve’s health that would need him to have more tests and more examining then she will refer him to a doctor who will have more knowledge on what the issue is and they will be able to advise give more advice to the Steve than Lisa may be able too. Lisa educating the community and giving them advice is another way to show that she is promoting good health to the community. The education she is providing will help people to see the first symptoms of serious diseases such as lumps on the breast, which should be checked out for breast cancer. This education of people finding out about diseases in the early stages will help a person to overcome the disease and get their good health back as soon as they can. Rather than having no education on looking out for the disease they may end up noticing the disease months down the line when it may be too late. Also if people are being given positive advice they may feel better about themselves and therefore their lifestyle may become of a better quality and more positive. Such as if she was telling Steve how much fitter and healthier he will be if he looses weight and cuts down his drinking and smoking. Also that he will look much better and people will find him more attractive. This positive encouragement will help Steve to take on Lisa’s advice and make him want to loose weight so he can achievement a positive outcome. The advice may also help people to seek out more medical help in order for them to maintain good health, without the advice they have been given by Lisa they may not know what to do about their health issue and things could have got much worse. Another task that Lisa might do as a community nurse is minor treatments. Lisa will not have the full medical training and knowledge as a doctor may have so therefore she will not be able to administer extreme drugs to the patient or be able to attend to serious wounds. However she will be able to dress wounds and make sure they are kept clean. Such as if Steve has a minor injury from being out drinking all night and falling over as he was drunk. He will need the wound dressing and Lisa will be able to clean it to prevent infection and then bandage it up to avoid further damage.
