For this week’s Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay project, you’ll answer three questions related to your opportunity as a nurse and an advocate. The first two questions relate to influencing a bill is traveling through the legislative process. The third question refers you to the social determinants of health as described in your course textbook reading and asks you to think specifically on your role as a nurse in influencing social determinants of health.
In a brief paper (no more than 2 typed pages, 1 inch margins, 12 font Times New Roman or Courier New), answer the questions below. Write each question as a new topic area and then follow with a paragraph or two to answer the question Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay. You may find it necessary to search for answers to the questions outside of the assigned reading. Be sure to use APA guidelines for writing style, spelling and grammar, and citation of sources.
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Answer the following questions:
What parts of the lawmaking process does a nurse have an opportunity to influence the final bill passage?
List at least two ways that this influence can take place. In your opinion, would one way be preferable over the other?
Reviewing the social determinants of health, select one to respond to this question:
What role can nurses play in promoting health status through policy changes directly affecting this social determinant?
Submission Details:
Submit your response in a 2-page Microsoft Word document (500 words).
Name your document SU_NSG4068_W2_Project_LastName_FirstInitial.doc.
Submit your document to the Submissions Area by the due date assigned.
Cite sources in the APA format on a separate page.
The parts of the lawmaking process where the nurses have a privilege to influence are quite many. First, the nurses can influence the introduction part of a bill by asking the members of the Congress to sponsor the bill. Second, at the hearing stage where the nurses can submit a written authentication to express an opinion and also give a background on the matter and also regulate how the bill will impact their constituent Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay. Third, they can influence at the markup stage where the nurses can propose amendments and changes to the law before its recommendation.
However, there are two ways in which the nurses’ influence on the legislative process can take place. First, is through advocacy in the community. Nurses act as advocates where they offer a link between lawmakers and nursing hence they can influence the health policies. The second way is through direct legislative arena where the nurses attend the health policymaking process (Keleher, & MacDougall, 2015). Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay. I prefer advocacy since it involves the refinement of opinions and clarifying key issues by the nursing community thus the nurse influence will represent the interest of the majority and not an individual’s interest like that of legislative arena.
According to Braveman and Gottlieb (2014), social determinants of health refers to the circumstances in the environment where individual were born, are living, learning, worshipping, and playing and its influence to health. Such social determinants include social norms and attitudes, public safety, availability of community-based resources, access to health care services, culture, and literacy. The determinant from the list above which affects the nurses’ role in influencing legislative process is the social norm and attitude.
Social norms and attitude are one of the social determinants of health which affects health policy-making process. Keleher and MacDougall argue that health policy and laws may be ineffective if they do not reflect social norms and the attitude of the community (2015). Social norms find their expression in both formal law and societal expectations Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay. The health policy should, therefore, be formulated on the basis that it entirely conforms to the attitude of the people and social norms. Nurses’ influence on the legislative process as advocators are therefore essential to ensure that the laws legislated are within the social norms hence the social determinants determines how the nurses will influence a given bill.
There are many roles of the nurses in promoting the health status such as through direct policy changing that affects norms as a social determinant of health. Mainly, nurses’ influence in health policies should serve as social norms protection. However, when nurses’ advocate for a bill through Congress corrects a problematic behavior in the community, then the social norms as determinants of health will be affected positively (Auerbach, 2013). Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay. Social norms are all about customary behavior. For instance, when a nurse seconds or proposes a bill against Female Genital Mutilation, a section of the community will feel that the law is positively affecting the social norm while others feel like they have been betrayed.
In conclusion, nurses play a critical role in the legislative process. Nurse leaders are expected to influence those policies which back to increasing the number of nurses. Additionally, nurses should encourage laws which support technology in nursing. Last but not least, nurses should be aware of new policies and bills which are relating to their profession. Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay.
Reference
Auerbach, D.I., Staiger, D.O., Muench, U. & Buerhaus, P.I., 2013. The nursing workforce in an era of health care reform. New England Journal of Medicine, 368(16), pp.1470-1472.
Braveman, P., & Gottlieb, L. (2014). The social determinants of health: it’s time to consider the causes of the causes. Public health reports, 129(1_suppl2), 19-31.
Keleher, H., & MacDougall, C. (2015). Understanding health(No. Ed. 4). Oxford University Press. Nurse’s Role in Influencing the Legislative Process Essay.