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Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study

INTRODUCTION: Recent UK health policies identified nurses as key contributors to the social justice agenda of reducing health inequalities, on the assumption that all nurses understand and wish to contribute to public health. Following this policy shift, public health content within pre-registration...

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Autor principal: Mabhala, Mzwandile A
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3698137/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23809694
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-12-46
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author Mabhala, Mzwandile A
author_facet Mabhala, Mzwandile A
author_sort Mabhala, Mzwandile A
collection PubMed
description INTRODUCTION: Recent UK health policies identified nurses as key contributors to the social justice agenda of reducing health inequalities, on the assumption that all nurses understand and wish to contribute to public health. Following this policy shift, public health content within pre-registration nursing curricula increased. However, public health nurse educators (PHNEs) had various backgrounds, and some had limited formal public health training, or involvement in or understanding of policy required to contribute effectively to it. Their knowledge of this subject, their understanding and interpretation of how it could be taught, was not fully understood. METHODOLOGY: This research aimed to understand how public health nurse educators’ professional knowledge could be conceptualised and to develop a substantive theory of their knowledge of teaching public health, using a qualitative data analysis approach. Qualitative in-depth semi-structured interviews (n=26) were conducted with eleven university-based PHNEs. RESULTS: Integrating public health into all aspects of life was seen as central to the knowing and teaching of public health; this was conceptualised as ‘embodying knowledge’. Participants identified the meaning of embodying knowledge for teaching public health as: (a) possessing a wider vision of health; (b) reflecting and learning from experience; and (c) engaging in appropriate pedagogical practices. CONCLUSION: The concept of public health can mean different things to different people. The variations of meaning ascribed to public health reflect the various backgrounds from which the public health workforce is drawn. The analysis indicates that PHNEs are embodying knowledge for teaching through critical pedagogy, which involves them engaging in transformative, interpretive and integrative processes to refashion public health concepts; this requires PHNEs who possess a vision of what to teach, know how to teach, and are able to learn from experience. Their vision of public health is influenced by social justice principles in that health inequalities, socioeconomic determinants of health, epidemiology, and policy and politics are seen as essential areas of the public health curriculum. They believe in forms of teaching that achieve social transformation at individual, behavioural and societal levels, while also enabling learners to recognise their capacity to effect change.
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spelling pubmed-36981372013-07-02 Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study Mabhala, Mzwandile A Int J Equity Health Research INTRODUCTION: Recent UK health policies identified nurses as key contributors to the social justice agenda of reducing health inequalities, on the assumption that all nurses understand and wish to contribute to public health. Following this policy shift, public health content within pre-registration nursing curricula increased. However, public health nurse educators (PHNEs) had various backgrounds, and some had limited formal public health training, or involvement in or understanding of policy required to contribute effectively to it. Their knowledge of this subject, their understanding and interpretation of how it could be taught, was not fully understood. METHODOLOGY: This research aimed to understand how public health nurse educators’ professional knowledge could be conceptualised and to develop a substantive theory of their knowledge of teaching public health, using a qualitative data analysis approach. Qualitative in-depth semi-structured interviews (n=26) were conducted with eleven university-based PHNEs. RESULTS: Integrating public health into all aspects of life was seen as central to the knowing and teaching of public health; this was conceptualised as ‘embodying knowledge’. Participants identified the meaning of embodying knowledge for teaching public health as: (a) possessing a wider vision of health; (b) reflecting and learning from experience; and (c) engaging in appropriate pedagogical practices. CONCLUSION: The concept of public health can mean different things to different people. The variations of meaning ascribed to public health reflect the various backgrounds from which the public health workforce is drawn. The analysis indicates that PHNEs are embodying knowledge for teaching through critical pedagogy, which involves them engaging in transformative, interpretive and integrative processes to refashion public health concepts; this requires PHNEs who possess a vision of what to teach, know how to teach, and are able to learn from experience. Their vision of public health is influenced by social justice principles in that health inequalities, socioeconomic determinants of health, epidemiology, and policy and politics are seen as essential areas of the public health curriculum. They believe in forms of teaching that achieve social transformation at individual, behavioural and societal levels, while also enabling learners to recognise their capacity to effect change. BioMed Central 2013-06-28 /pmc/articles/PMC3698137/ /pubmed/23809694 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-12-46 Text en Copyright © 2013 Mabhala; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research
Mabhala, Mzwandile A
Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title_full Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title_fullStr Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title_full_unstemmed Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title_short Health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
title_sort health inequalities as a foundation for embodying knowledge within public health teaching: a qualitative study
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3698137/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23809694
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-12-46
work_keys_str_mv AT mabhalamzwandilea healthinequalitiesasafoundationforembodyingknowledgewithinpublichealthteachingaqualitativestudy