NR503 Epidemiology Midterm Exam Chamberlain College of Nursing

How does social justice and health inequities influence population health care provision? Why is this critical information for the provision of evidence-based care? - More and more studies are being conducted to look at the relationship of sustained exposure to toxic stress to a variety of poor health outcomes and highrisk behaviors. These behaviors include such things as cutting, hypervigilance, promiscuity, eating disorders, poor school performance, depression, violence, suicidal ideation/attempts, and justice system involvement. These are just a few of the many behaviors found to be associated with sustained exposure to toxic stress. Studies such as these illustrate the importance of understanding the social determinants of poor health and the potential for doing good and preventing harm to aggregates and populations by targeting exposures to such things as child abuse and neglect for prevention, early recognition, and intervention., Vital Statistics - Vital statistics provide important outcome measures that APRNs can monitor and compare over time and analyze by demographic variables to detect such things as health disparities. In the United States, the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) collects the official records of births, deaths, marriages, divorces, fetal deaths, and induced terminations of pregnancies from state and local health departments (Aschengrau & Seage, 2013). Personnel from local health departments review the data from death certificates, including demographic data, looking at the immediate cause of death and any contributing factors of death, and recording multiple causes of death. Local data are sent to a state office for collation and then sent to the NCHS, which provides this information to the public on its website ( annual publication, Vital Statistics of the United States (Friis & Sellers, 2009). APRNs can access national and global health statistics from multiple agency sources, including government agencies, to identify health trends and patterns (Partners, 2014). However, due to the lack of agencies and/or resources in certain populations or regions, health information might not be available or might be limited in scope Morbidity - Refers to ill health in an individual and the levels of ill health in a population or group. Mortality - Mortality rates, also known as death rates, can be useful when evaluating and comparing populations. As stated earlier, there are many factors that can affect the natural history of disease, and measuring mortality allows investigators to compare death rates among and within populationsCases - Refers to individuals who acquire a certain disease or condition. Social Justice - the defense of human dignity by ensuring that essential human needs are met and that essential human rights are protected for all people Epidemiology - the study of disease distribution within populations and the risk factors that affect increases or decreases in distribution.