Pennsylvania Nurse, Front Page 2017 Issue 1 | Page 9
nal AACN Essentials document)
provides a framework for the
member centers of the Wellness
Committee to document nurse-led
wellness center activities prepar-
ing undergraduate nursing stu-
dents to engage in health promo-
tion, community education, and
outcomes analysis.
Essential VII (AACN, 2013, p.
21) included four recommenda-
tions for which the BSN should
prepare:
1. Participate in activities that
facilitate community involve-
ment in creating a healthy
environment for individuals,
families, and groups.
2. Collaborate with commu-
nity partners to promote the
health of individuals and
families within the popula-
tion.
3. Practice evidence-based pub-
lic health nursing to promote
the health of individuals,
families, and groups.
4. Partner with key stakeholders
and groups in care delivery to
individuals, families, groups.
During their clinical experience,
undergraduate students assigned
to NLWCs, whether located in
a specific site such as a senior
center, as well as a center without
walls, can meet Essential VII via
various health promotion and
wellness activities in which they
are actively engaged. Due to the
different primary and secondary
prevention and health promotion
Table 1. Wellness Committee Goals 2015-2016
• Complete literature reviews regarding nurse-led managed health
clinics to utilize findings for best practices in member centers
• Review data that NNCC has collected regarding wellness centers
• Explore what data points would be beneficial for the Wellness
Committee to utilize when applying for future funding
• Continue to explore opportunities for abstract submission
highlighting Wellness Centers at professional conferences
• Perform a program assessment to determine student perceptions
of nursing roles outside traditional settings
activities occurring in the com-
munity at any given week, clinical
experiences range from assigning
pairs of students at one time, to a
clinical group of eight students, to
engage in nurse-led wellness activi-
ties in the community. Ongoing
dialogue and collaboration be-
tween faculty and nurse-led center
staff is essential when planning,
implementing, and evaluating
undergraduate clinical activities.
Specific examples of clinical activ-
ities in NLWCs from the wellness
committee schools in Pennsylvania
are found in Table 2.
Outcomes from
NLWCs
Anecdotal evidence supports
NLWC outcomes, including: ap-
propriate utilization of healthcare
services; prevention of hospital-
ization; improved health man-
agement; patient satisfaction;
and student learning outcomes
(improved cultural competence
and meeting competencies for
public/population health). How-
ever, quantitative outcomes data
for NLWCs are more difficult to
collect. One example of a retro-
spective chart review included
181 patients who used six differ-
ent NLWCs in 2011 compared to
a sample of one insurer’s patients
who did not receive nurse led well-
ness centers (Thompson, Bucher,
& Bell, 2016). Examples of the
range of outcomes data that can
or have been collected are shown
in Table 3.
The zip code data project is an
initiative by the NNCC wellness
committee to quantify outcomes
across several NLWCs. This proj-
ect engaged undergraduate stu-
dents in clinical experiences. The
wellness committee collaborated
with the Community College of
Philadelphia (CCP) to implement
a uniform data collection system.
CCP secured project funding from
The Independence Foundation.
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