RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Role of Public Health Agencies in Addressing Child and Family Poverty: Public Health Nurses’ Perspectives
Benita E. Cohen* , Marion McKay
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2010Volume: 4
First Page: 60
Last Page: 71
Publisher ID: TONURSJ-4-60
DOI: 10.2174/1874434601004010060
PMID: 21347213
PMCID: PMC3043274
Article History:
Received Date: 27/8/2010Revision Received Date: 18/10/2010
Acceptance Date: 19/10/2010
Electronic publication date: 30/11/2010
Collection year: 2010
open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
Poverty rates among child-bearing families in industrialised countries remain unacceptably high and have significant implications for population health. Both today and in the past, public health nurses have observed the impact of poverty on family health and well-being every day in their practice; yet, their perspectives on their role in addressing child and family poverty are currently absent from the literature. This paper presents findings of a qualitative descriptive study that explored perspectives of public health nurses in an urban Canadian setting about the impact of poverty on the well-being of children and families, and the potential roles of health organisations and public health nurses in addressing this issue. A key finding is the large gap between the role that nurses believe they can potentially play, and their current role. Barriers that public health nurses encounter when attempting to address poverty are identified, and implications of the findings for public health policy, practice, and research are discussed.
