Community Education Project?

Nursing Students Student Assist

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I just started my final class in an RN program, Leadership Management & Community Health. I have to do a community teaching project and need to turn in an idea and outline asap. Several of my classmates are doing hand washing at day cares and grade schools. I want to do something different. I thought about teaching something at the senior citizens center. I found out that approximately 75% of the attendees are diabetic and it was insinuated that they might need some nutrition teaching. I have done similar presentations before on this topic at the LPN level and would like to explore a different area, I just don't have any good ideas. If anyone has any ideas, I am not limited to any particular group, it can be even a church group, class room, or anyone else I can get together in a group of no less than 10 people. Any ideas or info will be greatly appreciated!

THANKS!! :bowingpur

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Specializes in FNP, Peds, Epilepsy, Mgt., Occ. Ed.

Do you know someone who is a member of a community organization such as Lions Club, Rotary, or something along those lines? They usually enjoy having speakers come in and do a short presentation.

MRSA is a good, current topic to do, and there's enough talk out in the media to make people interested. You can get information from websites like the CDC that's geared to the general public.

If you want to do something on diabetes, maybe instead of doing diet or exercise teaching, go over what patients can expect when they visit their PCP. For example, yearly dilated eye exams, A1c every three months, blood pressure every visit, etc, and why these things are important in the prevention of complications.

Yet another topic that isn't talked about nearly enough is antibiotic overuse and misuse; why antibiotics aren't always appropriate, why it's important to take all of them as directed, why it's not a good idea to buy stock bottles from Mexico and pop a few when you don't feel well, etc etc.

Figure out who your audience is going to be and then tailor your presentation to that (you might do breast self-exam for a women's group, but if you do MRSA at lunch you probably want to skip the really gross photos!).

Hope this has helped a little.

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Thanks so much for these great ideas. I have decided to go with antibiotic resistance. I plan to address a group of parents and grandparents of young children. I have noticed that this is a much needed topic in my rural community, but would have never thought to use it for this project, so thanks again!:up:

If anyone else wants to use this topic for teaching, cdc.gov/antibioticresistance is a good place to start.

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Specializes in med/surg, telemetry, IV therapy, mgmt.

i was going to suggest foot care or fingerstick testing and how people can get testing supplies paid for through their part b medicare coverage if you are going to do this in a senior center. foot care and examination of the feet for open sores is something that can be done by everyone even if they don't have diabetes.

you can find other ideas from some of the teaching materials (which you can download and print) for diabetes on this website:

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