According to Maurer and Smith (2013, p.17), “teaching is the process of imparting cognitive knowledge, skills, and values.” So, nurses have a special role in caring for the ill and preventing diseases due to their knowledge of many skills. More so, a community health nurse has special opportunities to foster human development and capabilities through client education. Furthermore, a primary responsibility of community health nurses is teaching to promote health. Evidently, diabetes has been one of the chronic diseases that seems to have a major toll on every community. Study has proven that diabetes mellitus is one of the major health concerns in the communities of the people of Haitian descent (Vimalananda, Rosenzweig, …show more content…
The target group age was between 40 to 55 and classified as the middle-age adults. The author used the 11 functional health patterns to assess the group and realized at this age, their health is compromised due to higher risk of living with chronic disease such as hypertension or diabetes. Furthermore, the Haitian community views health as a personal responsibility and self-treat as a way to promote health or prevent disease. They use home remedies first before seeking help which make them more vulnerable to carry a chronic disease without knowing it. According to Vimalananda et al., (2011) diabetes is a major health concern for the Haitian community, and they have the worse glycemic control compared with both African Americans and non-Hispanic whites in an urban safety-net hospital. In fact, diabetes is a major health concern for the United States (U.S.) population too. According to American Diabetes Association [ADA] (2016) “Diabetes is the seventh leading cause of death in the U.S. and can cause serious health complications.” In 2014, about 29.1 million people have diabetes, 86 million have prediabetes, and about $245 billion of total medical costs and lost work and wages for people with diagnosed diabetes (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2015). Taking all this in consideration, the author developed a teaching plan to address the unique features of Haitian culture and health beliefs that may affect the course of diabetes