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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Recorded presentation

Carol R. Shelton, PhD¹, Susan Brawner, RN², Lynn Blanchette, RN, MS³, Richard Corrente, RN, BS⁴, Sonia Depina, RN, BS², Douglas Hobin, RN⁵, Felicia Ofakansi, RN, BS⁵, and Carolyn Wood, RN, PHD¹. (1) Nursing, Rhode Island College, 600 Mt. Pleasant Ave., Providence, RI 02907, (2) Rhode Island Hospital, 593 Eddy St., Providence, RI 02903, 401-738-6102, sstmartin@lifespan.org, (3) College of Nursing, University of Rhode Island, Upper College Rd., Kingston, RI 02881, (4) Neonatal Intensive Care, Women and Infants Hospital, 101 Dudley St, Providence, RI 02905, (5) Jane Brown, Rhode Island Hospital, 593 Eddy St, Providence, RI 02903

Students in the Community/Public Health Nursing course are required to complete a public health policy project during the semester. The project is a group undertaking of each clinical section. In the fall of 2005, a group of students including three registered nurses and two generic students focused on a problem that was beginning to attract the attention of poverty advocates and eventually state legislators: the increase in the cost of oil, gas and electricity and the increase in the number of families whose utilities were turned off because of their inability to pay the high costs. Questions arose, “What happens to people who do not have heat and electricity? What are the health consequences of such actions?” The students' research led to the discovery of this problem as it had been articulated in Great Britain. Here it was termed “Fuel Poverty”.

The public policy project is designed to assist students to develop a comprehensive understanding of the public health problem, to critically analyze the roots of the problem, to propose policy solutions to address the problem and to develop advocacy skills that can lead to changes in policy to reduce and/or limit the serious consequences that result when nothing is done.

The students developed a sophisticated understanding of the United States environmental policy as it relates to fossil fuels and the economic and global consequences of the country's policy decisions. The health consequences associated with this problem on individuals and families in the community became quite obvious. The students brought their research to the attention of the R.I. Public Utility Commission as well as to the legislators in the state at hearings that were conducted at the State House and at the Public Utility Commission. They worked with advocacy groups in the community to bring attention of this serious public health problem to the general public. The public policy consequences of their work will be known at the end of the legislative session in Rhode Island in June, 2006.

Learning Objectives:

• To describe the application of a public policy assignment to a newly recognized public health problem.
• To define "Fuel Poverty" and discuss the health consequences of living without adequate heat or electricity.
• To recognize the relationship between global economic policies in oil and gas and its affect on low-income and vulnerable groups.
• To develop an understanding of the necessity of working with broad-based caolitions in working toward solutions for this problem.

Keywords: Advocacy, Public Health Curriculum

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No

Recorded presentation