What steps would the nurse take to address these as part of a health education plan?

The role of health education in health promotion is vital. Health promotion by definition is “educating people about healthy lifestyles, reduction of risk, developmental needs, activities of daily living (ADL’s) and preventive self-care.” (Whitney et al., 2018). In order to live a healthy lifestyle an individual must know what a “healthy lifestyle” consists of. The same goes for reducing risks, ADL’s, preventative self-care and developmental needs. It is important for the healthcare professional or in our case, the nurse, to educate an individual continuously for the duration of the patient’s care with the nurse. They should be educated on what the medications are that they are being given, as well as why it is being administered, dosage, route etc. For example, patients always want to know why they are getting Lovenox or Protonix when they have not taken it before. They should also be educated on diet choices, at the hospital that I work at, sometimes the patients will be placed on certain diets like nothing by mouth (NPO), American Diabetes Association (ADA), renal, heart healthy, low potassium etc., and they state that they do not have diet restrictions at home, so they have to be educated on why they were placed on the diet and they should consider this type of diet once discharged.