The 2023 National Nurses Month Celebration theme is “You Make A Difference – Anytime, Anywhere & Always” and is divided into weekly focus areas which include: Self-Care, Recognition, Professional Development, and Community Engagement.
The University of Kentucky of College of Public Health (CPH) recognizes the intersection of public health and nursing, which comprises the largest professional segment of the workplace in public health. These synergistic professionals are involved in prevention, education, advocacy, activism, assessment, and evaluation of public health.
The title “public health nurse” designates a nursing professional with educational preparation in public health and nursing science with a primary focus on population-level outcomes. In short, they hold a vital role in the prevention of disease and help to promote community health and safety.
Dr. Jones has spent most of her professional career in nursing education. While not educated in public health officially, her passion and service has been promoting the health of rural populations including rural elders, farmers, and members of Anabaptist communities.
Community Impact
Last year, Dr. Jones and her colleague completed a community-based medication safety program for rural elders. Funded by the Anthem Foundation, the program was designed to develop, implement, and evaluate the Rural Elder Awareness of Medication Safety (REAMS) project.
The nurse-led educational program was a collaborative, interdisciplinary effort between nurses and pharmacists and was conducted in two rural counties in south-central Kentucky. Forty-nine rural elders participated in an individualized educational session focused on self-efficacy, adherence to refills, and medication knowledge. Findings suggest an interdisciplinary, community-based, individualized medication educational intervention could increase medication adherence in older rural adults.
Dr. Jones provided leadership in the formation and sustainability of a community-based organization, The Kentucky Partnership for Farm Family Health and Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit organization began in 1992 supported by funds from a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. The mission of the organization is to prevent agricultural illnesses, injuries, and fatalities and promote health and safety practices among farm families and their communities.
Dr. Jones was the organization's Regional Coordinator and serves on the board of directors. This organization has established multiple community partnerships and served as the sponsor of an annual Progressive Agriculture Foundation (PAF) Safety Day since the beginning of this safety program. For over 25 years, Dr. Jones has served as Coordinator or Assistant Coordinator of the PAF Safety Day in her community. Over 500 4th grade students attend this event each year learning about safe practices on the farm.
During the past few years, Dr. Jones has been an active member of a statewide initiative, Raising Hope. The primary goal of the organization is to prevent suicide among the farming population. Dr. Jones and her colleagues at WKU conducted focus group interviews with farmers to gain a better understanding of the stress farmers encounter. The lack of appreciation and limited understanding of the occupation of farming by the non-farming public was reported as a major source of stress.
Sponsored by the Raising Hope initiative, Dr. Jones and her colleagues implemented a Farmer Cultural Awareness project to provide farmers with a voice to share their rich stories. Nineteen farmers from south central Kentucky were interviewed to capture the “lived experiences” of farming. These farmers represented a cross section of gender, race, age, and agricultural commodities.
A website was built to highlight clips and information on the farmers. To promote the farmer stories and the website, informational cards highlighting each farmer were created and printed. Each card contains a QR Code that links the individual farmer to the website. Also, large canvas bags were purchased. The bags contain an image of the state of Kentucky with samples of some favorite foods such as milk, fruit, and pizza along with a statement, “Farmers produce our favorite foods.”
Over 5,000 of these bags have been distributed at sites attended primarily by non-farmers to show appreciation of farmers for their contribution to our quality of life.
In response to limited mental health providers in rural areas along with the stigma associated with mental illness, Dr. Jones and her WKU team created a 1-credit-hour interactive, continuing education course, CRUSH-ing Farmer Suicide.
The course focuses on how to prevent farmer suicide through cultural respect, understanding, sensitivity, and humility (CRUSH). It delves into the culture of farming and how this knowledge can help health care providers respond to a farmer in crisis. Over 600 health care professionals have completed this training.
Mennonite Community
Dr. Jones has worked with the South-Central KY AHEC (Area Health Education Center) program at WKU on numerous projects throughout the years. Together, they formed a unique service-learning partnership between an old order Mennonite community, an emerging population in agriculture, and nursing and medicine.
Using a participatory approach, the members of the community requested an educational topic for each month. Students (nursing, medicine, and others) prepared the educational presentation and provided health screening and services. For over 20 years, Dr. Jones arranged the monthly gatherings in the old order Mennonite community until the onset of the pandemic.
Her work with this community led to future work with other Anabaptist communities including the establishment of a genetic clinic, WeCare Clinic-Medical Care for Special Needs in Pembroke, KY, where she serves on the Board of Directors.
Dr. Jones, and Jenn Harris, Director of the Todd County Health Department, were invited to CPH’s 2023 National Public Health Week to present on “Mennonite Population of Kentucky and Celebrating Care.
Kentucky's Mennonite populations is listed as the 8th largest on the North American continent, one of the fastest growing in the past 20 years. Dr. Jones and Harris facilitated questions including:
Agricultural Health Nursing
From 2011 to 2016, Dr. Jones served as co-investigator for the five-year NIOSH (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) Project, Nurses Utilizing Research, Service, Education & Practice (NURSE-AP) developing a novel 3-credit-hour online academic course, Agricultural Health Nursing.
The content of the course served as the foundation for the development of two continuing education CE programs for health care providers: 1) The Nursing Response to Mental Health Issues in Agriculture Populations and 2) Providing Quality Health Care for Plain (Anabaptist) Populations.
Qualitative methods (interviews) were used to collect data to support the content of these on-line, interactive programs. In support of research to practice, the CE programs are currently available online for health care providers nationwide via (https://ky.train.org course # 1068945 and #1068571).
40 years as an educator
Dr. Jones is a Professor Emerita in the School of Nursing and Allied Health at Western Kentucky University (WKU). She earned her BSN from the University of Tennessee in Memphis, MSN from Vanderbilt University, and a PhD from the University of Cincinnati.
Dr. Jones taught nursing at WKU for over 40 years. She holds certification as a nursing educator (CNE) and is a fellow in the National League for Nursing-Academy of Nursing Education. She previously served as President of the Kentucky Nurses Association and two terms on the Kentucky Board of Nursing.
Dr. Jones continues to use her knowledge and skills to improve the health of rural populations; however, her greatest sense of accomplishment has been serving as a mentor for young emerging leaders who will hopefully follow in her footsteps.
