Sustaining a nurse‐led community partnership to promote environmental justice

Abstract

The Westlawn Partnership for a Healthier Environment (WPHE) is a longstanding group of community stakeholders that was formed over a decade ago to identify, prioritize, and address environmental health (EH) concerns in a low‐income, predominantly African American, urban neighborhood, which faces a disproportionate burden of EH risks, particularly asthma. Launched by the University of Wisconsin‐Milwaukee College of Nursing, which established a nurse‐managed health center within the community 30 years ago, WPHE utilized the Protocol of Assessing Community Excellence in Environment Health methodology to develop, implement, and sustain the partnership. WPHE implemented programs for Healthy Homes, Healthy Day Cares, and bicycling, and made system and infrastructure changes within the community to address the top identified EH concerns: indoor and outdoor air pollution, mold exposure, access to safe and healthy food, and pesticide exposure. WPHE's efforts have resulted in significant local, state, and national policy impacts to promote environmental justice. This brief report shares how the partnership was formed, its priorities, major activities and accomplishments, and insights into sustaining a community‐based EH partnership, including recommendations for the key role that public health nurses can play to promote environmental justice.

Generating Data Visualizations of Longitudinal Cohort Ambient Air Pollution Exposure

“…Although this nursing work was notably part of cross-sector coalition building, multidisciplinary and community engaged, nursing expertise presented a trusted catalyst among stakeholders to direct the relevance and meaningful reach of an environmental health project. 32 Similar narratives about the often overlooked, but essential role of nurses in environmental health and environmental justice include Charlotte Brody and Liz Boornazian. Nurse Brody, committed to healthy lifestyle habits, became an evidence-based advocate after her own comprehensive testing of the body burden of chemicals.…”

“…In this study, we created descriptive data visualizations and a sample written report-back intervention that was tailored to respond to grassroots community member concerns about exposure to ambient pollution from a factory criminally convicted of violating the Clean Air Act. Although this nursing work was notably part of cross-sector coalition building, multidisciplinary and community engaged, nursing expertise presented a trusted catalyst among stakeholders to direct the relevance and meaningful reach of an environmental health project 32 . Similar narratives about the often overlooked, but essential role of nurses in environmental health and environmental justice include Charlotte Brody and Liz Boornazian.…”

“…Examples of community health management nursing interventions may include biomarker or physiologic screening for health risks from environmental exposures; participating in multidisciplinary initiatives, programs, or coalitions to reduce environmental health hazards; promoting health protective government policy; community health education; and care coordination for at-risk groups and communities. Nurse-led community partnerships focused on environmental health have implemented programs to reduce home environmental toxin exposures (such as pesticide, chemical, and mold exposures), environmentally friendly transportation initiatives, and healthy food access 32 …”

“…Nurse-led community partnerships focused on environmental health have implemented programs to reduce home environmental toxin exposures (such as pesticide, chemical, and mold exposures), environmentally friendly transportation initiatives, and healthy food access. 32 Engaged stakeholders from the grassroots meetings in this project had expressed a great deal of interest in a subsequent health study to ascertain short-and long-term health effects from the air pollution at the site, which had now decreased substantially. 15 Our data visualizations and study revealed that achieving adequate statistical power is highly unlikely to study excess cancer risks associated with ambient and community, nonoccupational, benzene exposures.…”