Difficulties perceived by public health nurses and nurses who perform health promotion activities: a qualitative interview survey
Toko Odagawa, Masanori Oikawa, Atsushi Asai
First Published: August 5, 2025
[in Japanese]
Abstract
This study aimed to elucidate the difficulties and doubts perceived by public health nurses and nurses who perform health promotion activities for citizens and workers, and to obtain clues regarding their relationships with ethical concerns relating to these activities. A semi-structured interview survey was conducted with public health nurses and nurses with experience engaging in health promotion activities. Public health nurses understood their own roles and the significance of their health promotion activities, and desired happiness for citizens through promoting health. On the other hand, some public health nurses had doubts about the effects and aims of the health promotion activities. Among these nurses, some felt contradictions between their professional responsibilities and their personal thoughts regarding health promotion, leading to difficulties with providing health guidance. When considering the results of this study as well as those of previous studies, in the current health promotion system, there is a tendency to overly emphasize an individual’s responsibility for their own health, leading to concerns of citizens harboring negative emo-tions. Our findings confirm the importance of not taking the aggressive stance of pursuing only an individual’s re-sponsibility for their own health more than necessary in settings where health guidance and education are being provided.
Key words
Health guidance, Health Promotion, Public Health Ethics, Public Health Nurse, Thematic Analysis
