Role of Community Nurses and Challenges Towards Providing Non-communicable Disease Services in Selected Blocks of Selected District in West Bengal

Introduction: Now communicable diseases (NCDs) are the leading explanation of mortality in India. Treatment cost is almost doubled for NCD as compared to other chronic illnesses. Community nurses are the key stakeholders for the management of NCDs at the community level. Objectives: A descriptive survey study was undertaken among community nurses of selected blocks of selected district of W.B., with the objectives of assessing the role of community nurses towards NCDs services and to find out the challenges towards providing NCDs services. Methods: Total 100 community nurses were selected through multistage sampling technique. Data were collected through semi-structured and structured interview schedule. All tools were tested for validity and reliability before data collection. Results: Most of the community nurses were adopted the roles of educator (99.35%), rehabilitator (98.6%), care provider (97.59%), supervisor (96.9%) and administrator (92.32%) respectively whereas they performed collaborator role only 69.35% towards non-communicable disease services. Most common challenges faced by the community nurses were overburden with a high inflow of patient (78%), overloaded with documentation (69%), lack of training (47%) and lack of awareness among community people regarding accessing non-communicable diseases services (14%) etc. Conclusion: Signaling the challenges faced by the community nurses and inadequate role performance in areas like providing care, there is a need for constant supervision and timely training among the community nurses.