Student/faculty practice and research in occupational health: health promotion and outcome evaluation

Faculty strive to connect theory and practice with real life situations for students. This study evolved from student intervention with small industries as part of their undergraduate community health nursing clinical experience. A pre-experimental static group design was used to explore the impact of health service availability on selected cardiovascular risk factors. Levels of health service: a) no service; b) student service; and c) formal health care service were compared. Chi-square, t-tests and MANOVA analyses supported three hypotheses that student intervention was equally as successful as formal health care service in reducing the selected cardiovascular risk factors of high weight to height ratios, blood pressure readings above 140/90 on three separate measurements, total cholesterol readings above accepted norms and a health risk profile which identifies risk for cardiovascular disease.