Abstract
The purpose of this qualitative study was to describe the characteristics of the project processes employed by public health nurses engaged in new planning and administrative projects. Five projects in three municipalities in which public health nurses were engaged in planning and administration were studied. A qualitative descriptive method was employed for semi-structured interviews and analysis. As a result, nine categories of activities were specific : grasping the actual situation and the health problems of the inhabitants and determining the necessity of new health services; considering the validity of project to be necessity for that community ; understanding the organization and judging the opportunity to carry out a new project ; carrying out trials of new projects ; positing municipal, prefectural, and national policies ; coordinating ; networking among sections of a municipality or other agencies ; encouraging the independence of the inhabitants or self-help groups and supporting their activities to continue and develop them ; and organizations evaluating the effects of a new project and planning the development or expansion of a project. At the time a new project is initiated, public health nurses have already grasped the needs of the inhabitants and are prepared to begin the new project immediately. In addition, public health nurses have always been consciously collecting information about policies, model measures and auxiliary measures of the government or the prefecture, and they have been prepared to position a new project within the policies and activities of their municipalities. In addition, under constant evaluation, these projects, while spreading throughout the community, are being developed and expanded.
