Strategies for Effective Health Promotion
According to the research, it has been identified that the health promotion is regarded as the process for allowing the people to enhance the control over them thereby improving their health conditions. It is considered to be the set of actions that result in fostering the well-being and good health condition (Baldwin, Fleming & Janda, 2016). The strategies that are required for ensuring the effectiveness of health promotion are as follows:
- Advocacy: Advocacy can be used for health promotion as it is a combination of both social and individual actions which are designed for gaining the policy support, political commitment, social acceptance followed by the support related to healthcare programs. Advocacy is comprised of various kinds of forms including the use of multi-media and mass media, community recruitment followed by the direct political lobbying. It is necessary for the health care professionals to perform the health-related activities as advocates in different levels of the society.
- Mediation: Mediation is a part of the health promotion strategy that deals with social, personal, and economic interests of all people and communities staying in private or public sectors for promoting better health (Smith, Crawford & Signal, 2016).
- Enabling: Enabling is the method of health promotion strategy that allows taking actions regarding a partnership with groups or individuals via mobilization of material and human resources for promoting better health conditions.
The list of potential barriers to the health promotion program is as follows:
- Inappropriate methods of communication: For communicating with the local residents it is always necessary to use multiple channels but using inappropriate methods of communication will not allow promoting health awareness in the local areas.
- Social and cultural issues: In the rural areas it can be seen that the people have lack of trust in the medical professionals due to the beliefs of their own cultures and traditions. These social and cultural issues try to bind the promotion of health awareness in the rural and urban areas.
- Ineffective in motivating the community: The communities are required to be motivated regarding the awareness about health issues and failing to do so results in weakening the health promotion (Batras, Duff & Smith, 2016).
- Barriers related to participation in health promotion: The geographic location acts as a barrier towards the implementation of the health promotion program.
The answer to Question 2
During the research, it has been found that there are various kinds of issues associated with the health promotion. The main problems related to the health promotion are lack of healthcare resources and funding issues for the promotion of better health. It has also been found that there is a lack of understanding about the health promotion by the health care staffs due to the lack of training being given to them (Eldredge, Markham, Ruiter, Kok & Parcel, 2016).
For example, a healthcare organization has organized a health promotion about the causes and effects of Cancer to aware the local people. But the healthcare staffs involved in the promotional activity do not have proper knowledge regarding the causes of Cancer and thus they will provide wrong information to the local people which are supposed to be a major issue (Selvey, Lobo, McCausland, Donovan, Bates & Hallett, 2018). Thus, proper training is always required for the healthcare professionals before organizing any health promotion program.
Health promotion is considered to be the method of influencing people for increasing their control towards the health issues by enriching their healthy behaviors and health literacy. Population-oriented health promotion involves promotional activities for the mass population and communities to reduce the risks associated with negative health impacts (Smith, Crawford & Signal, 2016). For example, organizing a health promotion seminar for mass population regarding the awareness related to drug addiction.
The setting oriented approaches for health promotion is considered to be the multi-disciplinary and holistic method that results in integrating health awareness actions in spite of several risk factors. The main goal of setting oriented approach for health promotion is about maximization of the prevention of diseases through an approach of the whole system. For example, this health settings has been utilized by Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion which includes various kinds of principles such as empowerment, community participation, equity, and partnership (Batras, Duff & Smith, 2016).
The answer to Question 3
The community health needs assessment is regarded as the process for providing descriptions related to the health conditions of the local people. It allows identifying the major risk-oriented factors followed by the causes of certain critical ill health conditions. It helps in finding the necessary actions that are required for addressing the health-related issues (Forbes & Watt, 2015). The community needs assessment is regarded as the critical undertaking for successful planning and implementation of health promotion programs because it helps in delivering the best care followed by informing the communities regarding the best health care services.
Potential Barriers to Health Promotion Programs
During the research it has been found that there are mainly three types of needs which include the following:
- Felt needs: The felt needs are the requirements of the people at it can be collected by performing the assessment of the communities or individuals related to the present situation or the past experience. For example, an asthma patient requires inhaler during his or her critical situation and this situation is categorized under felt needs (Wakerman, Humphreys, Wells, Kuipers, Entwistle & Jones, 2017).
- Needs determined by the organization: Needs determined by the organization is regarded as the decision that is being given by the external organization to any community. For example, the organizational determined requirements have been decided by the Ministry of Health for fulfilling the requirement of the community.
- Express needs: These are requirements which have been moved from the identification level to that of being conveyed to the consideration of experts at different levels by demands, protestations, petitions and so forth these requirements have been stood up or communicated in the form of writing. For example, when a person requires blood in emergency and does not have the money to buy those bottles of blood then he or she can request to the governing authorities in the form of a letter.
Collecting all types of needs is crucial for the health program planning because of the fact that it will help us in gaining a much deeper understanding regarding the basic needs of all the communities. It is much evidence that every community has separate needs based on their social structure and culture (Hadgkiss & Renzaho, 2014). Thus, before performing any health program planning it is always necessary to uncover all the needs of the people within the community for providing better healthcare facilities.
The answer to Question 4
The chosen health issue is related to smoking in Australia. According to the research, it has been analyzed that the Australian Government has taken various kinds of initiates for reducing the prevalence of smoking in several parts of Australia with the planning and implementation of health promotion. The health promotion organized by the Australian government concentrated on the approaches towards tobacco control by implementing social marketing campaigns (Purcell, O’Rourke & Rivis, 2015). The planning of the health promotion included various kinds of activities that were related to the reduction of smoking in Australia such as prevention of initiation, encouragement of the cessation of tobacco intake, and mobilizing the support of the communities for legitimating the policies related to tobacco control.
In the research, it has been found that the Australian Government has initiated a campaign known as “Quit for You, Quit for Two” which was specially prepared for targeting the pregnant women. According to that campaign, the pregnant women were instructed to quit smoking for allowing their children to have a healthy life and these aspects are supposed to help in bridging the gaps that are being analyzed during the assessment of the health promotion activities (Gould, Patten, Glover, Kira & Jayasinghe, 2017).
References
Baldwin, L., Fleming, M. L., & Janda, M. (2016). Chronic disease health promotion programs in Australia: How is program sustainability incorporated into planning, implementation or evaluation of programs?. PROSPERO International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews, CRD-42016035343.
Batras, D., Duff, C., & Smith, B. J. (2016). Organizational change theory: implications for health promotion practice. Health Promotion International, 31(1), 231-241.
Eldredge, L. K. B., Markham, C. M., Ruiter, R. A., Kok, G., & Parcel, G. S. (2016). Planning health promotion programs: an intervention mapping approach. John Wiley & Sons.
Forbes, H., & Watt, E. (2015). Jarvis’s Physical Examination and Health Assessment. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Gould, G. S., Patten, C., Glover, M., Kira, A., & Jayasinghe, H. (2017). Smoking in pregnancy among Indigenous women in high-income countries: a narrative review. Nicotine & Tobacco Research, 19(5), 506-517.
Hadgkiss, E. J., & Renzaho, A. M. (2014). The physical health status, service utilization and barriers to accessing care for asylum seekers residing in the community: a systematic review of the literature. Australian Health Review, 38(2), 142-159.
Purcell, K. R., O’Rourke, K., & Rivis, M. (2015). Tobacco control approaches and inequity—how far have we come and where are we going?. Health promotion international, 30(suppl_2), ii89-ii101.
Selvey, L. A., Lobo, R. C., McCausland, K. L., Donovan, B., Bates, J., & Hallett, J. (2018). Challenges facing Asian sex workers in Western Australia: implications for health promotion and support services. Frontiers in public health, 6.
Smith, J. A., Crawford, G., & Signal, L. (2016). The case of national health promotion policy in Australia: where to now?. Health Promotion Journal of Australia, 27(1), 61-65.
Wakerman, J., Humphreys, J., Wells, R., Kuipers, P., Entwistle, P., & Jones, J. (2017). A systematic review of primary health care delivery models in rural and remote Australia 1993-2006.