Health Promotion Programs. (SOPHE) Society for Public Health Education. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: (SOPHE) Society for Public Health Education
Издательство: John Wiley & Sons Limited
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Жанр произведения: Медицина
Год издания: 0
isbn: 9781119770909
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of actions at multiple levels by individuals, groups, healthcare systems, community human service organizations, businesses, schools, colleges and universities, and governments to combat the virus. The actions span from individual behaviors to governmental policies and legislation—hand washing, social distancing, and self-quarantine combined with stay-at-home orders and travel restrictions. Businesses made employee and customer health promotion and safety a priority. The actions had clear health outcomes that impacted individuals and whole populations of people and communities across the globe.

      COVID-19 is a brutal exclamation point to America’s pervasive ill health. Americans with obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and other diet-related diseases were three times more likely to suffer worsened outcomes from COVID-19, including death. Had we flattened the still-rising curves of these conditions, it is quite possible that our fight against the virus would have looked very different. The need for health promotion programs is greater than ever.

      Figure 1.1 Health promotion is associated with more than just healthcare to impact health outcomes linked to length and quality of life

      Health promotion programs are designed, implemented, and evaluated in complex and complicated dynamic environments. They are multifaceted and multi-leveled. We work directly with people trying to figure out how to best address their health needs. We work in schools, colleges and universities, communities, workplaces, and healthcare organizations. At the same time, we are surrounded by forces greater than any organization and group of individuals. The result is that processes of planning, implementing, and evaluating health promotion programs unfold in a nonlinear progression of small steps forward and sometime a couple steps backward. It is dynamic.

      Health, Health Promotion, and Health Promotion Programs

      Health promotion and health promotion programs are rooted in the World Health Organization’s (1947) definition of health as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” While most of us can identify when we are sick or have some infirmity, identifying the characteristics of complete physical, mental, and social well-being is often a bit more difficult. What does complete physical, mental, and social well-being look like? How will we know when or if we arrive at that state?

      In 1986, the first International Conference of Health Promotion, held in Ottawa, Canada, issued the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion, which defined health in a broader perspective: “health has been considered less as an abstract state and more as a means to an end which can be expressed in functional terms as a resource which permits people to lead an individually, socially, and economically productive life” (World Health Organization, 1986). Accordingly, health in this view is a resource for everyday life, not the object of living. It is a positive concept emphasizing social and personal resources as well as physical capabilities.

      Arnold and Breen (2006) identified the characteristics of health not only as well-being but also as a balanced state, growth, functionality, wholeness, transcendence, and empowerment and as a resource. Perhaps the view of health as a balanced state between the individual (host), agents (such as bacteria, viruses, and toxins), and the environment is one of the most familiar. Most individuals can readily understand that occasionally the host-agent interaction becomes unbalanced and the host (the individual) no longer is able to ward off the agent (for example, when bacteria overcome a person’s natural defenses, making the individual sick).

Concept Definition
Intrapersonal level Individual characteristics that influence behavior, such as knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and personality traits
Interpersonal level Interpersonal processes and primary groups, including family, friends, and peers, that provide social identity, support, and role definition
Population level Institutional factors Social capital factors Public policy factors Rules, regulations, policies, and informal structures that may constrain or promote recommended behaviors Social networks and norms or standards that may be formal or informal among individuals, groups, or organizations Local, state, and federal policies and laws that regulate or support healthy actions and practices for prevention, early detection, control, and management of disease
Source: Adapted from McLeroy, K. R., Bibeau, D., Steckler, A., & Glanz, K. (1988). An ecological perspective on health promotion programs. Health Education Quarterly, 15, 351–377.

      Health promotion programs provide planned, organized, and structured activities and events over time that focus on helping individuals make informed decisions about their health. Health promotion programs promote policy, environmental, regulatory, organizational, and legislative changes at various levels of government and organizations. These two complementary types of interventions by design achieve specific objectives to improve the health of individuals as well as, potentially, all individuals at a site. Health promotion programs take advantage of the pivotal position of their setting within schools, colleges and universities, workplaces, healthcare organizations, and communities to reach children, adults, and families by combining