Health and Health Promotion

Definition of Health and Health Promotion

• Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, not just the absence of disease and infirmity.
• Health promotion is the process of enabling people to increase control over the determinants of health and thereby improve their health.

Characteristics of Health Promotion

• Comprehensive social and political process.
• Strengthens the skills and capabilities of individuals.
• Changes social, environmental, and economic conditions to alleviate their impact on public and individual health.
• Participation is essential to sustain health promotion action.

Examples of Health Promotion Activities

• Water and sanitation activities.
• Nutrition programs for a community.
• Infection prevention activities, such as immunization.
• Awareness campaigns on HIV testing.

Goals and Objectives of Health Promotion

• Goal: Strengthen the skills and capabilities of individuals and groups to improve individual and public health.
• Objectives:
  • Prevent disease and early medical treatment.
  • Prevent complications of diseases.
  • Ensure people are well-informed and able to make healthy choices.
  • Help people acquire skills and confidence to take control over their health.
  • Change policies and environments to facilitate healthy choices.

Scope of Health Promotion

• Determined by expected health outcomes and methods.
• Includes educational and environmental supports for actions and conditions conducive to health.

Principles of Health Promotion

• Equity in health: Ensure equal opportunities for wellbeing and fair access to health resources.
• Empowerment for health: Enable individuals and communities to express their needs and take control over their health.
• Participatory: Involve those concerned in all stages of planning, implementation, and evaluation.
• Inter-sectoral: Collaboration between agencies from relevant sectors.
• Sustainable: Bring about changes that can be maintained once initial funding has ended.
• Multi-strategy: Use a variety of approaches, including policy, development, organizational change, community development, legislation, advocacy, education, and communication.
• Holistic: Foster physical, mental, social, and spiritual health.

Health Promotion Strategies and Approaches

• Enabling: Empower individuals and groups through mobilization of human and material resources.
• Creating environments that are supportive of health: Mediate in society to promote and protect health.
• Advocacy: Create the essential conditions for health through lobbying, social marketing, and community organizing.

Health Promotion Approaches

• Preventive approach:
  • Primary prevention: Prevent disease onset.
  • Secondary prevention: Prevent the progression of disease.
  • Tertiary prevention: Reduce further disability or prevent recurrence of illness.
• Behavior change approach: Bring about change in individual behavior through changes in individuals' knowledge.
• Self-Empowerment approach: Empower individuals to make healthy choices through education and skill-building.