Unit 20: Promoting Health Education- P1

In this unit I am going to explain three different approaches to promoting Health Education the three approaches I am going to explain are Mass Media, Community development and Two way Communication. The first approach to promoting Heath Education is Mass Media. -Mass media-any written, printed, visual, electronic, auto-visual media developed to reach mass audience and the public. -Audience segmentation-division of a population into a more homogenous groups based on similarities in attitudes, beliefs and knowledge.

This allows greater impact of the message. It is used mainly in promoting Health Education to raise public awareness about a particular problem or issue, Stress the ill-effects of unhealthy behavior and the benefits of preventive behavior. Mass Media can be found anywhere and everywhere. Just a few of the many different types of Media are, Television, Radio, billboards, Posters. There have been many different effective National health campaigns such as: Physical activity, diet, smoking, heart disease, sexually transmitted infections and mental health.

There are many different ways of approaching promoting health education such as, planned campaigns and advertising. This has the advantage of targeting a wide target audience and may be tailored to meet specific objectives. Unpaid publicity, this may be low cost campaigns that may seem to provide greater credibility to the target audience. Mass media can use many different approaches to promoting health education. Some of the ways you could promote health education is fear, some campaigns use fear to get the message across and for it to have effect such as, smoking and the effects such as cancer.

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An Example of a mass media campaign used to promote health education is the NHS Anti-smoking campaign that featured a number of media approaches such as very graphic posters and television advertisements such as The ‘I’d do anything’ advertisement. These types of advertisements are designed to motivate smokers to quit and by featuring the children of smokers singing “I’d do anything” from the musical Oliver with the endline: “Your kids would do anything for you.

Why don’t you stop smoking for them? I think that this type of approach would have a very positive outcome with a number of people giving up smoking, The outcomes from this NHS campaign would be measured by Engagement and response, Daily/weekly call figures, Number of NHS Quit Kits ordered and Web stats – unique visits, time spent on site, number of page views Another mass media approach would involve health educators working to encourage healthy lifestyles and wellbeing by educating individuals and communities.

They create awareness on subjects that can prevent diseases, injuries, and other health problems. Health educators attempt to prevent illnesses by informing individuals and communities about health-related topics, such as proper nutrition, the importance of exercise, how to avoid sexually transmitted diseases, and the habits and behaviours necessary to avoid illness. The advantages of using mass media to promote health education are that you can raise important issues and create awareness about them.

Mass media is also a good way to get people thinking about and discussing the issues, it is also a good way of reaching a large audience and a scatter gun approach can be used. On the other hand there are a few disadvantages of using mass media to promote heath education, such as cost effectiveness. Mass media can be very cost effective and have high costs such as advertising. A Scatter gun approach and it may not be as effective as a direct approach. Sometimes you cannot tell who the message is coming from and it is only one way communication.

You also can’t see the outcomes or tell if it has been effective for a very long time. Overall I believe that the use of mass media in health promotion is widely used. It can be used locally, regionally and internationally. But the outcomes of some mass media campaigns are yet to be realized and to be proven as successful or unsuccessful. Mass media is one of the main approaches used in health promotion and its lack of success may be due to its oversimplification or segmented view of health and well-being.

The second approach to promoting Heath Education is Community development. -The process whereby people who are marginalized or living in poverty work together to identify their needs, create change, exert more influence in the decisions which affect their lives and work to improve the quality of their lives, the communities in which they live, and the society of which they are part. Community development involves changing the relationships between ordinary people and people in positions of power, so that everyone can take part in the issues that affect their lives.

It starts from the principle that within any community there is a wealth of knowledge and experience which, if used in creative ways, can be channeled into collective action to achieve the communities' desired goals. Community development is used to promote health education because the problems can be directly targeted and hit. Community development is used to target issues such as environment issues, housing, crime, pollution, support and isolation. By improving these issues you can improve the health issues that have become a consequence, Such as smoking, alcohol, drugs, stress, exercise and crime. See diagram below:

A further approach to community development could involve a multiagency approach. The multiagency approach could involve the Government, local authorities, health trusts, the police, schools and other agencies all co-operating to achieve one outcome within a community. You can promote heath education by targeting an individual group such as children, young people, families and the elderly. It would involve the entire agency’s working together effectively, putting children, young people and their families at the centre of decision making in order to meet their needs and improve their lives.

An example of using community development to promote health education could involve starting a group meeting in a local community centre and doing sport activities. Or the local council providing free health facilities for the community such as Hall Classes that could vary from aerobic sessions or keep fit sessions that could involve using the wide range of equipment available at all the sports centers throughout the borough. The session aims could be to develop fitness, weight control, balance, and coordination, fun and group interaction.

There are many advantages of using community development to promote health education such as working to improve people’s living environment. Providing a joint effort that brings the community together. It can also improve self esteem and make people have a “can do” attitude and empowers the community. It is also effective because it can be done on an effective small scale. I. e. 1-1 or 1-10 and you can be given the feedback automatically. Another benefit may be that it is not cost effective because you could use resources from the mass media such as: leaflets, posters or videos.

On the other hand the disadvantages of using community development to promote health education are having to have a number of people that are committed for it to have an effect, and some people within the community may have a negative attitude and feel as if change is not possible. Others may depend on other people to fix the issues and you may not be able to evaluate the outcomes to see the effectiveness. Another problem may be that the message may not reach everybody within the community or people may hold back on their feelings or opinions.

Overall I believe that Community development is an effective way of promoting health education because it can be used within a community to target a specific area or health problem that may need attention, such as poor housing. I believe that by addressing the main problems you can also target the health problems that have become a result of this. The final approach to promoting health education is two-way communication. -Two-way communication uses communication to negotiate with publics, resolve conflict, and promote mutual understanding.

Two way communication is used to in promoting health education mainly to discuss health issues that may affect certain individuals. Two way communication involves one person having a thought then sending that message to the person who is concerned. The receiver then processes the message and gives the feedback. This cycle continues until a positive outcome has been achieved. Two way communication works by only addressing it to a certain individual whom it may concern such as a doctor to a patient.

Its effectiveness depends on the way it is addressed to the receiver because people with different ages may need to be spoken to differently such as a young child would be spoken to in a different tone of voice or manner compared to an adult. Two way communication is used to promote health and social care in many different ways. It involves basic talking and listening, this can be a very effective simple way of making a positive change. Body language can also contribute to the outcomes of health promotion because if the health promoter shows open, positive body language and shows interest in the feedback they are receiving.

This will show a positive attitude and may have a positive effect because the person who it concerns will feel supported. Two way communication could also be used in the form of leaflets, letters or posters detailing some basic information about the health promotion. Two way communication can also be used to promote health education presented as E-communication by using Email, Facebook and Video. An example of using two way communication to promote health education could involve Voluntary Organizations promoting a health message within a school such as an anti-drugs campaign.

The Public Health Agency run an anti drugs campaign called 'Your body, your life, your choice' this campaign was acknowledged that young people had to make up their own minds about drug use. The campaign works to provide young people with accurate information on the dangers of drugs, and to influence the attitudes of young people so that they are prepared and taught not to experiment with drugs. The target audiences for this campaign are 10-13 year olds and 14-17 year olds and parents. There are many advantages of using two way communication to promote health education.

An advantage of using two way communication is that it can be used on a very cheap, small scale basis such as a 1-1 or a 1-10, you can also be given direct feedback. Sensitive issues can also be discussed between two people. I also think that it is an advantage that the target audience can be chosen to meet the specific health promotion needs, such as aiming an anti-cannabis campaign at 16-19 year olds. On the other hand I think that the disadvantages would be that it may not have the same effectiveness as the mass media approach because it is only being used on a small scale.

I also feel that it is very limited at what health promotions can be used for what audience. Another disadvantage is that I feel that it would be hard to stress the delayed gratifications to the audience and I think that people would rather choose the instant gratifications. Overall I think that using two way communication to promote health education is a good idea because it can be used on a small scale and private, sensitive issues can be discussed. I also think that it is a good effective way of promoting health education because the issues can be targeted and hit where it will make the biggest impact such as in schools.

On the other hand I think that this way of promoting health education may not be as effective as the mass media approach because the mass media approach can reach a wider audience. Health Promoters Health promoters work to promote a positive attitude about keeping healthy, living a healthy lifestyle, preventing illness, and preventing any existing illness from becoming worse. Health promotion covers many different health issues such as diet, obesity, smoking, exercise, alcohol, preventing heart disease, cervical screening, breast screening, sun and health ect.

Health promoters can be found both local and nationally an example of a local health promotion is Refresh Free leisure, Anyone who lives, works, is in full time education or whose GP practice is in Blackburn with Darwen qualifies for free leisure. This campaign depends on the use of mass media, two way communication and community development. An example of a national health campaign is the NHS Anti smoking campaign, this is a national campaign because it was used across the country and across Ireland and Scotland.

This campaign mostly depended on the use of mass media but also used two way communication and community development to create a more effective outcome. An example of a international Health promoter is, The World Health Organization (WHO) this health promoter is the coordinating authority for health within the United Nations system. It is responsible for providing leadership on global health matters, shaping the health research agenda, setting norms and standards, and monitoring and assessing health trends.

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