What is health promotion and education? ~ Zeniths Blog

Our world changes rapidly and this brings about new challenges to people. Health education and promotion is a new branch of social science that can provide better adaptation for humanity to survive! What is health education and promotion? Continue reading to find out more!

Health promotion and education

Health promotion and education is seen as a new branch of social science and even as a profession! It synthesized various types of sciences:

Environmental;
Psychological;
Medical;
Social.

Health promotion and education is a system of systematic knowledge, strategies, and skills to protect communities from various diseases. It’s the development of individuals and communities towards protection from harmful ailments and diseases.

Health education and promotion specialist

Various educational institutions around the world have a need for health education and promotion specialists. The developed countries of the world, like the USA, GB, Canada, France, and others are making big strides when it comes to getting these specialists. The main idea of these programmes is to train specialists who can monitor and prevent diseases from spreading in towns and cities.

Another major job for these specialists is determining the sources of diseases and neutralizing them. Health specialists can work in various institutions, facilities, and departments. These include schools, gyms, non-profit organizations, clinics, and hospitals. They can also continue their education in universities to get even higher salaries on their future job positions.

Health promotion can be an ideal specialization for students who want to provide help to others. Students can also learn various major factors and risks connected with the spread of diseases in the society. Health education and promotion is a part of the World Health Organization (WHO) programmes. Health education and promotion specialists are required in various regions of the world!

What is health education?

Health education is a combination of various areas of education, such as:

Spiritual health;
Intellectual health;
Emotional health;
Social health;
Physical health;
Environmental health.

Health education can also be defined as any kind of education experience that relates to an awareness about health. The WHO defines health education as a constant opportunity to acquire various information concerning health.

Concept of health education

The concept of health education was created in the 1950s. The main idea was to teach specialists who can fight and prevent the spreading of various diseases. It was a part of a new approach to medicine. It led to the creation of

health-educators. These are health specialists in various institutions who would be able to alert others about diseases. There were various approaches which provide specific learning techniques to the future health educators.

Health educators are supposed to be professionals who can perform various duties relating to health education. Their main responsibility is to create and provide various procedures, strategies, approaches, methods that can lead to a healthy existence of an individual or group of individuals.

Principles of health education

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Interest in health education. People who don’t have an interest in the health education are not able to spark this interest to others. Therefore, it`s impossible to help patients who are not interested in their well-being.
Participation in health education. This principle is based on constant learning and discussions in groups on topics that deal with health education.
The principle of comprehension. It is the ability to acquire and imbibe knowledge about health.
The principle of reinforcement. This is aimed at ensuring that the specialist will not lose his or her skills;
The principle of motivation. This principle supposes that a health specialist is motivated in providing help and can motivate others to get this help.

What is health promotion?

It`s a process responsible for increasing the awareness of the health of people. Health promotion as a process includes a wide range of social interventions. According to the WHO standards, there are three main elements of health promotion:

Healthy Cities. This element ensures the responsibility of city authorities to provide health -related opportunities to citizens. It also includes building up rural and urban areas according to the international standards.
Health Literacy. It includes promoting health education in various educational institutions.
Good Health Governance. This element requires the good governance of medical facilities in a country. It also includes various policies directed toward improving health facilities.

Principles of health promotion

Health Promotion includes the whole population of a country;
Health Promotion is directed towards determination of the source of diseases;
Health Promotion includes various legal actions which helps to increase the health condition of a country.

Conclusion

Health education and promotion are the two elements of social studies that can lead to great changes of the health condition of a population. So, it`s very important to train professionals who specialize in health education and promotion.

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