Health Care Strategic Plan

Health Care Strategic Plan

Introduction

The concept of health promotion initially emerged and continues to gain strength as an approach to improving health status and health condition of people. Health promotion is a key component of the complex relationship between actions, knowledge, attitudes, behaviour, and health outcomes from the individual to the societal level. Health promotion is increasingly applicable and relevant to practice within health care and health research specialty around the world.

This paper aims at exploring the fundamental concepts of health, health promotion, and multiple health models that define the effectiveness of approach taken towards the health promotion. Separate discussions of research on health require defining the boundaries of health promotion factors and how does each factor defines the effectiveness of approach taken towards health promotion.

Definition of Health

It is necessary to determine which factors constitute the components of health. Many researchers have identified fundamental concepts which lead to universal definition development to define the concept of health. Contemporary approach towards defining health is more holistic compare to conventional definition of health which defines it as a phenomenon of presence or absence of disease (Gorin 2006, 19).

Definition of Health Promotion

The concept of health promotion is based on the interpretation of social and cultural health, and disease. The health promotion is the process of enabling people to gain greater control over their health. It is a dynamic and evolving concept referring to the management of health of people in the context of their daily lives. Health promotion concept promotes the attainment of the highest level of physical, mental, and social development. Tones (2001, p.23) defined health promotion as a process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health.

Another definition that defines the health promotion suggests that health promotion is the process of enabling individuals and communities to increase control over the determinants of health, and thereby to improve their health (Tones 2001, 29). It includes the education, prevention, where people act in coordination to policies, systems, and lifestyles, through advocacy, empowerment, and building a social support system that enable them to live a longer healthy life.

Under these definitions, health promotion is a mechanism of enabling people to have greater power for making choices for well-being improvement. Determinants of the health promotion have been identified in the first definition, whereas second definition emphasize on the components of health promotion that enhances the capability of individuals towards health improvement. This definition places emphasis on social and environmental intervention instead of individual behaviour (Tones 2001, 32).

Approaches to Health Promotion

There are five approaches that are commonly used for enhancing health promotion. These approaches include:

1.Medical approach

2.Behaviour change approach

3.Educational approach

4.Empowerment approach

5.Social change approach

The Medical Approach

Medical approach focuses on freeing the people from diseases. In this approach, patient is dependent on medical professional or experts for the treatment (Cattan 2006, 48). Major emphasis, in this concern, is placed on patient's ability to effectively follow the medical procedures. This might include compliance with medical treatments, drug compliance, or ...