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Health Promotion

What is Health Promotion?

Health Promotion is usually defined as the process of encouraging and enabling individuals and communities to increase their control over the determinants of their health, and thereby improve their health. (Adapted from the World Health Organisation's Ottawa Charter, 1986).

Why do workplace health promotion?

Workplace health promotion can target issues of broad organisation wide concern (eg. smoking), and/or issues that staff within a local workplace have identified as being of concern to them (eg. sun safety, stress management). The aim of health promotion is to prevent illness and promote good health, by reducing risk factors for disease and by promoting access to healthy behaviours.

How are health promotion programs usually conducted?

Health promotion initiatives typically use the following processes:

Identify priority health issues in the local workplace
Gain principal/manager/staff agreement about how to address health issues
Raise staff motivation, skills and confidence to address health issues (eg. via education/training)
Make changes which aim to improve access to health promoting behaviours (eg. increase the range of nutritious & affordable foods available in a tuck shop)
Monitor progress and provide positive feedback to support staff and individual behaviour changes (eg. via newsletters. staff reports)
Evaluate and report meaningfully (to principal/staff) about project outcomes.

General Health and Wellbeing

Australian Health Promotion Association
Association of health promotion professionals - provides information, advice, professional development about latest developments in health promotion practice.
Health Promotion Publications by the NHMRC
The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) of Australia provides guidelines for health professionals, databases of health and medical research and research funding.
World Health Organisation's Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion (new window)

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