Public Health Policy Intervention - Coursework Example

Public Health policy intervention Introduction The present public health and community procedural context is rapidly shifting. The instant policy strategies and ingenuities entail setting up social inclusion strategies, participation of the local communities, promotion of parity among the dissimilar community clusters, social presence and authentication beached exercise. For the establishment of all these agendas and strategies, there is a great need to ensure public practitioners and different health staffs adopt the new ways of performing these activities. There is, thus, a need to evaluate the various functions within a certain environment. This is crucial in the institution of a local policy intervention and in meeting the stated intervention targets. However, in most cases, there is a tendency among most practitioners to fail to translate rhetoric concepts into meaningful projects because of ill preparedness. It is, therefore, important to set clear strategies on the best ways of setting up a proper and well organized public policy intervention. A health promotion event was well defined by both Linda Ewles and Ina Simnett in the early 80s and has since been of significance to present day expert. They featured six categories of human existence in which healthy living or health may be considered. These include: physical health, mental health, emotional health, spiritual health, societal health and social health. Local public policy intervention Intervention in local settings tends to operate in clusters and may adopt simpler approaches. Intervention has, therefore, had a lengthier history as it uses a systematic search for proof of effective health promotion. A number of policy philosophers have stated that, the effect of health promotion should be measured across the range of proceedings and not on the variations of a specific individual conduct. There is, thus, a need to review the various methods to add a wider perspective of research and its methods. This should mostly dwell on the quality of health publicity intervention and the research design. The purpose of evaluation Evaluation involves the assessment of the effectiveness of an intervention. It is, therefore, important to ensure that the right information is found on strategies that have worked and those that have not. Evaluation has a noteworthy role in protecting the public from bad practices and, therefore, a need for ethical standards and rules that safeguard intervention from being of harm. Poor practices of intervention may lead to local communities evading other future intervention strategies. This leads to a huge problem in terms of change and growth in most local surroundings. Health promotion and advertising play a noteworthy role in the evaluation methodology and the introduction of development strategies, which are consistent and with systems of working. Who does the Evaluation? Tilford and Tones (1994, p. 67-72) observed that the earlier literature on the different evaluation strategies of social programs seemed to be concerned with evaluation being an “independent and outside unit”. In the current times, assessment has shown to be an essential conception within program delivery and appears to include different experts. As a result, health organizations employ the expertise of third parties to evaluate the interventions. Nevertheless, an organization should contemplate on its available resources before looking for an external assessor. The World Health Organization (WHO) maintains that, at least ten percent of project estimates and budget should be directed to the evaluation. Arguably, external evaluators are important in the evaluation phase as they bring a fresh angle of interpreting occurrences or situations. They may notice issues that none of the internal evaluators have ever noticed. It is easier for internal evaluators to make their own reports in the absence of the external evaluators in order to create a need for independence among the two groups. In addition, the external assessors may appear intimidating to the internal staff creating a communication breakdown. These makes the health policy team institute poor strategies and fail to meet its goals. It is important to set good working associations so that the various staff members are fully aware of the importance and benefits of having good evaluation strategies. This entails being free to communicate with each other and cooperate. On the other hand, the individuals directly involved in issuing projects within the intervention can be assigned roles as internal assessors. They can mostly have a vested interest in the projects, and risk being unfocused as opposed to the external assessors. They may also possess inadequate proficiency in evaluation, which may lead to poor quality as opposed to those of the external evaluators. However, it is vivacious to note that, internal evaluators may be well versed with the main project and its context, creating a need for them to assist in the interpretation of the different happenings on each phase. The involvement in evaluation helps in building or establishing ownership of the analysis and findings. This was analyzed by Smith et al. (2009, p. 64-83). It may be challenging when internal and external evaluators work together in various facets of the project. Therefore, for success to be grasped, there is a need to concur on the corresponding roles of each individual. It is even viewed that working in such a collaborative and integrated setting conveys and reveals the strengths and success within both groups of the evaluation team. The scope and principles of local public policy intervention The different set of initiatives to advance health is evidently deep in content, approaches and range. They comprise major evaluation and policy initiatives on specific health items and this may include housing and monetary policy. This also involves distinct trivial projects, which include setting up food co-operatives or issuing parenting teachings for young mothers. The center of focus should mainly be in the population groups of numerous sizes, those originating from entire population to small community groups, rather than personalities. Intervention, therefore, entails any feature of the spectrum that encompasses the wider public well being. There is a clear variance, then, amid individually set biomedical intervention and the wider public health intervention that are more composite both in them and in the collection of possible outcomes they attain. According to scholars such as Smith et al. (2009, p. 112), there are expected consequences if health promotions are mostly poorly analyzed and defined. This results in various valued results such as making contribution and empowerment challenging to evaluate. Nutbeam (1998, p. 41), therefore, presents the key challenges experienced in this examination. Such comprises of: The use of research proofs more methodical in the development of activities Refining the measurements and definition of various outcomes Presuming suitable valuation strengths Presuming suitable assessment schemes Principles of Evaluation and recommendations In order to establish a meaningful health promotion and to come up with solutions on whether health promotion is a good deal or not, the World Health Organization (WHO), selected a team to offer stages and strategies on the suitable methods for health promotion to add the quality. There principles were as follows: a. Participation At every phase of the evaluation process, everyone who has an interest should be included. The stakeholders involved should include policy architect, health experts and civic associate. b. Manifold methods This entails gathering a wider and broader range of information gathering steps. c. Capacity building In this principle, over evaluation, discrete persons and community capacity should be enhanced. d. Appropriateness The evaluation strategy should be generated in a way that can include both the complex situations and health marketing intervention and their end result objectives. Recommendations Every person with a clear strategy in health promotion inventiveness should be given an opportunity to contribute in all stages of its development and evaluation. The evaluation phase should have a considerable amount of resource, probably, ten percent. This is paramount for the achievement of the whole project as it totally depends on the evaluation criteria and analysis. It is important to evaluate and gauge the various initiatives. This includes making follow ups on their processes and their results. Experts at this point have to be trained and maintained to ensure a stable and a consistent evaluation team. Health Promotion models and theory The models and theory are very crucial in health promotion and are normally used interchangeably. They both provide a clarification on how an item works. Notably, a model is used to offer a graphic depiction of the items of theory. This allows the addition of processes and features not attached in formal theory, but rather borrowed from involved experts. By enunciating the viewpoints of Nutbeam and Hurris, a number of the distinct theories in health promotion haven’t been thoroughly tested and therefore might be more precisely referred to as being theoretical models (Nutbeam and Harris, 1991). Frequently used models According to Nutbeam and Harris (1999), there is no solitary theory that superintends health promotion functions, and there will never be. This is because there is a range of health problems and diverse population settings and differences in skills and practices. The model clusters include: i. Planning model This is used to plan a program or an intervention. This involves having to develop a distinct implementation plan and unfolding the logical arrangement of the plan. However, it also includes setting up precise and clear strategies and defining the various components. ii. Change models This mainly dwells on change on a particular organization or individual. iii. Behavior and Communication change models This analyzes the different modules that should be initiated in an educational setting. This, according to Nutbeam and Harris (1999), includes understanding the specific needs and views of the aimed audience and deciding on the form of message and the best channel to air a particular message, in addition to realizing the desired outcomes of the promotions and campaigns. iv. Health education and promotional model This focuses on the type of diet and various diets that are to be avoided. The values of the theories Harris and Nutbeam (1999) also include models that analyze the procedures of community participation and action. Their views are that the models will serve to help marketers understand how they can help and reinforce the capabilities of individuals to act as a team and solve major concerns. Arguably, these theories help in organizing intricacies. This is because they provide a unique way of creating order out of confusion of practice. Needless to say, the theories also synthesize a range of dissimilar entities which include the effects into various clear forms that enable the experts to quickly understand the important points. Stakeholders and Participants The various participants in these programs are members of the public, leaders and other concerned sponsors. They include people who are directly touched or affected by the programs and the leaders of the organization who are able to support in modification. There are numerous marks of change such as the young elected officials whose functions influence problems. There are also representatives of change such as the religious front-runners who can add to the answers and solutions. Other stakeholders include members of the routing group, directors and the entire representatives of the community welfare originalities, program leaders and the supporting staff. Various Ethical issues There is a need to consider ethical issues and their effects in health. According to Springet and Berkley (2006), ethical issues involve the different processes of promoting local community health and development. This procedure should be deliberated in the design and evaluation stages. Ethical issues have some advantages of ensuring that programs flow in an effective way and improves individuals standing in the community; it enables individuals to occupy the proper high ground when arguing the facts of the program and also to exercise ethical control. In fact, it also warranties that one remains on the right track when it comes to legal issues and professional issues. Some of the ethical policies that need to be considered include: a. Confidentiality Spriget (2006) states that, confidentiality has been the most important ethical factor as it is frequently violated and its effects are adverse. Privacy safeguards the community participants and also protects them from these violations. It aids in establishing trust and union among various stakeholders in the program. b. Consent Information can only be shared through the owner or program allowing permission. If the material is shared without the owners’ approval, it is an abuse of consent. c. Disclosure Participants in this case have the right to identify if they are part of a research when joining a program. They also have the right to know the purpose of the study. Conclusion It is important to dwell deeply on the evaluation phase as it gives meaningful proof of various items needed in local public health scenery. It is, therefore, important for evaluation to be adjusted to suit intervention forms and be able to adopt various issues of concern. It is important to note that having a good evaluation design enables the combination of different research approaches. This is proposed as it produces a varied range of information that will ideally support both the truth of the study and external cogency. Finally, it is a good practice to avoid evaluation processes that are expensive and complex. This is because they require varied methods and involvement from different entities. References Ewles, L., & Simnet,I. 2010. Promoting Health: A Practical Guide. London: Bailliere Tindall. Nutbeam, D., & Harris, E. 1999. Theory in a nutshell: a Guide to Health Promotion Theory. Roseville, Australia: McGraw-Hill. Tones, B. K. and Tilford, S. 1994. Health Promotion: Effectiveness, Efficiency and Equity. Chapman & Hall, London. Smith, S.et al, & Argawal, A. 2009. Research and Evaluation Report: University Research.Oxford University. Berkley, T., & Springet. C. 2006. Estimtig the Powerof Public Health. A Practical Guide.New York: Springer Verlag. Read More