Health Promotion Open course

The following course inIntroduction to Health Promotion is provided in its entirety by Atlantic International University’s “Open Access Initiative” which strives to make knowledge and education readily available to those seeking advancement regardless of their socio-economic situation, location or other previously limiting factors. The University’s Open Courses are free and do not require any purchase or registration, they are open to the public.

The course in Health Promotion contains the following:

• Lessons in video format with explaination of theoratical content.
• Complementary activities that will make research more about the topic , as well as put into practice what you studied in the lesson. These activities are not part of their final evaluation.
• Texts supporting explained in the video.

The Administrative Staff may be part of a degree program paying up to three college credits. The lessons of the course can be taken on line Through distance learning. The content and access are open to the public according to the “Open Access” and ” Open Access ” Atlantic International University initiative. Participants who wish to receive credit and / or term certificate , must register as students.

Lesson 1: The Concept of Health

The first definition of health has a basic fault in it – it tries to define a primary state through a secondary state. Health is a primary state. It cannot be fully defined through a secondary phenomenon, disease. And then there is a larger question. Does being free from any disease which can be given a name, makes one healthy? I think, no. I know so many people who have no known disease and yet they are not healthy. I know a woman who likes to show off her tons of jewelry to those who can’t have it; a woman who snobs at everyone.

Lesson 2: PARADIGMS IN HEALTH

In this section I will be discussing the two most prevalent models of health. These two models of health are not, of course, total opposites. There exists in this case as well a large clouded middle between the two limiting labels. These are collections of thoughts about how to go about continuing life. These two paradigms in modern healthcare I hope will one-day come to know one another. For now let us say that in generally speaking there are two different approaches or models of medicine and they are allopathic and holistic. Allopathic is another term for our modern western medicine, which in the United States is the dominant one and the one most familiar to the masses. The other, the holistic model, also known as alternative, is commonly associated with older ideas that originated in the East.

Lesson 3: RELATION MIND-BODY

The idea that our minds and emotions play a critical role in our health—a fundamental premise in integrative medicine—is far from new. Many ancient healing systems emphasize the interconnection between mind and body in healing, including Hippocrates, the father of Western medicine, who taught that good health depends on a balance of mind, body, and environment.
Modern scientific research supports this age-old tenet of medical wisdom. It began in the 1920s, when Harvard scientist Walter Cannon, MD, identified the fight-or-flight response through which the body secretes hormones called catecholamines, such as epinephrine and non-epinephrine. When they enter the blood stream, these hormones produce changes in the body—i.e. a quickened heart or increased breathing rate—that put the person in a better physical state to escape or confront danger.

Lesson 4: LIFESTYLES AND HEALTH

People make decisions based on beliefs, attitudes, and values. Our life experience and interaction with others also shapes our thoughts and actions. Personal behavior is affected by the information you learn at home and school, and from the radio, newspapers, and television. The good news is: you can change the way you live.

Lesson 5: HEALTH BEHAVIORS

Health promotion has been defined by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) 2005 Bangkok Charter for Health Promotion in a Globalized World as “the process of enabling people to increase control over their health and its determinants, and thereby improve their health”.The primary means of health promotion occur through developing healthy public policy that addresses the prerequisites of health such as income, housing, food security, employment, and quality working conditions. More recent work has used the term Health in All Policies to refer to the actions to incorporate health into all public policies. There is a tendency among public health officials and governments—and this is especially the case in neoliberal nations such as Canada and the USA—to reduce health promotion to health education and social marketing focused on changing behavioral risk factors

Lesson 6: CONDUCT HARMFUL TO HEALTH

What comes to mind when you think of taking risks with your health—driving recklessly, or maybe abusing alcohol or illegal drugs? Those behaviors are certainly risky. However, many people have less dramatic behaviors that are just as dangerous in the long run. Tobacco use, unbalanced nutrition (too many calories and/or too much of one food group and not enough of the others) and a lack of physical activity are some of the key risk factors for the most common causes of death.

Lesson 7: SICKNESS AND HEALTH

Illnesses are classified as either acute or chronic. An acute illness lasts for a short period of time and may go away without any intervention, the assistance of medications, and/or surgery. Chronic illness is classified as an illness that recurs or persists for a long period of time and may last for a person’s entire life. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), chronic diseases are among the most common, costly, and preventable of all health problems. More than 1.7 million people die of a chronic disease each year in the United States. Additionally, approximately 80% of older adults have at least one chronic illness, and at least 50% have at least two. Unfortunately, chronic conditions may lead to pain and disability, which may result in a lower quality of life.

Lesson 8: NON-CHRONIC DISEASES AND QUALITY OF LIFE

Early versions of healthcare-related quality of life measures referred to simple assessments of physical abilities by an external rater (for example, the patient is able to get up, eat and drink, and take care of personal hygiene without any help from others) or even to a single measurement (for example, the angle to which a limb could be flexed). The current concept of health-related quality of life acknowledges that subjects put their actual situation in relation to their personal expectation. The latter can vary over time, and react to external influences such as length and severity of illness, family support, etc.

 
Lesson 9: CLINICAL ANXIETY AND HEALTH

Anxiety is a normal reaction to stress and can actually be beneficial in some situations. For some people, however, anxiety can become excessive. While the person suffering may realize their anxiety is too much, they may also have difficulty controlling it and it may negatively affect their day-to-day living. There are a wide variety of anxiety disorders, including post-traumatic stress disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and panic disorder to name a few. Collectively, they are among the most common mental disorders experienced by Americans.

Lesson 10: THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS

Quality of life (QOL) is the general well-being of individuals and societies. QOL has a wide range of contexts, including the fields of international development, healthcare, politics and employment. Quality of life should not be confused with the concept of standard of living, which is based primarily on income. Instead, standard indicators of the quality of life include not only wealth and employment but also the built environment, physical and mental health, education, recreation and leisure time, and social belonging.

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