1. Define public health and provide a brief description of the evolution of public health.
Public health is the combine organised efforts from different sectors (public or private) within the society that help people to become healthier or less sick, promote health, prevent illness and prolong life. Its focus to promote good health practices on the population; therefore their involvement is more on populations wellbeing physical and mental health than individuals cases.
Public health has been through an evolution in history. This progression started with the need to look for resources to address the elimination of illness and ways to prevent diseases. Baum gave us an overview regarding the old public health and its focus on the improvement
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Provide examples of the functions of public health. Which of the functions of public health most interests you and why?
According to the World Health Organization, Public Health has three main functions: Assessment and monitoring of the health of populations or communities at risk to identify health problems and priorities. The formulation of public policies intended to solve and identified the local and national health problems and priorities. Also, ensure that all populations have access to a cost-effective care, including health promotions and disease prevention services.
Examples: Assessment and monitoring of an specific population who is developing a disease, such as aborigines Australians and the development of the hepatitis B or the lower/medium income households people who develop cardiovascular diseases due to lack of exercise and poor diet. The information is collected and analysed to confirmed trends and identifies health priorities.
The National Health Priorities Areas (NHPAs) has identified 9 diseases that need urgent attention; therefore become a health priority in Australia. The public health function involves the decreasing of the social and financial burdens associated with biological and mental health problems in the population (AIHW,
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The lack of exercise, and the increase of illness due to the overweight or obesity left the person feeling hopeless and without a clear direction; therefore it has been suggested that it could be connected with depression. The overweight or obese cannot move further, cannot access sports, do not participate actively in physical or social activities, and, therefore, can be isolated, so then the lack of interaction, the unhappiness with current health status drags the person to the stage of discontent which leads to mental health issues, if not treat it immediately. http://www.healthdirect.gov.au/obesity?gclid=CJ7kq4rCo8UCFVWVvQodyzcAAw According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the current rates of overweight and obesity are continuing higher in Australia. 3 in 5 Australian adults are overweight or obese; which is over 12 million people. 1 in 4 Australia children is overweight or obese. These trends are intimidating and immediate reaction by the Government is required. http://www.aihw.gov.au Analysis using Social determinants of
Public health is the measures taken by the government to prevent ill health and disease. The government monitor health so that they can develop different programmes and legislation to improve the health and well being of the people in the country. They do this by attempting to solve inequalities, so that all people not matter what are able to live a healthy life. There are eight policies to improve today's public health, these are; planning for health
Historically, public health has existed to take care of that issue beyond the scope of the individual. Public health existed in some ancient societies such as the Inca Indians and Romans. Years ago the health department's main goal was to control epidemics that came through and devastated society. Public health was mainly a policing profession and quarantine regulations were the typical controlling methods. A second major function of the health department was to monitor the water supply, which was a major source of these diseases that affected whole community. Thirdly the health department provided care for the indigent patient. This factor makes many of us believe that the health department is for those who can't afford regular allied allied health care. The health department is there to serve all of us, but charges each person on his or her ability to
Public health concerns itself with the prevention of lifestyle diseases, such as heart problems, as well as diseases of which the occurrence can be reduced if the public is educated about it, such as HIV/AIDS and cholera (Tut 102 for PYC4811).
The Advances in public health have been possible due to the contributions of people with ideals of change who decided to make a difference in their communities through the creation of innovative ideas capable of changing the lifestyle of a community. Public health is about helping people to stay healthy, and protecting them from that psychosocial factor that may affect their life and that is why the public health worker must have a passion for a change and for a better quality of life for their community. In the beginnings of public health there were two people who acted as agents of social change and they were Sara Josephine Baker and Clara Barton.
In this session long project, the class was instructed to watch a video on the introduction to public health and to answer three questions. What are the three core functions of public health? What are the essential services associated with each of these? What agencies (federal, state, or local) are responsible for carrying out these core functions and essential services? In the paper below these questions will be answered in reference to the E-learning video while using the provided sources.
According to Charles-Edward A. Wilson, in the book Introduction to Public Health, public health’s main goals are to prevent disease and promote health (Schneider 2017). He further states that this is a “science and an art” (2017). The science behind public health works is data collection and statistics interpretation. The art is the discovery and subsequent tracking of mysterious, alongside known, illnesses leading to sustainable solutions for the communities prolonged life and well-being. Although there have been highly successful advances in public health’s goals since its conception, funding remains lower than what may be necessary due to the controversies associated with what could be deemed socialist notions. Public health efforts have somewhat intangible benefits which do not always translate well to the visible costs.
More than 30 years ago, violence and health were not used in the same sentence. However, this issue is complex and deeply rooted into our culture. That is why a public health approach must be taken to ensure the safety of communities. Public health is about dealing with problems affecting health and aims to provide the maximum benefit for the largest number of people. Public health
In my opinion the most important issue in public health is infectious disease control, since public health had been established in the fourteenth century to present thousands of infectious diseases prevented, treatments provide and many people surviving, public health is protect the patient and Saving a life.
community, living a satisfied and healthy live, is about impact our environment has on our
Public health can now deal with community health and prevention, individual care and treatment as well as broader political and economic situations such as air pollution. Public health’s main concern is with disease prevention and many health care organisations are now practicing preventative medicine in order to maintain this. The ultimate focus of this approach has shifted from disease treatment and crisis management to focusing on health in general and how to improve this concept throughout the community.
In reflection on the lecture we had, Public Health was a concept that only occurred to me when thinking of government hospitals when in fact Public Health is much more. It is the science of protecting and
In my opinion, the public health professionals should be viewed as agents that propagate changes in their communities, undoubtedly, the history of the American Public Health Care System coupled with the world health Organization’s history of the public health depicts the dedication of many public health professionals to the health of their communities. These professionals have gone above and beyond their call of duties to assure their communities and other communities around them enjoy a better health. Certainly, without the public health professionals’ collaboration with the other stakeholders in their communities to championing their communities’ health needs, majority of the community health projects enacted in most would have failed. Great examples are successful health programs such as the one that eradication of smallpox, and polio in America. Also, worth noting are the current fights against adult and childhood obesity, heart diseases, HIV/AIDS to name a few (Turnock, 2016; Mooney, 2005).
In Australia our health is very good compared to may nation of the world and most citizens’ have come to expect a high standard of public health delivery. In order to at least sustain the current level of public health and important tissue to consider is what areas within public health should we invest public funding i. e taxpayer’s money, to
Public health is its own system within a larger one known as the healthcare delivery system. The healthcare delivery system comprises of many sectors, all with different perspectives and goals. Public health and the healthcare delivery systems very much complement and compete with each other. Public health as stated by Richard Riegelman is about knowing what not only makes us sick but also knowing what makes us healthy and how that can be achieved if we come together and work as a community.2 Public health is everything around us and because of that it has the responsibility of focusing on everything and everyone. Public health looks beyond the answer for a cure, it looks at the how, why, when, where, what and therefore a solution on how to protect not only the individual but serves an entire population. Competition within the healthcare delivery system is something that began the moment public health was developed because the process of public health was separate from the development of private medical practices. We still deal with the differences between these two sectors; one main reason being that their public health approach was population based and took a prevention viewpoint when practitioners took an individualistic approach to cure diseases not prevent them. 1The healthcare delivery system complements public health in the aspect that they hold together a system that was created for the sole purpose of taking care of others health. According to the World Health
The health of the public is a constantly growing and never-ending cycle. There is always a threat or growing concern that can/will affect people’s health. Public health can be defined as a society coming together and working diligently to ensure the conditions in which people live are healthy. Ensuring that the conditions are favorable where people live and increasing their health conditions should be a goal for all societies (Bartlett, Jones, 2010).