public health major

public health major

The Importance of Public Health Education

1. The Role of Public Health Professionals

In order to meet the purpose of enhancing the health of the public, the profession of public health has continued to grow and evolve. Today, professionals apply education, investigation and implementation of programs and policies designed to address and solve health issues at local, state and national levels. The aim of these professionals is to prevent diseases and promote the well-being of the public. In the future, it is hoped that public health professionals will be innovative and take the initiative to develop new approaches or invent new methods for the betterment of the public’s health. This will be partially facilitated by their earned ability in various aspects of the public health system.

Public health professionals play an important role in promoting and protecting the health of the population. In the 21st century, there appears to be an upsurge in the health care industry, resulting in the high demand for public health professionals. The public health system has a wide array of professional jobs for dedicated individuals in search of a challenging career. The role of a public health professional is to serve the public community. This is often a selfless job and requires a great deal of patience and understanding. In this role, the professional will practice in a particular area of expertise. The main goal is to ensure all people have the chance to attain the best health possible. The public health profession will continue to rise in popularity due to the increasing demand for health care experts in the coming years.

2. The Impact of Public Health Education

Health education curriculum exposes future generations of health education specialists to the most recent developments, ideas, and theories… “The curriculum sets forth standards, is planned, and is a course of instruction designed for the welfare of the society and its members” (Joint Committee on Terminology and the NCHE, 2001, p. 28). Health education curriculum gives good direction for reaching healthy school policies and supporting school setting and environmental strategies…. “Health education can redefine the health of the nation by assuring a competent, knowledgeable, and skillful workforce. Curriculum creates the health education specialist and assures the availability of the best quality health education to the public” (Joint Committee on Terminology and the NCHE, 2001, p. 28).

Curriculum is the training of most individuals within the group to enhance their work efficiency. The general awareness and opinions of the people in the community are formed through the formal and informal learning process that is relevant to current life situations.

According to various research, comprehensive school health education programs and policies, including counseling and medical services, have proven to be an effective way to decrease the risk of a number of health problems among young people and to positively influence their knowledge, attitudes, behaviors, and long-term educational and occupational goals. Student health risks, protective factors, and health behaviors are influenced by the choices they make on a daily basis. Comprehensive health programs support the choices young people make and enhance their academic success. By linking health with educational achievement, successful prevention and a wide array of positive health outcomes can be attained” (Lasswell et al., 1998, p. 271).

3. Challenges in Public Health Education

There are several reasons for the importance of public health education. Public health education increases the knowledge base of the community regarding various health issues prevalent at that time. It creates awareness among the people regarding common diseases. Awareness, in the sense that it tells them why a particular disease occurs, how it can be prevented, and if it is an illness, then how it can be treated. Public health education not only deals with the prevention of diseases, but also provides details of how a disease affects an individual in terms of physical, psychological, and economic implications. This knowledge generally helps in changing the attitude and behavior of an individual. Behavior change is one of the significant outcomes of public health education. Public health education can affect change in various ways. It can shift a person’s knowledge, impacting attitudes, and subsequently changing behavior. Another way to change behavior is to change one’s skills. For example, if an individual learns the skills to manage stress, they may eventually implement these skills and change their behavior regarding high-stress situations. The third way to affect change is to create a change in the environment. Public health education can promote public policy that addresses health issues, facilitating change. The environment can be changed through the increasing of resources. If an individual or a community has increased resources, they may implement several behavior changes to utilize the resources and optimize health. Behavior change is a critical outcome because it aims to promote healthy living. Public health education can reduce health problems through prevention and control. It does this by using the learned information and implementing it at a community level. Any implementation of public health education is better than no education. A last significant meaning of public health education is that it is a professional field. Public health education professionals are concerned with individuals, groups, and communities, imparting knowledge of health issues, information, and any programs that can improve all these. Through being a professional, the field is systematic and has a specific intent to improve public health.

The goal of public health education is to prevent disease and promote health. Public health education is very important, not only for students to make their career in health sectors, but also for local people because they come to know what a person can get from their surroundings. Public health educators are specifically trained to provide research-based interventions that correlate with health behavior change. Public health education is the development of individual, group, institutional, community, and systemic strategies to improve health knowledge, attitudes, skills, and behavior. Public health education is a complex, multi-faceted endeavor. The public health education and promotion major helps students gain knowledge and skills to create a healthier society through education of individuals, groups, and communities. Students learn to design, implement, and evaluate health programs in varied settings.

4. Strategies for Improving Public Health Education

Past successes in public health education demonstrate the potential for applying knowledge from reputable research and best practices in lifting the standard of care across both social and medical sectors of society. Devastation of once widespread diseases like polio or the deaths of countless individuals to smallpox are examples of the necessity of public health education. It is in these epidemiological efforts that we have learned the effectiveness of education and have seen positive contributions to entire societies. These are certainly highly encouraging aspects in the future of public health education. With an increasing number of professions falling under the public health regulatory umbrella, it is the skills and knowledge of science and medicine that will most impact the future of public health. So the focus now and the future of public health will rely heavily on the continuing education of current and upcoming professionals. This is a global issue as the rate of globalization continues to rise, as does the number of health threats that affect global populations. As our knowledge of how our environments, societies, and medical practices affect our health changes, the implementation and quality of the education imparted on future leaders in public health will need to change to reflect the needs of diverse communities. This will require strategic planning and innovative programs to ensure the needs of leaders and the intended beneficiaries of their care are met. This will be the cornerstone in a shift of care from simply maintaining the status quo to making significant gains in overall health for populations.

5. The Future of Public Health Education

Society today demands an increased quality of health for individuals and families. It is this demand for improvement that has created a passage for the expansion and growth of public health education. Public health education strives to create a better quality of life for individuals by preventing and resolving health issues. This will always be a necessity, and even with legislation concerning medical care expanding, there will always be a great need for health educators and community health workers. This is due to the continuing and widespread emphasis on the application of health education and promotion at both the individual and community levels.

The future is promising for public health education as it will continue to grow as a preferred profession. There will always be new problems in public health that were previously unknown, and it’s the challenge of a health educator to solve these. Rising to meet the challenges of improving the public’s health, health educators and promotion specialists are today’s visionaries too. They are always seeking ways to improve community health through the use of evidence-based practices.

Public health education has a diverse employment market. Medical care settings employ the most health educators, though other professional settings and educational environments utilize health education specialists. With an undergraduate degree, employment opportunities for a health educator are numerous.

Public health education and careers are becoming increasingly popular as more people want to improve their communities’ health and help prevent disease and injury. Health educators, who are much more likely to work in public health and related fields than community health workers, are typically focused on engaging community members, teaching them about health and what brings about it, and implementing changes to improve community health.

The future of public health education will continue to offer numerous employment opportunities for the best qualified individuals. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, demand for health educators is expected to grow by 20 percent, and medical and health services managers can expect an even greater 23 percent growth in employment opportunities. The trend in employment growth is expected to continue through 2018.