Health promotion is undoubtedly a significant tool to combat a number of health related issues. Health promotion allows an individual to understand the different aspects of health, thus, enabling them to have better control over their health. Through provision of knowledge regarding one’s health and wellness, health promotion allows that individual to control the habits which can have negative impact on their health. Spreading awareness about significant diseases and making people aware about their symptoms and prevention is the ultimate way to increase one’s control over their health. Health promotion aims to promote healthy habits and curb the unhealthy habits which keep people from attaining overall wellness (Naidoo and Wills, 2016). Health promotion is a procedure consisting of a wide range of environmental and social interventions which are designed to uplift the quality of health of people. It addresses the root causes of poor health and provides with preventive measures to eliminate the same. In this assessment, a well-structured health promotion plan is provided for obese people along with other crucial factors associated with the issue. The key factors causing obesity, preventive measures and further evaluation of the campaign are highlighted thoroughly.
Obesity is a major health issue which is being faced by large number of people across the globe. Being obese refers to being overweight. Obesity is a health condition where a person has gain a lot of weight which implies that the person is having excessive body fat which can affect their health in a negative way (Sturm and Hattori, 2015). Obesity should be treated at once upon identification of the same. Obese people suffer from a number of physical and mental illnesses which is why obesity must be handled with thorough care. Identification and prevention of obesity at an early stage can reduce the number of obese people around the globe. If obesity reaches extreme level it can increase the health risks associated with it. Apart from causing multiple health issues, obesity can become life threatening as well. This, it is mandatory to identify obesity among people and for further initiation of treatment. For this purpose, it is essential to test overweight people and potential group of people having higher risk of becoming obese to ensure if they are obese or not. A number of procedures are there to check the same. It is known that the body weight of a person is proportionate to their height. If a person is having appropriate body weight in accordance to their height then the person is in a good health and there is no sign of obesity. But if their height does not compliment their body weight, rather they seem overweight then there is high probability that the person is obese (Flegal et al. 2016). Healthcare practitioners, to be specific, the nutritionists are able to identify probabilities of obesity through this procedure. To identify obesity a number of physical examinations are there and this procedure is one of the widely adopted procedures by medical practitioners.
The procedure requires measuring body weight and height of the individual, followed by comparison of the results. If body weight matches with height then it is considered as a positive outcome and the person is declared healthy (Mazidi and Speakman, 2017). But if the body weight seems more while compared to the height then it is possible that is person is suffering from obesity. Such a result calls for further evaluation of the health condition of the individual to know the level of obesity. In this context, a number of medical tests are performed on the individual for the healthcare professional to gain deeper understanding regarding the health status of the person. Obesity is related to multiple factors such as heart rate, BMI (Body Mass Index), blood pressure, body temperature etc (Tomiyama et al. 2015). Medical tests are performed to look for all these vital signs of obesity. For example, if one’s Body Mass Index is above 30, then the person is considered as an obese person. A person having BMI less than 18.5 is underweight, from 18.5 to 25 is normal, from 25 to 30 is overweight, and more than 30 is obese (Locke et al. 2015). Moreover, lungs, heart and abdomen are examined thoroughly by the healthcare professional. Obesity accelerates the risk of cardiovascular diseases (Saydah et al. 2015). Any sign of abnormality in the functions of these organs indicate towards presence of obesity. Obesity might seem a normal weight gain problem but it has a number of underlying health problems associated with it. An obese person is likely to go through physical as well as psychological problems. The psychological problems consist of stress and depression. An obese person is concerned about their future and spends a lot of time thinking about the same, which causes stress. As for the depressions, social discrimination and rejection are root causes of it. An obese person is likely to be mocked by others which lowers their self-esteem and affects their confidence level. At times, obese people are found to have suicidal tendencies. Thereby, the obesity must be detected at an early stage and treated accordingly.
Obesity is not an issue of a particular country; rather it has become a global issue. A large number of adults as well as children are being diagnosed with obesity every single day. It is necessary to adopt measures which can eliminate obesity or reduce it to a greater extent. Obesity has two primary causes behind it; one is unhealthy eating and other one is physical inactivity. To reduce cases of obesity, it is essential to take needful actions against these two causes. Eating habit is something which cannot be corrected through any medication. The individual must be aware about negative impacts of unhealthy fast foods (Brownell and Walsh, 2017). Now-a-days, readymade food or fast food has become cheaper and easily available, which boosts its chances of attracting the younger generation, As a result, childhood obesity has become a much talked about issue, especially across European countries. Fast food has loads of harmful chemicals in it, some of which are responsible for making people obese. Sugary drinks are found to be highly responsible for generating childhood obesity (Chapman and Bendre, 2018). Having high levels of body fat, consumption of such foods can result into obesity. Therefore, self-awareness must be obtained in order to reduce consumption of fast foods. As easy availability is another factor of increased sale of fast foods, the Government must take needful steps to maintain the overall wellbeing of its countrymen (Cornelis et al. 2014). As an example, Government can impose good amount of taxes on the fast foods. With rising price, a large number of people would stop buying fast foods. This will result into reduction in number of obese people. Giving up unhealthy food habit solely would not be able to accelerate good health. A person must consult nutritionist and follow proper diet in accordance to their body mass and height in order to gain overall wellness. Another cause is physical inability. Being physically active not only boosts fitness level, but also increases the effectiveness of digestive system. With more effective digestion power, people are able to digest their food properly. Therefore, the chances of gaining body fat become less. Physical activities are much required to reduce body fat and acquire fitness. Physical activities like walking, swimming, yoga, exercises can help a person to lose weight and maintain a healthy life. If a person spends more than lying on bed or sitting on a couch, it is likely that they will be gaining more weight than the ones who are having physically active life. Physical activities not only help to lose weight, but also provide confidence and empowerment (Daubenmier et al. 2016). A person having a slim body is likely to have more confidence and self-esteem than that of an overweight or obese person (Ng et al. 2014). Hence, it is mandatory to do physical activities like swimming, exercise, yoga, walking on a regular basis to avoid gaining unnecessary body fat. But the people must be self-motivated to give up fast food or join yoga classes. Without proper awareness, it is impossible to achieve overall fitness and lead a healthy life.
When it comes to spreading awareness, health promotion campaigns are of much importance. Health promotion campaigns allow individuals to gain better control of their health by identifying symptoms of particular illnesses in order to reduce potential health risks. Through health promotion campaigns, public are made aware about symptoms, consequences and preventive measures of a particular disease (Hubley and Copeman, 2018). Basically, effective health promotion campaigns focus on a particular disease for better outcome. In this context, a health promotion campaign is to be designed which aims to spread awareness regarding obesity. Health promotion campaigns goes through a number of steps before being able to serve its purpose. At first, the health promotion campaign is given a name; in this context it is – ‘Eat healthy, say no to obesity’. To design the campaign appropriately, relevant data is required. The data must be authentic and accurate in order to make the campaign more effective. In the given scenario, it is necessary to gather more information regarding to the illness the campaign aims to promote. Therefore, firstly, all relevant information regarding obesity should be gathered from previous research papers, articles, statistics, books etc. As obesity is a common health problem now-a-days, there will be plenty of data sources available both online and offline. Therefore, data sourcing would not be difficult. Then, the findings are analysed. The analysis is a major part where the objective of the health promotion campaign on obesity is clearly understood. The symptoms, consequences, prevalence statistics, preventive measures, Government policies are to be studied thorough in order to produce a proper design for the health promotion campaign. A number of skills like critical reading, critical thinking is to be used to design the campaign. While designing the campaign, it should be kept in mind that it must cover all the relevant aspects of obesity in order to acquire the desired outcome.
The planning stage plays a pivotal role in determining the overall effectiveness of the campaign. In this stage, proper planning is conducted to ensure seamless execution of the health promotion campaign. Health promotion campaigns have a number of different dimensions which must be pre-planned in order to eliminate the chances of unwanted errors (Eldredge et al. 2016). This stage requires efficiency in planning, organising and decision-making skills. The key objective of this stage is to deliver a well-structured error-free plan which will be able to make the health promotion campaign successful. In the context of health promotion campaign regarding obesity, it is necessary to divide the campaign into different sections and work on each of the section to make it better. The aim of this campaign is to make people aware about obesity and its root causes. The campaign aims to encourage people to give up unhealthy food habits and increase physical activities. The target audience are to be fixed in this stage. For this purpose, there is no need to target specific group of people. Obesity is a common problem and can occur to anyone irrespective of age, sex, race, nationality, profession (Ogden et al. 2015). Therefore, common people are considered as target audience for this campaign. Not just overweight people, anyone can be vulnerable to obesity, therefore proper awareness is needed for everyone. Anyone having access to fast food or sugary drinks can become obese. Thus, parents visiting supermarkets, school students, university students, office goers all are exposed to this health hazard. Then important tools are identified to implement the campaign successfully. Resources must be planned accordingly. Resources refer to money, equipments and people. Budgeting is important to take care of financial resources so that the campaign does not run out of money. This will result into failure of the health promotion campaign. To enable a better planning it is necessary to prepare a timeline reflecting a work plan for the campaign. The work plan should consist of details related to campaign like what to do, when to do, and how to do. A well-defined work plan allows a more effective implementation of the campaign.
After designing and planning, the most crucial stage comes, that is execution of the plan. Planning would become ineffective if it is not executed appropriately. In this stage, the health promotion campaign is arranged on the pre-defined date at pre-defined venue. In this context, the campaign is organised at a school ground. Before a few days of the campaign, leaflets were distributed among people to make them aware about the same. Therefore, parents would be accompanying their children to help them understand the factors related to obesity. In this process, the parents would also become part of the health promotion campaign. Supermarket can be chosen as venue as a large number of people visit there every day. But there are chances of conflicts as the main motive of the campaign is to turn people against fast food and sugary drinks, and these are among top selling products of supermarket. Hence, to avoid conflicts, school ground is chosen, where children as well as adults can be part of the campaign. Initially the campaign makes people aware about obesity and highlights the worldwide statistics of obese people and how the numbers have increased gradually (Cobb et al. 2015). Followed by that the target audience will be made aware about different symptoms of obesity, root causes, consequences. Two way communications is to be implemented to allow people to share their views regarding the matter. The target audience is to be provided with preventive measures to combat obesity. The negative impact of fast foods and sugary drinks is to be conveyed to the target audience so that they can control their food habit (Alviola et al. 2014). Also, the audience should be made aware about the importance of physical activities in burning excessive body fat. For better outcome, a yoga workshop can be arranged and people should be encouraged to participate in the same to allow them to understand the positive impacts of physical activities. The additional yoga workshop can be joined by children as well as adults and different sessions would be there for both the age groups. The target audience are directed towards a healthy direction through provision of free BMI check-up. This check-up would allow them their current health condition so that they can control lifestyle in accordance to the result obtained. If anyone is found to have BMI above 30, then the person would be referred to healthcare professionals for further treatment procedure. The children should be encouraged to eat healthy food and join yoga classes, dance classes, swimming classes to keep obesity at bay (Rivera et al. 2015).
A health promotion campaign allows the target audience to have a clear understanding of a particular health issue. It enables a person to take health related decisions effectively, allowing them to lead a healthy life. In other words, health promotion campaign provides health related awareness to the individuals so that they are able to regulate their lifestyle in accordance to their health condition (Flora et al. 2018). The campaign illustrated in above section regarding obesity will have positive impact on the mind of target audience. The health promotion campaign is aimed to provide preventive measures to the target audience so that the prevalence of obesity can be controlled. One of the major benefits of the health related campaign is that the individuals can identify if they are obese or not just by knowing their Body Mass Index. The health promotion campaign will make people aware about the side effects of consuming fast food and sugary drinks. This will enable then to rethink about their food habit and physical activities. The prime motive of the campaign is to reduce the number of obese people and promote overall wellbeing. The campaign presents two simple ways as solutions to this problem; which are giving up fast food and sugary drinks, and adopt healthy food habits, and another one is being involved in more physical activities in order to burn excess body fat. Therefore, it is likely that health conscious people will be following these two methods to keep obesity at bay. The campaign has been structured properly to provide a person with brief idea regarding the disease. They can use this knowledge to make their lives healthier and better.
A health promotion campaign, if planned properly and executed accordingly, can bear positive outcomes. In the modern era, people have become busy in upgrading their personal as well as professional position. In such a scenario, people are ignoring health issues and its symptoms. They are reluctant to go for medical test; therefore, most of the life-threatening diseases are being diagnosed at third stages or final stages (Skinner et al. 2016). To avoid this situation, one must be aware about different illnesses and should also learn to identify their symptoms and prevent the disease. Health promotion campaigns play a pivotal role in generating self-awareness related to health issues. The above described health promotion campaign regarding obesity would be of much help for the target audience. Individuals would be able to maintain a healthy diet by giving up fast food and sugary drinks and adopting healthy food habit (Lobo, 2018). They would also be indulging in more physical activities such as swimming, yoga, exercise and outdoor sports. Children would be playing out more than spending time with video games and smart devices. School authority can take additional step by encouraging students to contribute more time in sports and other physical activities. The target audience can use their obtained knowledge to make more people aware about obesity and its consequences (Ogden et al. 2014). All of these will result into lesser number of obese people.
Conclusion
Health promotion campaigns have deep impact on the mind of the target audience. It provides them with sufficient knowledge about specific health issues, allowing them to lead a healthier life. Self-awareness is necessary when it comes to promote wellness. And there is no better way than a health promotion campaign to generate self-awareness. The health promotion campaign designed to combat obesity would be generating positive results by making more people aware about root causes of obesity, symptoms, consequences (physical and mental), worldwide statistics and health reports. It will provide them with preventions which upgrade their health conditions.
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