LET’S GET HEALTHY TOGETHER
CASE: AUSTRALIA SCHOOLS
The Victorian Department of Health in Australia has made a plan for public health and well-being that helps the local municipalities develop health plans in their communities. 86 Each municipality customizes its plan on how to implement health-promotion and health care to account for local conditions. The emphasis of this project is to involve the communities in the work and have local contact points for the public. 87 A government-funded initiative, Healthy Together, provides resources, inspiration, and communication networks for schools, workplaces, and communities to become health-empowering. 88 An example is the municipality of Greater Dandenong that, through Healthy Together, helped the building company Burbank provide health initiatives for employees, including a staff gym, weekly fruit boxes, a quit-smoking program, and more. 89 The results were: 90
WORKPLACE
FOOD
•• Burbank reported higher employee retention •• 80% of staff reported a positive effect from the health initiatives
CITIES
TOOL FOR CO-CREATING HEALTH CARE The fragmented health care systems of today require broad and multi-stakeholder collaborations in all areas to improve the quality of care and prevention of NCDs, as well as integration of health-empowering interventions throughout societal arenas. The following tool illustrates 10 key steps for policy and other decision makers to promote more person-centered care, a means for achieving these goals. Included are health literacy, the knowledge and resources people need to self-manage their health, and how policy makers and professionals can take responsibility for infusing health-empowerment into other sectors.
86 Department of Health, Victoria, Australia. ‘Local Government Planning for Health and Wellbeing’. Jan 2014. Online: www. health.vic.gov.au 87
Ibid.
Healthy Together. ‘Healthy Together Victoria’. Online: www.healthytogether.vic.gov.au 88
City of Greater Dandenong. ‘Healthy Workplaces’. Online: www.greaterdandenong.com 89
Healthy Together Greater Dandenong. ‘Burbank’. Case study. Online: www. greaterdandenong. com
90
health care
HEALTH CARE
185
PEOPLE POWERED HEALTH