Health professionals everywhere have done a lot in creating health awareness and promoting health in recent times. It is disturbing that so many people still pick, encourage, and maintain harmful behaviors such as smoking and unhealthy eating. Most people are aware of the health dangers related to smoking and excess weight, yet a lot of people still smoke and have excess weight. Research has proven that physical activity alone can help prevent chronic non-communicable diseases, most of which are associated with unhealthy lifestyle and behavior. The barriers to healthy living extend past the material things, financial capability, or societal influence. Behavior and psychological factors such as a simple lack of willpower, also present as barriers. Both children and adults need specific amounts of physical activity in order to maintain healthy living and prevent disease. A community-based health prevention program was designed to identify some of the behavior and psychological barriers hindering behavior modification and disease prevention and find solutions for improving healthy living within the community. Physical activity, among other initiatives, was recommended by the program to help with behavior modification and promote healthy living and disease prevention.
Mission Statement
The mission of the program is to encourage healthy living among the public and prevent disease through physical activity and other strategies and behaviors that encourage healthy living. In promoting healthy living within the community, the program hopes to expand its services and rationale to other areas to promote healthy living on a broader scale.
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Vision
The vision of the program is to create a society where everyone is not only aware of the benefits of disease prevention and the behavioral and psychological barriers to healthy living but is also actively involved in promoting healthy living by committing to physical activity and other healthy living behaviors and strategies. The strategy of the program is focused on encouraging healthy behavior so that current and future generations can be impacted positively.
Stakeholders and Roles
The initiative was taken by the local health center, in conjunction with a number of health organizations, with the goal of enriching lives within the community. If the program became a success, it would receive further funding from the state and federal government as well as other private bodies. All the local health facility’s workers were included in the program as they all interacted with the community on different levels. The programs was set to include all community members, including children and adults. The objective of the program included promoting health awareness and healthy living, health education on physical activity, behaviors barring healthy living, and monitoring and encouraging the locals to commit to healthy lifestyles. Health professionals would conduct meetings within the community at least once a week to educate and promote health. Concerned bodies, including the state government, would provide funding for the initiation of the program and ensure various facilities such as playgrounds for children and gymnasiums were renovated or available. Health professionals educated the locals on the importance of preventing disease through behavior modification. Parents and teachers were to ensure children engaged in maximum physical activity while at home and school. Adults were directed to attend carry out aerobatic activities regularly and visit the gym at least once a week.
Behavior and Prevention in Maintaining Health
The development of chronic non-communicable diseases is associated with unhealthy behaviors and lifestyles. Disease prevention strategies may significantly lower the chances of occurrence and development of chronic non-communicable diseases such as heart disease ( Yu et al., 2018) . Disease prevention mechanisms not only work to encourage healthy living but also helps reduce the economic burden of having to treat chronic non-communicable diseases for years ( Wood & Neal, 2016) . Unhealthy behaviors such as unhealthy eating, lack of sufficient physical activity, excess alcohol consumption, unsafe sexual practices, and smocking all contribute to unhealthy living and hinder disease prevention. Unhealthy eating may lead to excess weight gain and a variety of health conditions, including diabetes and hypertension ( Yu et al., 2018) . Lack of sufficient amounts of physical activity increases the chances of an individual developing severe chronic diseases such as heart disease. Smocking subjects one to numerous chronic disease conditions, including lung cancer, while excessive alcohol consumption causes conditions such as alcoholism and liver disease. Unsafe sexual practices expose people to a wide range of diseases, such as the dreadful HIV/AIDs, among other deadly venereal diseases.
Through progressive public health education and health promotion strategies, the public gets to have an opportunity to take preventative measures for their health through behavior modification. Educating the public and getting people to modify their behaviors and to commit to healthy and preventative practices can significantly help in preventing disease within the community and society as a whole.
Behavior and Psychological Barriers
Children grow up and take up behaviors and characters from the adults around them. Youths smock and drink because they see older people doing the same. People with excess weight do not always take kindly to advice relating to body weight and physical activity. In general, almost everyone knows the dangers of unhealthy behavior, yet they cannot get themselves to modify their behaviors. Some of the barriers to behavior modification and disease prevention include resources, lack of willpower, lack of social support, peer pressure, and mentality. People cannot properly participate in physical activity if there are no resources and proper facilities for exercise. Some people simply lack the willpower to engage and commit to physical activity or stop unhealthy behavior or lifestyle. Lack of support from the family or community may also discourage people from modifying their behaviors. Children and youths start smoking, drinking, or engaging in unhealthy behaviors as a result of peer pressure or the need to fit in or due to the simple fact that they see adults doing the same. Negative mentalities stop people with excess weight from realizing that their health is at stake.
Recommendations for Behavior Modification and Disease Prevention
Physical activity . One major recommendation for behavior modification and disease prevention is to encourage physical activity. This can be facilitated by constructing playgrounds, footpaths for running and jogging, public gymnasiums, and through educating the public on the benefits of physical activity. Physical activities range from household and occupational chores to leisure-time activities and exercise ( Rogers et al., 2018) . For adults, about one hundred and fifty minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity or about seventy minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity per week is sufficient to keep the body healthy. Children need more duration of physical activity as they are still growing and learning. Physical activity helps reduce the risks of heart attack, diabetes, and blood pressure, manage body weight, improve psychological health and feelings, lower risk of falls, and develop stronger bones and muscles. A person also gets to recover quicker after hospitalization if they actively carry out physical activities.
Other recommendable strategies include community health and educational meetings, health awareness and promotions, sexual education for the youth, medical apps, and banning public smocking ( Holland, 2019) . It is easier to get people to change their lifestyle if the advice, warning, or teaching is coming from health and medical professionals. People with excess body weights are much more likely to try out healthy eating habits and physical activity if health professionals advise them. Banning public smoking would reduce the prevalence of smoking and lower the chances of every youth smoking. The youth can also benefit a lot from sexual education as they will be able to practice safe sex. Medical apps connecting the public to health professionals would work to commit people to healthy lifestyles.
References
Holland, J. E. (2019). Promoting Healthy Habits and Active Living for Children and Families at the Well-Child Visit.
Rogers, L. Q., Carter, S. J., Williams, G., & Courneya, K. S. (2018). Physical activity. In Handbook of Cancer Survivorship (pp. 287-307). Springer, Cham.
Wood, W., & Neal, D. T. (2016). Healthy through habit: Interventions for initiating & maintaining health behavior change. Behavioral Science & Policy , 2 (1), 71-83.
Yu, E., Malik, V. S., & Hu, F. B. (2018). Cardiovascular Disease Prevention by.
