Health Education Journal

This paper evaluates the dissemination methods developed as part of a researeh project on women's smoking. An information pack and dissemi nation strategy were developed to disseminate key research findings and practice implications to health practitioners. The information pack was designed to be user-friendly, distilling key research findings in ways that were relevant to practice. The dissemination strategy utilised existing organisational and professional networks. The evaluation of the strategy and the information pack suggests that they provided an effective mechanism for reaching practitioners at the front-line of care, and for improving their knowledge of women's smoking and smoking cessation strategies, and their reported professional practice.

Generating unpaid mass media coverage has been shown to be the most cost-effective method of reducing smoking prevalence. This study looks at the feasibility of generating such unpaid coverage over a prolonged period. Press releases, letters for publication and articles on tobacco-related items Were sent to the local media by an initiative co-ordinated by a health authority cancer-prevention project. Between April 1990 and March 1992, this generated at least 1120 column-inches in the local and national press (81 per cent of the press coverage of tobacco by the three main Oxford papers). More coverage, was generated for policy matters (635 column- inches) than for items relating to knowledge or individual behaviour (485 column-inches). Half the press releases were used by the radio stations and all were published. This assessment concluded that it is feasible to initiate good coverage of health issues and to sustain this over a two-year period.

A pilot nutrition intervention programme for schoolchildren was designed and carried out under the EU programme 'Europe against cancer', from September 1994 until June 1995. Seventy-three students, aged 13-14 years, took part in the study as the intervention group, and 53 more students as the control group. The aim was to develop and implement a nutrition education programme for lower secondary schools with emphasis on the prevention of cancer. Therefore, attention was focused on encouraging, the consumption of fruit and vegetables. The programme was accomplished in three three stages: the assessment of the dietary intakes of the participating adolescents; the intervention-education which lasted ten weeks; and the reassessment of dietary intakes in order to evaluate the impact of the intervention. The intervention did not result in major changes in the dietary habits of the children although small improvements have been observed. The programme has been positively accepted by the administration of the schools and all the participating students showed great interest.

A study was undertaken of over a hundred professionals working with drug users in one English county, drawn from health, community care, social services, the criminal justice system and a number of voluntary organisations. The study set out to discover perceptions of professional roles and in particular of the differing aims of drug education. Three distinct and conflicting models of education were described: education for prevention, education for harm minimisation and education for individual empowerment. Conflict of roles and responsibilities was evident and the favoured solution was clarification of aims.

This study set out to test the effectiveness of three different types of exercise intervention; fitness assessment, exercise consultation and Hifor mation only. Sedentary subjects were recruited using a stages-of-change questionnaire and randomly assigned to one of the three intervention groups. One dependent variable was physical activity measured by a self-report seven-day-recall questionnaire. Physical activity levels increased significantly (p< 0.001) irrespective of intervention. Some of the increase was maintained over a six-month period though there was some decline in the last three months. In terms of adoption of exercise, simply giving information in a supportive environment was a relatively low-cost inter vention. There was some evidence to support the view that exercise consultation was effective in helping subjects maintain initial increases in physical activity levels. Maintenance of initial adoption, however, requires ongoing support.

There has been considerable interest in the application of the Stages of Change model developed by Prochaska and DiClemente. Much has been written about the model's implications for lifestyle change interventions, and national training programmes are underway to train health care staff to provide brief stage-specific interventions. However, there is, as yet, relatively little evidence comparing stage-based with non-stage-based interventions. It is argued from this review of the evidence that it is difficult to generalise from existing research to support brief staff-training approaches.

This paper examines methodological issues in physical activity measure ment by examining the findings of the 1994 Trent Health Lifestyle Survey which reported physical activity participation levels in adult men and women in the Trent region of England. In the survey, individuals were sampled from FHSA registers across ten districts of Trent Regional Health Authority ( N=18,787), and results indicated that high proportions of males (44 per cent) and females (46 per cent) had not undertaken any occasions of moderate or vigorous physical activity of at least 20 minutes duration in the previous four weeks. When asked about accumulated time spent on physical activity, 65 per cent of males and 64 per cent of females reported participating in 30 minutes or more 'energetic' activity on most days. In order to examine methodological issues, results of the survey are compared with those from national physical activity prevalence surveys. This comparison illustrates that even small methodological differences between surveys can substantially influence results, and caution is required in making such comparisons.

This article describes a health authority's approach to setting up and evaluating a coronary heart disease prevention programme through the workplace. The Bedfordshire Healthy Workplace Project was set up in 1992 'to stimulate interest and activity in workplace health promotion' and has developed an action research model to evaluate the impact of working with local employers on coronary heart disease risk behaviour. Action research as a methodology for health promotion research, and some of the main benefits and barriers are discussed.

This paper examines the place of health education in public health in England and Wales between 1890 and 1940. It traces the way that local authorities developed health education for mothers, schoolchildren, and those suffering from tuberculosis and venereal disease, considers the establishment of the Central Council for Health Education in 1927 and the content of its journal, Better Health, and provides a case study of health education in one city, Leicester. The paper notes an important transition in health education in the mid-1930s, but concludes that overall the work of the Ministry of Health, local authorities, and voluntary organisations in this area was motivated more by anxieties about morality and citizenship than a genuine concern with health and disease. It suggests that in the period 1890-1940, as today, delays and advances in medical expertise, ideas about the relationship between the individual and the state, and wider concepts of morality and citizenship all had an important impact on the changing content and role of health education.