Introduction
Obesity is a condition which is characterized by excess body fats in a human body, resulting to multiple health problems. Obesity has in general reduced people’s life expectation and caused deaths worldwide. Such statistics became the reason for the creation of The Sentinel Site for Obesity Prevention.
Founded in Australia, it was formed as cooperation between Deakin University and the local government agency responsible for health and education. The Sentinel Site for Obesity Prevention’s main goal was to create awareness about the consequences of obesity, mainly among children, as well as help a person avoid or overcome it (Allensworth, 2010, p.50).
Their main agenda is to make sure that their site is able to make the community cooperate and work with them. In this case, they can reach out to as many people as possible, by giving evidence of childhood obesity.
The government is the main stronghold in the obesity campaign because it gives presiding, which people are to follow. For example, the Australian government has come up with various movements against obesity, in addition to the Sentinel Obesity Site (Barkway, 2009, p.90). As a result, demonstrations against obesity are spreading worldwide (Clendon, 2010, p.80).
Discussion
According to Ottawa Charter, the main principles of public health create and establish the public policies, nurture supportive atmosphere, motivate community actions, improve personal abilities and focus on health unit services towards health promotion and disease prevention (Gottwald, 2012, p.99). The Sentinel Site for Obesity Prevention meets most of Ottawa Charter’s principles to improve health promotion (Crips, 2012, p.150).
They have been able to develop public policies and also develop a supportive environment. To achieve this, they used ANGELO framework (Analysis Grid for Elements Linked to Obesity) as a tool to public policy development and creation of a supportive environment to nurture growth of the policies (Frankim, 2010, p.66).
The community actions were also strengthened, which was achieved by means of demonstrations. If a community joined forces against a particular issue, namely, obesity, the effect is largely felt (Dinu, 2008, p.55). Nevertheless, the Sentinel Site has not met all the principles of Ottawa Charter fully, one of them being improvement of personal skills.
The site has mainly focused on community effort and impact rather than on an individual level impact (Gauld, 2009, p 63). This could however, greatly improve an obesity prevention in the future if implemented because if a doctor or a nurse are able to acquire more skills in their professions, they are able to display them in the work they perform; in this case they will be able to stop or discourage any methods that may result in childhood obesity (Leona, 2012, p.77).
Secondly, they have not fully been able to focus on the health care services so they need to improve health promotion and disease prevention rather than focus on building new health cares. Improving the existing heath care outlet would be cheaper and faster than the construction of a new one which is to be built from scratch (Noble, 2012, p.211).
According to Jakarta Declaration, the site had the following strategies on health promotion, namely, improvement of infrastructure for health promotion for easy access, motivation of the community on individual levels, creation of a community to enhance sharing of knowledge, abilities and resources, consider health promotion as an investment and improve social awareness for health promotion.
The Sentinel Site has succeeded in achieving the creation of a community to enhance sharing of knowledge, skills and finances because the site works as a community (Talbot, 2009, p.43). Secondly, the issue of improving social responsibility for health promotion has been achieved. In other words, when individuals are educated and are aware that their health is their own responsibility, they are therefore, able to take actions and leave a healthy lifestyle.
Thirdly, by motivating community on an individual level through the campaigns held by the Sentinel Site, the community always takes part in them and, as a result, the individuals get motivated and learn more about their health issues. There are two other strategies, which are improvement of infrastructure for easy access and considering health promotion as an investment (World Health Organization, 1997).
They exist because the health promotion movement is not very well funded to financially be able to improve infrastructure, but the available movements are able to serve the purpose (Bartholomew, 2011); what is more, the issue of considering health promotion as an investment is not a tool for promoting health but it is rather a capital generating base which in the future can be adopted by the Sentinel Site after they have achieved their goal of health promotion as an incoming generating base (Stainton, 2012, p. 34).
Conclusion
It is clear that The Sentinel Site for Obesity Prevention has come a long way in health promotion. The interventions as outlined by Jakarta Declaration and Ottawa Charter were not exhaustive, which, however, can be improved in the following ways. The site should work towards personal improvement, which can be achieved by offering online education or open learning education (Ringruber, 2013, p.94).
Secondly, the site should try to improve existing health care centers by means of buying new facilities, employing more qualified workers and improving the hygiene. This would be very effective and quite cheap in comparison to building health centers. Thirdly, the site should advertise their health promotion campaign as a business investment (Peate, 2012, p.55).
Since this will attract investors, the site should consider it as a way of making money and letting the world know they exist. Fourthly, the site should approach the government to help them improve the infrastructure for easy access of medical material. In addition, in order to be universally recognized, the site should be advertized all over the world, which can only be achieved by vigorously campaigning (Paker, 2009, p.33).
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