Health Promotion Unit
Health Promotion Unit
The Unit is located in St John’s, just above the St John’s Day Care Centre and close to the St John’s Clinic complex. It is staffed by the Health Promotion Coordinator, Sharon Greenaway, assisted by the Primary Health Care secretary, Mauvette Aaron. To be effective effectiveness however, it also relies on partnership and collaboration with other health and non-health sectors, as outlined below. For an informative leaflet about the Unit, click on Health Promotion Unit
Our office phone number is (664)-491-9935. E-mail address greenaways@gov.ms or healthprom@candw.ms
Caribbean Health Promotion Charter
Health Promotion is much more than educating the public about health. In 1993 the Caribbean Health Promotion Charter was developed and launched at a regional conference. The Charter makes it clear that Health Promotion is a very broad concept, which needs the input of a wide range of different sectors, rather than just health alone.
The Charter highlights six strategies:
- Formulating healthy public policy
- Reorienting health services
- Empowering communities to achieve wellbeing
- Creating supportive environments
- Developing / increasing personal health skills
- Building alliances with special emphasis on the Media
For more information about Health Promotion in the Caribbean setting click here for a Powerpoint slide show, which explains these strategies in more detail.
Health Promotion Team
To be successful, the above Strategies require commitment at the highest level, and we are therefore very appreciative of the support of our leaders, both within and outside the health sector.
To assist with Health Promotion plans and activities a multi-sectoral Health Promotion Team meets periodically, in order to share information on health related projects and programmes, collaborate on selected health promotion activities, and act as an advisory group on Health Promotion issues and plans. This helps to avoid duplication, and promotes the sharing of skills and resources. The Team consists of representatives from health and non-health sectors, as well as the media, youth, non governmental organizations and the private sector.
Health representation includes hospital and community nursing, nutrition, sexual health, mental health, environmental health, dental service, School of Nursing and Health Promotion Unit. Representatives from outside the Health Department include Agriculture, Education, Community Services, Sport, broadcast and print media, National Youth Council, Red Cross, Diabetes Association and the Montserrat Chamber of Commerce and Industry. As you can see from the above, there are many sectors outside the Health Department that have a vital impact on health, and together we hope to achieve much more than working separately.
Health Policies
Health Promotion has played a role in the drafting of several policies, plans of action, strategies and protocols in key areas across the service, collaborating with the various sections / deparments involved. Some of these are:-
- Montserrat Protocol for Management of Diabetes in Primary Health Care
- National Food and Nutrition Policy and Plan of Action
- Protocols for Mental Heath Services on Montserrat
- National Policy for the Care of Older Persons
- Communicable Disease Surveillance Manual
- HIV/AIDS and Cervical Cancer Prevention strategic plans
Some of these are complete, while work on others is ongoing.