About the Book
This text brings together both the history of community involvement in health, and ideas and proposals for further developing the potential of this approach. It explores the roots and branches of community involvement, drawing together different strands from within and outside of the NHS. Also explored is the impact of the rapid changes in the NHS on local communities and patients and the ways in which current policy can enhance and enable the general public to be more involved in their own health and in effective service provision/ideas. Models and case studies are used to illustrate practical ways in which skills and knowledge can be enhanced.
Table of Contents:
Part 1 Context - the roots and branches of community involvement in health: history - the early roots - summary, community development, the influence of social movements, the new public health, health for all, self-help, lobbying and campaigning, conclusion; emergence and development of the community health movement - summary, early history, the development of a national profile for community development and health work, the development of a community development and health "social movement", the development of national health promotion involvement, the growth of the community health movement, the decline of national support and coordination of community development and health work, why did it all fall apart?, community development and health rises again; bringing it up to date - social policy and issues - summary, central government initiatives, regeneration initiatives, increasing health inequalities, the changing face of local government, the new role of the voluntary sector, advocacy and user involvement, developing sustainable infrastructures, linking community development with organization development; why is community involvement in health important now? - summary, benefits to individuals, benefits to communities, benefits to organizations, benefits to society. Part 2 Moving from theory into practice: key concepts; building community action on health - summary, community work, principles of community work and community health work, collective action cycle; advocacy - summary, history, what is advocacy?, advocacy in practice, setting up an advocacy project, monitoring advocacy services, strategic approaches to advocacy, benefits of advocacy; stages in setting up community health projects - summary, introduction, what is a community health project?, what does a community health project do?, making community initiatives work, has the initiative been properly set up?, does the project have sufficient status to effect change?, a community health project check list; participatory health needs assessment - summary, introduction, participatory needs assessment in context, getting participation at all stages in the needs assessment process, deciding who to focus on for a needs assessment, time limits, existence of community groups and networks, existence of any cross-agency forums and networks, past history of research/needs assessment in the area, priority given to the area by other agencies, definition of a "community", organization development; a participatory approach to evaluation - summary, difficulties and dilemmas with evaluating community development, community development approaches to evaluation, evaluation models, evaluating community development and health work. (Part contents)
