Promoting Health and Well-being

The aim of this assignment is to carry out a health promotion campaign on an area that I feel is being publicised regularly in the media. The area that I have chosen is binge drinking as it is growing concern in today's society and by carrying out this campaign I hope to raise awareness within my chosen target group. I will look at the different aspects on binge drinking and the different campaigns undertaken by the government in order to control binge drinking. I will carry out both primary and secondary research in order to devise my health promotion campaign. What is binge drinking? There is no actual definition of the term ‘binge drinking' although it is usually defined as drinking more than half the recommended weekly intake in one session. It is important to recognise that the majority of people do not consider themselves to be binge drinking as they may be oblivious to the recommended weekly allowance or they may be on a night out and do not realise that they are binge drinking/. People ‘binge drink for many reasons but it often caused by: * Peer pressure from friends * To escape from the pressures of life in order to relax. * To increase self confidence and self esteem to deal with social situations * To have fun Binge drinking is also drinking with the intention of getting drunk, drinking as much as possible in a short pace of time and also to the point in which you lose control. Binge drinking is caused by the decrease of alcohol prices so people are able to afford more. Also most people today have an increased disposable income to which they are able to spend anywhere, and most people feel spending it on drink it beneficiary. Drinking surveys in the UK normally define Binge drinkers as men drinking eight or more units of alcohol in one drinking session and for a woman it would be six or more units. This is double the maximum recommended ‘safe limit's' for men and women respectively. Many experts and institutions now use this as a definition of binge drinking. The ‘National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism' defines binge drinking as a pattern of drinking that brings a person's blood alcohol concentration (BAC) to 0.08 grams percent or above. Below is a graph that shows the results of a survey carried between 1998 till 2005 of the percentage of people drinking more than the daily number of units of alcohol: (www.sirc.org/publik/binge_drinking.shtml) (www.sirc.org/publik/binge_drinking.shtml) Read also Six Dimensions of Health Worksheet From this graph we can see that a higher percentage of men drink more than the recommended daily number units of alcohol than woman. But in 2004 we can see that the percentage of men binge drinking has decreased and the percentage of women has slightly decreased. Statistics: Binge drinking has become more and more common in today's society especially with college students as it has become the norm that they go out and get drunk on a typical night out. Below are few statistics that I have found on binge drinking: ‘Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that over 50% of 15 to 16 year-olds have participated in binge drinking, and another report showed that 44% of 18 to 24-year-olds are regular binge drinkers.' (http://www.thesite.org/drinkanddrugs/drinking/problems/bingedrinking) â€Å"Almost one in every six female drinkers aged over 16 now drinks more than double the recommended daily amount of three units,† the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found. (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_6783/is_2009_May_6/ai_n31616613/ These statistics are very shocking as at the age of 16 girls should not be consuming alcohol never mind drinking the double daily amount of recommended units. This shows that there are no barriers to the age that young people will start experiencing alcohol ‘one third of fourteen year olds and half of fifteen years are drinking alcohol weekly' (www.bbc.co.uk/insideout). If they are doing this now at such a young age then this could lead to serious implications with their health in later years. Two in three of the 1,600 under-18s who needed medical treatment after drinking binges last year were girls. (http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/03/22/binge-drinking-shame-of-britain-s-teenage-girls-115875-21217342/) This statistic that was published by the Sunday Mirror in March of 2009 we can see from this that young women are putting themselves at risk by binge drinking. In Northern Ireland a shocking 44% of young people admitted to having their first alcohol drink aged between 11-13 years with an unbelievable 15% of young people admitting to being just 10 or younger when they had their first alcoholic drink. (Northern Ireland Statistics ; Research Agency) 2008 (http://www.derrycity.gov.uk/care/alcoholcare.html) This statistic proves how many young people in Northern Ireland locally have had an alcoholic drink and this could lead to binge drinking very easily. We can see from this statistic that the percentage of people is increasing throughout the number of age groups. Ireland is listed as having one of the highest levels of binge drinking among the 15-16 year age group. In a recent European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs 1 in 4 young people in Ireland and the UK claim they have been drunk 20 times within the previous 30 days. (Northern Ireland Statistics ; Research Agency) 2008 Within the UK the binge drinking problem is also a major concern with â€Å"More than a third of British adults drink over the safe daily alcohol limit,† (The Guardian newspaper) January 2009 (http://www.derrycity.gov.uk/care/alcoholcare.html) However the amount of adults and young people binge drinking is on the increase governments have had to put forward other ways to tackle this social problem in the form of strategies. Below are three strategies that are put in place in the UK today. * The know your limits campaign – This strategy was launched in 2008 by the Public Health Minister as part of a à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½10 million government campaign to tackle binge drinking. Its aim was to make aware to people the units in drinks so that they may be encouraged to stick to these guidelines. They advertised this campaign through adverts, radio, the press and billboards. It has a budget of à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½6million from 2008 and 2009 to target those at most risk of binge drinking, the 18 to 24 year olds. It provides people with guidelines of how to stick with the recommended daily units of 2-3 units a day for women and 3-4 units a day for men. As well as this it puts out there images of how binge drinking can affect the individual's health particularly through the advert on ‘You wouldn't start a night like this, so why end it that way', in which the girl is shown a pouring drink all over her clothes and vomiting. (www.dh.gove.uk/en/news/recentstories/DH_084904) * The safe sensible Social Strategy – This strategy was launched in 2007 by the Department of Health and Home Office. It set out goals to which they hoped to promote sensible so that harm to the person was reduced. The aims that they set out are: * Minimise health harms * Minimise violence and antisocial behaviour * Ensure people enjoy alcohol safely and responsibly They aimed to encourage a safe environment by focusing on support and information for those who are at most risk. * The Alcohol Harm Reduction Strategy – This strategy was set up for England alone by the government to decrease the harm caused by alcohol and binge drinking. It was not established to cut out drinking alcohol completely but to prevent, minimise and manage the effects of binge drinking. Target group: For this assignment I will be taken a sample of the population in order to carry out a questionnaire so that I am able to get their views and opinions on binge drinking. When deciding on what group I chose to target for binge drinking I took into consideration what age group and sex the health promotion campaign would benefit, will the target group be willing to participate and will they be interested in the research carried out. I have chosen a target group which I will focus my study on and focus the types of questions I will be asking. I have chosen females between the ages of 15 – 18. Rationale for my chosen target group: The reason that I have chosen females between the ages of 15 – 18 was because I could relate to them as they are girls around the same age as me. I also chose this target group as they are easy to access as it relates to year 12 to year 14 within my school. Another reason that I chose to target this age group and this sex was because, when I was looking at the statistics that I gathered both locally and nationally I found out that, over 50% of 15-16 year-olds have participated in binge drinking and almost one in every six female drinkers aged over 16 now drinks more than double the recommended daily amount of three units. Within my area in Derry it has become increasingly popular to drink at a young age and drink is very easily accessible and Fake identification is also on the increase and I would like to be more aware of these issues. So by carrying out this health promotion activity on binge drinking I feel that I can either prevent or delay them to a later age so that they are a lot more sensible and totally aware of the dangers and effects of binge drinking. Resources While carry out this assignment, I have had to gather different forms of research for the chosen topic. I will now discuss the types of secondary research that I have gathered and why these are of importance: * Internet – I have found information regarding statistics for binge drinking rates within the UK and Derry. I have referenced the sites that I have used throughout my assignment. * Newspaper article – An article that was published in March of 2009 in the Sunday Mirror stating that ‘Two in three of the 1,600 under-18s who needed medical treatment after drinking binges last year were girls.' * Television documentary – In one of my lessons in my health and social care class I watched a programme on the effects of binge drinking that the celebrity Michelle Heaton took on in order to show the British Public what they are doing to their health and bodies. It really showed both me and the viewers the reality of the dangers of binge drinking throughout numerous weeks. It definitely portrayed the negative sides of binge drinking. I felt that it highlighted the dangers of binge drinking and the serious risks involved. * Health promotion leaflet regarding alcohol – Alcohol ; Young people has been put together in Northern Ireland. It includes questions and answers on alcohol and there are also useful contact details to contact in order to get advice and guidance. The leaflet was useful as it was easy read and educational for the reader. * A leaflet – I also used another leaflet that I found in my local hospital which clearly set out the dangers of binge drinking on the human body through a diagram. I felt that this was beneficial to me as a reader as it was easily set out. I have used all the above resources which have enabled me to gain a greater understanding of the definition of binge drinking. I felt that this has enabled begin my health promotion campaign with a greater understanding of the term binge drinking. Promoting health and well-being Health and well being can mean different things to different people. Health and well being can be described in different ways like: The achievements and maintenance of physical fitness and mental stability. This is a positive definition of health and well-being. The absence of physical illness and disease and mental distress is a negative definition of health and well-being. The holistic definition of health and well-being is the combination of Physical, Intellectual, Emotional and Social health. I think health and well-being means being able to run a mile because if you can't run a mile you are not healthy. You might not exercise regularly so you are not healthy. I think hardly ever going to the doctor means that you are not healthy because you don't now if you have any diseases and you don't know if you are ill so you have to go to the doctor. I think to be healthy you will need to have a good figure, need to go to the doctors regularly and doing exercise regularly. Physical needs are all about our body working. Everyone's body is unique and we need all our cells to work because we need to do certain things at certain at time like going to the gym regularly. There are certain physical needs every one needs like food, water, shelter, warmth, clothing, rest. If we didn't have theses things our body wouldn't work the way want it to work. Intellectual needs are the things that keep our brain working like education, mental stimulation and employment. If our minds or brain does not work regularly, this will affect our health. A disabled person will have a problem on learning new things. Emotional needs are all about people being loved, respected and secure. Read also Six Dimensions of Health Worksheet People need to feel, recognise and express their different emotions to cope with situation in their life like: when you fall in love and then get married, you find out that your partner is having an affair, you need to be able to get over it. Social needs are those that make us adapt to environment like making new mates. You need these because it will affect your health. This can include you having a relationship with some one. You need to enjoy your self because this can affect your health. http://www. european-quality. co. uk This is a picture of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It shows things that a person will need in life to survive and it shows what a person that might not need as much as other things The triangle shows important needs at the bottom and complicated needs at the top. The triangle is set like this because it is showing the things we need in life to survive like food, drink and etc. this is shown at the bottom. At the top it is showing what we don't need in life to survive like self-actualisation. This is the complicated need of a person in life. There is a table that is showing life stages from infancy to later adult hood. Infancy aged around 0 to 3 years Child hood aged around 4 to 10 years Adolescence aged around 11 to 18 years Adult hood aged around 19 to 65 years Later adult hood aged around 65+ years People's health will change during life at Infancy and child hood. At this age the child will need help going round. The baby will need help to sleep. It needs protecting and the baby will cry for food. This is a physical need of child. The baby will learn how to play with toys. How to communicate with others. The baby will start listening to music. The parents will need to teach the child to read by reading bedtime story. This is an intellectual need of a child. The baby will need love and care from parents. This is an emotional need of a child. The baby will need to make new friends and will need to go to nursery. This is a social need of a child. At adolescence peoples health change dramatically. This person will start going on to sports like running, gymnastic. The person will become healthier and will have a good diet. Some times the person will have a bad diet so he or she will be not healthy. This is the person's physical need of a person. There hormones will be high! This person will go to school to be educated. He or she will learn new skills. They will learn how to play games like jigsaw, chest. This is the intellectual need of adolescence. Adolescence will start to understand what hormones are and will start to develop it. He or she will star to have relationship with the opposite sex (male or female). This is an emotional need of a child. These teenagers will start making mates. He or she will start to go out with mates. It will star doing activity (hobbies). It might go to clubs. This is a social need of a child. A disabled person's life will change dramatically like he or she might recover the disability. If the person is disabled he or she will need different types of health. This depends on how the he or she is disabled. The disabled might need help like: how to walk, accessibility such as lifts, needs potential help. Some disabled need help every time. He or she might need help to go to the toilet (can't control bladder). This is physical need of a disabled person. The disabled person will need to learn how to use a wheelchair. They might need to be educated. This is an intellectual need of a disabled person. The disabled will need ways to deal with bullies like: people laughing at them. It will need love from parents, sisters, brothers and family. This is an emotional need of a disabled person. A disabled person will need help have difficult making new mates because he different to everyone around him. Many parents don't let their disabled children out because he or she might get lost or might have got into a fight or might have done serious damage to themselves. This is a social need of a disabled person. At adult hood it is a time to take on roles of independence, lifestyles, marriage, and family. During adult hood people health changes because of many reasons like: Physical, this is a time where we are our healthiest and will reach our peak performance. Intellectual, at adult hood, it will be harder to learn new things because our brain is becoming weaker day by day. They can try to learn new things but this time it will be harder. They can learn to play games like: darts. People go to school at adult hood so they can get educated. Emotional, at adult hood people will become more emotional. Their hormones develop. They might fall in love with the opposite sex. They might loose a member of there family. Social, at adult hood people will go out more with mates. They might go clubbing or they might go to a strip club. They will have more confident. They will make friends easily. Some people might find making friends hard. This can be because he or she might be shy. At later adult hood people over the age of 65, health will change very quickly like he or she will retire. This means they are very old. Many older people start doing things they have not done when they were younger and when they were at work. They might go on a vacation. They might start to play some type of sport like golf. Some older adults are not able to be as active in their retirement as others because they are not as healthy as they used to be. They might also loose their partner or a member of his or her family. The standard definition of negative health and well-being is when someone thinks that health isn't injuries, illness or disease. But this is a negative definition of health and well-being. For example, David aged 40, works in a super market. He takes drugs like cocaine, cannabis, and magic mushrooms. He thinks he is healthy because the drugs make him feel good and tough and he hasn't been ill for 15 years. His hasn't been for a check up and hasn't been to the doctor. He doesn't know that he has lung cancer and asthma. Rebecca aged 20, works as a car instructor. She doesn't exercise regularly. She smokes because all her mates smoke. She thinks it is cool smoking so she doesn't go to her local doctor for check ups. She hasn't been there for 7 years. She thinks she is healthy because she is skinny and she is good looking. This two are examples of negative health and well-being. The standard definition of positive health and well-being is the state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. This means if someone is not feeling well he or she goes to the doctor and also has regular check-ups to ensure the body stays healthy. For example: Tom aged 30, works in hospital. He thinks he is healthy because he goes to the gym every day for 3 hours. He likes weight lifting because it makes his muscles bigger. He isn't on medication and goes to doctors regularly for a range of checkups. He doesn't take drugs. Tom has no illness. He also has a healthy diet and goes out often with his friends. Clair aged 15 thinks she is health because she runs a mile every day and goes to the gym regularly. She likes taking gymnastic classes. She goes to a private school called Challenge College. In school she has joined many after school clubs like chess club, basketball and others. She goes to her GP regularly and she doesn't have any dieses. Theses two are examples of positive health and well-being. Here is the 1948 definition of health and well-being: The World Health Organisation takes a more positive view when it describes health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of dieses of infirmity' (WHO, 1946) Here is the recent definition of health and well-being: The more up to date world health organisation definition of health is â€Å"the extent to which an individual or group is able, on the one hand, to realise aspirations and satisfy needs and, on the other hand, to change or cope with the environment. The later definition of health and well-being is better. This is because the old version does not include the health change day to day but it includes the recent definition of health and well-being. In the 1948 definition of health and well-being it doesn't say anything about life stages changes every day but it mentions about the mental and physical health. The meaning of holistic health is, when a person refers to (P. I. E. S) physical, intellectual, emotional and social. For example everything and everyone around us and affect our health. We need to be prepared for any challenge in life. Here are some examples: Samantha aged 20, works as a train conductor is always looking at all her aspects of her life like: Physical: She always goes to the gym because she likes to be fit and healthy. She is always eating healthily. She goes to doctors for regular checkups. Samantha goes jogging every morning. Intellectual: she is always thinking on how she can improve her life. She goes to college so she can be educated and she is learning how to drive a car. She has started to play games like chess and monopoly. She has started playing for the girl's basket ball team. Emotional: she has broken up with her boyfriend. She hasn't let the broke up upset too much. She is still living with her parent. She looks after her nieces and nephews. Her grandparents have passed away. She doesn't care much about this because she didn't now them at all. Social: Samantha is always thinking of new ways of making new mates. She likes going out with her mates. She likes going to Hollywood bowls. She spends most of her time with her boyfriend called David. Dom aged 60, doesn't work because he has retired and he is disabled. He always looks at his aspects of his life like. Physical: He has to sit in a wheel chair. He rides in his and thinks it is fun. His granddaughter is looking after her. He goes doctors for check ups. He is exercising his upper body because he can't exercise his lower body. Intellectual: Dom has started to take chess clubs lessons. He has started to learn French. He has joined a basketball team. He is learning how to play basketball. He is learning how to play other sports so he can stay fit. Emotional: Dom has lost his wife in a car accident. The death of his wife affecting him for a long time. He has four grand children. He looks after three of them in his spare time. Social: Dom can't do things he dreamt to do along time ago because of his disability. He goes out a lot but can't do everything a normal person can do. He has lots of mates. Lots of his mates come and see him and see how he is doing. In school and at home I asked people what they think health and well-being means to them. I asked Junayed, my parents, my brothers, my friend Tom and my friend Ashlie. Here are the results of my health quiz.