Recommended Study Sequence

This unit explores the impact and relevance of Primary Health Care in its context as a World Health Organisation (WHO) strategy for achieving “Health for All”. It also examines the ways in which Primary Health Care, along with other significant WHO initiatives, provides a framework for the organisation of a just and humane health care system. The integration of associated theoretical concepts will enable an understanding of the complex dimensions of health and well-being to evolve and then to inform health care practices and the planning of programs that can lead to sustainable health.

An individual’s personal characteristics and their family, social and community environments have complex interrelationship with their health and health behaviours. The challenge for health professionals is to understand this complexity and encourage the practice of health promotion within a primary health care framework so enabling people to achieve a sense of power and control over their lives. The unit explores the health of individuals and communities in the context of health promotion. Evidence-based health promotion strategies are examined using social health and ecological perspectives.

This unit presents the principles, strategies and activities associated with social epidemiology and the contribution that this epidemiology makes to the understanding of health and illness of individuals, families and communities. Consideration of social epidemiology in supplementing classical approaches is included, as is consideration of primary health care epidemiology in relation to health service delivery and planning. Students will explore the consequences of primary health care decision making that will enable evidence-based health care practice and relate it to their practice.

The planning, development and implementation of primary health care initiatives rest largely on the capacity of health care workers to develop and engage in partnerships with a diverse range of consumers, health care workers and organisations. In this unit students will critically examine the complexities inherent in developing and sustaining effective and active partnerships with individuals and groups in primary health care contexts. The interpersonal, cultural and socio-political issues that shape communication and the development of partnerships will be examined. Current approaches used to plan for and respond to crises, emergencies and disasters at an individual, organisational and community level will also be explored.

A diverse society may have widely differing conceptions of what constitutes acceptable and maladaptive experience and behaviour as well as differing attitudes to mental illness and healing traditions. This unit provides an overview of the issues inherent in discussions of mental health and mental illness within a community. It examines the influences of, for example, environment, culture, adaptive ability and support systems on psychological well-being while considering approaches which promote resilience, attachment, a sense of belonging and empowerment. Contemporary issues related to selected vulnerable groups will be explored.

This unit provides an insight into the contemporary world of older people though selected themes. Students will gain experience dealing with the ways older people are represented through the media, health and social policies, laws and legislation, and the way that these representations impact on their lives. In particular ageism and its link to health and sociopolitical issues in older people is examined. Additional issues for older people in regard to their opportunities to access health care services and their experiences of these services are also addressed.