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Conclusions — using health promotion competencies for HP program development
HP competencies have been studied for variety of reasons. Here the main reason, to identify essential core competencies, was to guide HP program and curriculum development within higher education and vocational training institutions. It has been suggested that one of the main problems with the de ned core competencies within curricula is that they are backward looking rather than forward looking. Within the HPP project HP program design was started by looking forward and aiming to identify HP competencies demanded in the future. The competencies identi ed in the survey were next used as an evidence and ground which nurtured the design process of the new HP programs. This process will be described closer in the next chapter.
The survey results offered a framework of nine competence domains and their pro les of competencies assessed as essential for all vs. not relevant in the eld (see also Figure 2). The following general forces were also identi ed which are changing the nature of health promotion and should be considered in our HP program design work:
• From sector based health promotion towards a holistic, multi-disciplinary and cross-sectoral approach to promote health and human welfare.
• From corrective measures towards preventive ones which enable and support the active role of each citizen to manage his/her well-being and health.
• From organization based HP towards proactive, need- and context-based solutions.
The survey results led to our next question related to creating HP study programmes:
How can we best prepare students, as future professionals in HP eld, to engage effectively in cooperative and sustainable health promotion in a rapidly changing environment?
Full overview of the survey results can be found here.
FUTURE-ORIENTED HEALTH PROMOTION
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