RHP&EO is the electronic journal of the International Union for Health Promotion and Education

Health Promotion And Health Care Reform In Eastern And Central Europe: Case Study Of A Capacity-Building Demonstration Program

Maurice B. Mittelmark(1), John Gunnar Maeland(1), Peter Makara(2), and Erio Ziglio(3)

(1) Research Centre for Health Promotion, University of Bergen,
(2) Hungarian National Institute for Health Promotion,
(3) World Health Organization, Europe

Investment in health promotion has the potential to make a significant contribution to health care reform, which is ongoing in most countries in Europe. For this to be realized, health promotion needs to be well organized and managed, nationally and locally. In much of central and eastern Europe, communities that once dependent entirely on central planning now have local responsibility to manage the health of the population. In this region especially, effective promotion of the public's health is essential to help control rising health care costs, and' to improve the quality of life of the people. Thus effective health promotion action is a strategic intervention to help the new democracies of central and eastern Europe cope with the radical effects of the abrupt political changes of 1989-1990.

To this end, the Research Centre for Health Promotion at the University of Bergen, the Hungarian National Institute for Health Promotion, and the World Health Organization (Regional Office for Europe) are developing an innovative health promotion training program for health officials in Poland, Slovenia, Romania, Latvia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary. The training program will focus on teaching skills for program planning and implementation at the community level. Training will commence August 1996 and continue for three years. Ongoing consultation will be provided by the University of Bergen.

The program will be evaluated using a case study research design, with each participating country as a case. The main study objectives are to evaluate the training programme and to study the process of development of health promotion action programmes at national and local levels, with attention both to factors that support and factors that impede implementation.

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