Creating Health from the
Grass Roots
 Everyone
talks about improving their health, but too few of us find the motivation
to do the right things about it. So it’s noteworthy when people
in 18 Pennsylvania counties are getting caught up in a lively game
of “Spin the Bone” and learning about their osteoskeletal
health. And when a walking club catches on with Monroe County residents,
with friendly competition for top mileage and its own newsletter, it’s
worth asking what’s behind the activity.
The answer would be, in part, “Creating Health,” a multimedia
health education initiative that brings Penn State Cooperative Extension
together with Penn State Public Broadcasting, the College of Agricultural
Sciences, the College of Health and Human Development, the M.S. Hershey
College of Medicine, the Division of Continuing Education, and Penn State
World Campus/Distance Education. The program brings together many components
of the University’s outreach community to persuade the public to change
its health behavior.
Expanding upon a model developed by Wisconsin Public Television, the consortium
examines the trends and issues around public health problems. Educators
work with public television producers to develop half-hour television programs
that address a specific health threat.
“We look at our state’s demographics and health statistics and try
to identify the major issues that seem to be bubbling up,” explains Marilyn
Corbin, state program leader for children, youth, and families. “Then we
draw on researchers and faculty members across the Penn State system to help
us develop the program. We rely on the Colleges of Medicine and Health and Human
Development to provide the direction and information for new program topics.”
But public TV is only the first wave of “Creating Health.” After
a program premieres, extension educators receive it in VHS or DVD format
for smaller, private viewings.
“The educator uses the video or DVD to augment local, hands-on educational
sessions,” Corbin says. “We collect publications, exhibit boards, Web-based
resources, and other types of materials so that agents have a variety of items
to use in their sessions.”
The first Creating Health collaboration, “Osteoporosis and Bone Health,” offered
practical information on nutrition, diet, exercise, and risk assessment
on public television stations across the state starting in October 2001.
That was followed by a Creating Health program on diabetes in 2002. “Children’s
Overweight and Obesity” premiered in April 2004.
“If we look at health statistics, we see that childhood obesity is a pervasive
community problem,” Corbin says. “So we’ve provided training and
resource materials that educators use in community workshops with parents and
in-school training with school administrators and others.” The local educators
come up with local wrinkles like the walking clubs, which use friendly competition
as a motivational tool.
A strength of the program, Corbin explains, is the nature
of the extension system. “Extension educators are the catalyst at the community level
to put the programs into place,” Corbin says. “The educators
find ways to use Creating Health materials in their committees, workshops,
seminars, summer camps, or after-school programs—they tailor it
to fit their community best, molding it to community needs.”
The next public health challenge for the Creating Health program has already
been identified: second-hand cigarette smoke.
“As a result of the tobacco settlement in the state there’s been a
lot more attention to encouraging people to quit smoking, and awareness of what
happens to kids that are exposed to second-hand smoke,” Corbin says. “The
Hershey College of Medicine is very familiar with the health issues around asthma
and children’s health quality—there’s a noticeable rise in asthma
cases in the state, and smoking affects asthma. That’s a trend we’ve
been watching, and an area that we can raise more awareness of.”
For more information about Creating Health, visit www.creatinghealth.psu.edu on
the World Wide Web.
—Gary Abdullah
|
Fall
2004