Strategies and methods in health promotion
A STRATEGY IN health promotion is ‘a plan of action that anticipates barriers and resources in relation to achieving a specific objective’ (Green 1980).
A method is a tactic employed as part of a strategy. Methods describe the means by which change is to be brought about within the target group, while some writers use the terms methods and strategies interchangeably, there are distinctions that are relevant to the understanding of the development of health promotion programs.
Strategies
Strategies can be broad based such as legislative changes conducive to healthy behaviour, or relatively narrowly focused, such as changing workplace smoking. Within these strate-gies there may be a number of methods of achieving the goals of improved health.
Currently, there are two major strategy dichotomies which have influenced the prac¬tice of health promotion.