Essay on Health Needs Assessment

Words: 3277
Pages: 14

Public health has the interests of the public at its core. According to the Department of Health (DoH) (2012) Public health is concerned with prevention and therefore encourages people to ‘stay healthy’ and ‘avoid getting ill’.

Health visitors work at the heart of the family to have a positive impact on the future of the child by preventing diseases and identifying any health or social problems early (Carter, 2011)
A Heath Visitor offers a service available to all families that primarily delivers ‘the core offer’ (DoH, 2011). This incorporates ‘the healthy child programme’ (DoH, 2009) promoting public health by ensuring each child under 5 receives the necessary health and development checks, essential immunisations and a contactable

In 2006, there were 112 people per square kilometre compared to 390 people per square kilometre in England (Research UK, 2008)

Not only does Appendix 1 demonstrate but the student is aware from practice there is very little deprivation within this locality. Unemployment is rare and the majority of families would fall into either working or middle class. In 2006 the area was ranked 297 out of 354 local authorities in England (where 1 is the most deprived) (Research UK, 2006)

The ethnicity of the area is minimally diverse; however statistics (Research links, 2011) demonstrate a small decline in White British where in 2001 the population was 97% and in 2099 this has decreased to 97.2%

The complications of having only 7.3% of the population of different ethnicity to the majority make them a minority. Interestingly, the Kellogg Foundation (2010) discovered, in accordance with the statistics to the locality that poverty within this country is tied to race. The study also suggests that the minority youths (under 8) are disadvantaged compared with their white peers when it comes to high-quality health care.

The Health Visiting teams that cover this district are a corporate health team based over five different GP surgeries covering a large area including three British military bases, one of which is extremely high security. Approximately 50% of the team’s caseload lives on one of the military bases and many of the remaining 50% have at least one or two parents