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. 2015 Jun;105(6):1061-5.
doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302621. Epub 2015 Apr 16.

Health awareness days: sufficient evidence to support the craze?

Jonathan Purtle  1 , Leah A Roman
Affiliations

Health awareness days: sufficient evidence to support the craze?

Jonathan Purtle et al. Am J Public Health. 2015 Jun.

Abstract

Health awareness initiatives are a ubiquitous intervention strategy. Nearly 200 health awareness days, weeks, and months are on the US National Health Observances calendar, and more than 145 awareness day bills have been introduced in Congress since 2005. We contend that health awareness days are not held to appropriate scrutiny given the scale at which they have been embraced and are misaligned with research on the social determinants of health and the tenets of ecological models of health promotion. We examined health awareness days from a critical public health perspective and offer empirically supported recommendations to advance the intervention strategy. If left unchecked, health awareness days may do little more than reinforce ideologies of individual responsibility and the false notion that adverse health outcomes are simply the product of misinformed behaviors.

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Figures

FIGURE 1—
FIGURE 1—
Trends in attention to awareness days in US Congress and health science literature (1974–2014).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment in

  • Purtle and Roman Respond.
    Purtle J, Roman LA. Purtle J, et al. Am J Public Health. 2015 Sep;105(9):e2-3. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302812. Epub 2015 Jul 16. Am J Public Health. 2015. PMID: 26180974 Free PMC article. No abstract available.
  • Presuppositions Underlying Health Awareness Days.
    Strand MA. Strand MA. Am J Public Health. 2015 Sep;105(9):e2. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302802. Epub 2015 Jul 16. Am J Public Health. 2015. PMID: 26180992 Free PMC article. No abstract available.
  • Purtle and Roman Respond.
    Purtle J, Roman LA. Purtle J, et al. Am J Public Health. 2015 Oct;105(10):e9-e10. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302841. Epub 2015 Aug 13. Am J Public Health. 2015. PMID: 26270286 Free PMC article. No abstract available.
  • Regarding Health Awareness Days.
    Budnick LD. Budnick LD. Am J Public Health. 2015 Oct;105(10):e9. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302833. Epub 2015 Aug 13. Am J Public Health. 2015. PMID: 26270302 Free PMC article. No abstract available.

References

    1. US Department of Health and Human Services. National health observances. 2014 at a glance. Available at: http://healthfinder.gov/NHO/nhoyear.aspx?year=2014. Accessed November 10, 2014.
    1. Mulvihill CJ. Health awareness day programs. J Am Coll Health Assoc. 1979;27(6):321. - PubMed
    1. US Library of Congress. THOMAS. Available at: http://thomas.loc.gov/home/thomas.php. Accessed November 10, 2014.
    1. US National Library of Medicine. PubMed. Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed. Accessed November 10, 2014.
    1. American Association for Health Education. Report of the 2011 Joint Committee on Health Education and Promotion Terminology. Am J Health Educ. 2012;43(2):1–19.

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