This is my Health and social care level 3 Unit 8 Promoting public health assignment for task 2.
The campaign I used was ACT FAST.
Feel free to message me if you want more information :)
Table of Contents
Introduction – Page 1
Act FAST – Page 1
D2 – Page 2
Health Promotion – Page 3
D2 D4 – Page 4
Models of Health – Page 6
Conclusion D3 – Page 8
References – Page 9
This piece of research will be discussing and analysing the success of the campaign Act
FAST and how successful it has been in changing the behaviours of individuals in England.
Health promotion and protection is applied through government campaigns in order to
protect the public. The World Health Organisation (WHO) states that health promotion is the
process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve their health (WHO,
2019). Health promoters in England include WHO, local governments, such as Essex
County Council (ECC), the NHS (National Health Service), and organisations such as
Cancer Research UK.
This suggests that the WHO wants people to live a healthy lifestyle and take steps to live a
better, healthier, and more fulfilling life. Health promotion can include promoting smoking
cessation, promoting a healthier diet, or the cessation of alcohol abuse.
Moreover, health protection is a responsibility of Public Health England (PHE); health
protection is defined as protecting individuals, groups and populations from a single case of
infectious disease, incidents and outbreaks, as well as non-infectious environmental hazards
such as chemicals (The Royal College of Nursing, 2020). A very recent and current example
of mass health protection is the outbreak of COVID-19. Many government agencies such as
WHO, PHE, the NHS (National Health Service), and the Department of Health joined
together to form a multidisciplinary team to gather information from all countries and then
share their knowledge to come to a solution to protect the public. This resulted in the
mandatory wearing of face coverings, the campaign Hands Face Space, and the
encouragement of washing hands more often for 20 seconds.
Act Fast
The selected campaign that will be discussed is FAST. PHE is leading the FAST campaign
in partnership with the Stroke Association; the campaign has been running since 2009 and
has been relaunched multiple times due to its success.
A stroke is where the blood supply to part of your brain is cut off; strokes need to be treated
as soon as possible, as they are extraordinarily dangerous. (NHS England, 2021)
According to the Stroke Association, a stroke occurs every five minutes in the UK, and
100,000 a year experience a stroke.
,Act FAST is incredibly successful; the campaign aims to help people be more aware of the
symptoms and signs of a stroke; these have been made into the acronym FAST to help
people remember the signs and symptoms, these include:
Face – has their face fallen on one side? Can they smile?
Arms – can they raise both arms and keep them there?
Speech – is their speech slurred?
Time - Time to call 999 if any of the symptoms are present.
This ultimately promotes health and protects the nation as it prevents any form of prevented
or delayed access to health and social care. Lack of access to health and social care is
when someone is being prevented from gaining support. For example, a lack of access
could be due to a lack of knowledge that they have a medical issue. The lack of knowledge
is significantly prevented by FAST as the acronym helps people remember the signs and
symptoms and has saved many lives.
We can see this by the data provided by the PHE overview of the Act FAST campaign,
which states that in 2018, 78% of people recognised at least one of the signs of a stroke
following last year's (2017) campaign (PHE Facts & Stats, 2018).
From this data, we can see that the campaign is highly effective in preventing illness, risks
and disease of the UK population and helps protect the whole of England who is at risk of
suffering from a stroke and helps inform the public of spotting signs of a stroke, ultimately,
helping us protect each other.
In addition to this, through the qualitative research PHE conducted, when asked, 97% of
people recognised that a face fallen on one side could be a sign of stroke, 95% recognised
slurred speech, and 92% recognised someone being unable to lift their arm. Despite this,
13% of individuals stated they would not call 999 if they were not sure if someone showed
signs of having a stroke (PHE Facts & Stats, 2018); this could be due to fear of wasting
medical professionals time or fear of being wrong if they are not 100% sure.
D2
During the 2018 launch, the campaign also branched out to different ethnic backgrounds,
which is extremely important. In 2018, PHE released an overview of that year's release
information, and they stated that the 2018 campaign would also target African, Caribbean
and South Asian communities. This was done as research was completed, which stated that
their particular ethnic backgrounds are two times as likely to be at risk of stroke.
This was a critical update in regards to approaches used for the campaign. It shows that
PHE is dedicated to improving everyone’s health, no matter what ethnic background
someone has, and shows that the campaign is continuously being updated to continue to be
effective and reliable. This research has been backed up by the British Heart Foundation
and the Stroke Association, which states, "if you're South Asian, you're more likely to
develop coronary heart disease than white Europeans. If you're African or African
Caribbean, you're at higher risk of developing high blood pressure and having a stroke than
other ethnic groups" (British Heart Foundation, 2019). In addition, "Strokes happen more
often in people who are black or from South Asian families. If you're black or South Asian,
you may need to get checked at an earlier age for diabetes, especially if you have any risk
factors like being overweight. "(Stroke Association, 2015).
, Little to no information has been found as to why these ethnic groups are at a more
considerable risk of having a stroke or heart-related conditions, other than the fact that
genetics and lifestyle choices play a part in the risks (British Heart Foundation, 2019).
This is an excellent step on publication in regards to the campaign, as it can hopefully
reduce the number of individuals with an African, Caribbean and or South Asian background
dying due to a stroke and encourage them to obtain medical help as soon as they are aware
of the signs. In addition to this, it ultimately reduces the risk of inequalities within healthcare
and shows that anyone can have a stroke and who are at a greater risk of suffering a stroke.
A health "inequality is unfair and avoidable differences in health across the population, and
between different groups within society" (NHS England, 2019). Health inequalities can
include sex, race, socio-economic status, disability and more. Health inequalities are
unavoidable in most circumstances; however, they can be addressed and possibly reduced
delicately. The Act F.A.S.T. campaign and the groups who are running the campaign do this
by addressing those who are at a greater risk of having a stroke; from the research
gathered, they do this very well as they are not calling out and victimising them groups,
which is extremely important, they just produce the facts and spread awareness on how to
look out and be vigilant for someone, or yourself, having a stroke.
This also backs PHE’s claim on the service working to protect the health of the whole nation,
as stated on the Government website, “We exist to protect and improve the nation’s health
and wellbeing and reducing health inequalities” (The Institute for Government, 2020).
Health Promotion
The Act FAST campaign reaches the public audience through posters on public transport
and areas that are very popular amongst people; an example of the poster is shown here in
image 1.
Image 1: (Phe campaign resources, 2019)
As we can see, the poster details all of the information one needs to spot the signs of a
stroke and detailed images of what to look out for. The technique of using posters and
billboards is very effective in educating people regarding stroke; we can see this in the Fact
Stats provided by PHE, which states that most people whom they spoke to are aware of at
least one sign of stroke through word of mouth, meaning someone probably saw one of the
posters and passed the information on (PHE Facts & Stats, 2018).
In addition to this, the increased admittance to hospitals suggest that the campaign was
highly effective and achieved their goals, this is shown by an NHS report which states that in
2001 the NHS in saw a 24 per cent rise in stroke-related 999 calls, and a 16 per cent rise in
stroke sufferers being seen quicker following the campaign launch and relaunch. This is
incredibly promising and shows that the campaign is working. (NHS Networks, 2012)
D2 D4
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