Analysis of Health Visiting Commissioning Policy in Public Health

This report delves into the Health Visiting Commissioning Policy, a crucial element of public health, particularly in the UK. It defines public health, emphasizing its role in disease prevention through education, policy, and research. The report focuses on the Health Visiting Commissioning Policy, which involves assessing public health needs, planning strategies, and implementing services with a defined budget. It highlights the role of health visitors in providing support and advice to families, especially those with young children, and their responsibilities in promoting health education and child development. The report further explores the policy's background, its supporters like Public Health England, and its impact on health staff, while also addressing contentious issues such as staffing shortages and challenges in data documentation. The conclusion underscores the significance of policies in safeguarding and improving public health outcomes.

Politics And Policy In
Public Health
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
BACKGROUND.............................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................4
Health visiting commissioning policy.........................................................................................4
Explain why it is a public health issue and who supports the policy..........................................5
Contentious issues in the policy and impact of policy on health staff........................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
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INTRODUCTION
Public health can be defined as process of improving and protecting health of
communities by the means of education, policy and research for prevention of diseases and
infections. Policies and politics in public heath is a major concern for maintaining and improving
public health which includes all sector of society (Barrington, 2019). They are majorly refers to
decisions, actions and plans which are taken to achieve specific healthcare goals within a society.
The following report will cover Health visiting commissioning Policy for public health in
local government. It is a important issue for implementing in public health as it helps in to
analyse healthcare needs of individuals, families, and other communities in order to promote
heath and wellness.
The following report will focus on public heath policy and politics which are raised in
public heath. Furthermore, it will state the continuous issues which will arise during the
implementation of policy and supporters which are included for the policy.
BACKGROUND
Health visiting commissioning policy for public health is a policy which involves in
procuring health services. It is a process for assessment of needs and requirements of public
heath and planning different strategies for providing services to meet those needs and the
implementing these services on a considerable budget. The commissioning cycle involves
analysing, planning, implementing and monitoring. It is important for members of the respective
policy to analyse the needs for public health. They build different strategies for planning services
for the public heath in order to protect safety and protecting heath of the individuals in public
health (Meier, 2016).
Health visiting commissioning policy involves a workforce of public heath visitors who
provide advice, support and medications for families with children and help them in making
decisions which can impact their future heath and well-being. The service is drive by health
visitors and supported by a skilled team. The policy is run by a process which is repeated
typically on annual basis.
Health visitors are the nurses or mid midwiferies with special public health qualification
who help families to maintain the health conditions of young children. This majorly involves
home visits. The key responsibilities of a heath visitor is to provide heath education and health
advice programmes for the families with children. They involved in taking actions for the
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development of babies and children. A health visitor analyse the parenting skills and home
situations of children and help parents by offering any needed support. They provide services
which is based on evidences on what works best for the individuals, groups, families and
communities. They help in improving health and removing health inequalities by means of
universal service for children with age group of 0-5 years and for individuals which are targeted
according to needs. They provide a platform to reach out to the individuals who have different
needs regarding to health. However, their main focus or prior target is pre school children and
their families (Birn, Nervi and Siqueira, 2016). Health visitors involves a minimum of five home
visits. Such visits are usually in the home of children, but heath visitor may involve parents of
the children to join heath groups, networks and clinics which are run by their team such as
nurses, community mothers, children centre staff etc.
The concept of Health visiting commissioning policy was introduce by NHS in the early
1990's. National health system is a healthcare system in United Kingdom which provides free
medical care to the public. Healthcare commissioning is an effective planning to deliver
healthcare in order to meet the needs of population.
MAIN BODY
Health visiting commissioning policy
Health visiting commissioning is a policy for public health which is involved in analysing
needs, planning and prioritising and monitoring health services in order to get the best heath
outcomes. It is comprise of range of different activities like to analyse the needs of public heath
and to plan services to meet the requirements of population. Then it implement services in public
sector and monitor and access the heath conditions of public after implementing their services.
The policy involves a process which is typically repeated on annual basis. It involves a
workforce of nurses and midwiferies who have special qualification related to public heath
(Tosun, 2017). The role of heath visitors is to provide advice and supports to the families with
children and encourage their parents to make effective decisions which may impact family future
and well-being. The role of a heath visitor is to promote heath education and conduct
programmes related to public health. They are generally involved in taking actions related to
babies and children. Their job is to analyse the parenting skill and home conditions of the
children. They help in to remove heath inequalities by providing their services to children and
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within the age group of 0-5 years and individuals who really need help in terms of their health
situations. A heath visitor or a nurse advice how to deal with risks and how to prevent accidents
and injuries of young children. They are majorly involved in analysing the risk factors of
child,and to take actions if needed. It is the job of a heath visitor to ensure that the families of
targeted children is getting proper support of them in their growth and development. They
arrange specific home visits for children. However, they also involves parents of children join
health groups, networks and clinics which are run by their team such as nurses, community
mothers, children centre staff etc. Thus, this policy helps in to protect the safety of public heath
and children of the country in order to promote health and wellness.
Explain why it is a public health issue and who supports the policy
Health visitors are involved in providing valuable support to the families with children.
The impact of health visiting commissioning policy results in overall health development of
children within a family and encourages healthy lifestyles of young children. The major issue of
the policy is that some of the nurses and midwiferies avoid adults and aged individuals because
they think they have been specially assisted to treat young children only (Greer, 2018). This is a
major concern for the policy also being a women sometimes they don't feel safe to visit homes of
the children and fails to deliver proper treatments to their targeted patients. However, rather than
these limitations the policy will lead to positive impacts on public health. The policy will include
elements for improving health and wellness of community along with screening, immunisations
and overall social and emotional development of young children. They focus on promoting heath
and wellness of the entire population and aware people regarding their health.
The policy is mainly supported by Public Health England. The role of public health
England is to improve and safeguard population heath and well-being and to reduce heath
inequalities. It assist local authorities of the country in commissioning of health visitors and
nursing services in order to deliver proper care of young children. Healthy child programme also
provide a framework for to support heath visitors (Gostin, 2016). They aims at helping parents to
make strong bonds with their children, they support parents for making their children safe and
healthy and aims at protecting children from infectious diseases. Local authorities play an
important roles in providing funds for ensuring protection and well-being of population.
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Contentious issues in the policy and impact of policy on health staff
Along with the benefits of the policy, there are some issues also which are need to be
consider in order to promote heath and wellness among population of the country. Staffing of
professional health visitors is a major concern of the policy. There is a need of trained and skilled
nurses and midwiferies who can deliver better care to the children and can give appropriate
advice to their parents regarding their health. They are currently struggling in retaining
permanent skilled staff. The second major issue of the policy is they face difficulties in
documenting the data of immigrants in the country. However, sometimes it is a issue of concern
for the nurses to take care as they increase the population overall. It is difficult to maintain
records simultaneously. The third major issue of the policy is nurses and midwiferies are indulge
in treating the population of young children only and overlook he treatment of adults and aged
individuals. However, they need to be properly trained as should deliver care to overall public of
the area. The role of policy in health staff is that they try to become more skilled and work with
more concentration as their target is to provide treatment to babies and children.
CONCLUSION
From the above study, it can be concluded that politics and policies plays a major role in
ensuring the safety and protection of public health. Policies and politics in public health is a
major concern for maintaining and improving public health which includes all sector of society.
Such policies help in assessing public needs and helps in to build services for the well-being of
society. They are majorly involve in procuring health services for the public heath communities.
Thus, they focus on all sectors of the public and implement their services in order to safeguard
and protect overall well being of population.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Barrington, R., 2019. Health, medicine and politics in Ireland 1900-1970. Public Health.
Birn, A.E., Nervi, L. and Siqueira, E., 2016. Neoliberalism redux: the global health policy
agenda and the politics of cooptation in Latin America and beyond. Development and
Change, 47(4), pp.734-759.
Gostin, L.O., 2016. Politics and public health: the Flint drinking water crisis. Hastings Center
Report, 46(4), pp.5-6.
Greer, S.L., 2018. Healthy or sick? Coevolution of health care and public health in a comparative
perspective. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law.
Meier, K.J., 2016. The Politics of Sin: Drugs, Alcohol and Public Policy: Drugs, Alcohol and
Public Policy. Routledge.
Tosun, J., 2017. Party support for post-exceptionalism in agri-food politics and policy: Germany
and the United Kingdom compared. Journal of European Public Policy, 24(11),
pp.1623-1640.
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