Description
Book SynopsisSearching the internet for health information or using health apps on mobile devices has become part of our daily routine, yet can be just as disempowering as empowering. This engaging overview critically examines the theoretical underpinning of digital health promotion and the use of digital tools and strategies to promote health.
Ivy O’Neil investigates how modern technologies can enhance health services provision and increase the accessibility and efficiency of health communication and promotion. She also looks at the challenges they bring to the social model of health, as they often focus on the individual and neglect the many social, environmental and economic determinants of health. Digital technologies, O’Neil argues, can have negative as well as positive implications and may be contributing to the ever-widening health inequality gap, thereby failing to be compatible with health promotion principles and values.
Offering a critical, practical and thoughtful overview of the application and usefulness of digital technology, this book will appeal to students of public health and health promotion, communication and policy.
Trade Review‘This book addresses a significant need, exploring health promotion strategies in light of new digital technologies and advances in communications. I particularly appreciate the incorporation of values-based and ethical considerations, with emphasis on health inequities and a more critical health promotion practice – perspectives of key importance in our current communications climate.’
Charlotte Lombardo, Program Director, MPH–Health Promotion, University of Toronto
‘Digital technologies have major implications for healthcare and public health. This book offers a necessary critical look at the ways in which digital health not only views responsibility for health but also offers new forms of surveillance and social inequalities.’
Jane Wills, London South Bank University and author of Foundations for Health Promotion
Table of ContentsChapter 1 – Introduction
Chapter 2 - Recent Development in Digital Technology relating to Public Health
Chapter 3 – The alignment of digital health promotion to health promotion principles and values
Chapter 4 – Behaviour change approach and behaviour theories in digital health promotion
Chapter 5 - Big Data and Public Health management
Chapter 6 – Digital technology and Health Inequality
Chapter 7 – Looking to the future
