Health promotion campaigns can positively influence the health of individuals, communities and populations by informing, encouraging and motivating behaviour change.

CBR can promote better health for people with disabilities by:

• identifying existing health promotion campaigns operating at the community, regional or national level and ensuring that people with disabilities are actively targeted and included in these campaigns;

• actively participating in health promotion campaigns and associated events to raise the profile and awareness of disability;
• encouraging health promotion campaigns to show positive images of people with disabilities, e.g. by depicting people with disabilities on posters and billboards;
• ensuring that existing health promotion campaigns utilize appropriate formats for people with disabilities, for instance ensuring that public service announcements are adapted for the deaf people with text captioning and sign language interpretation;
• identifying existing resources within the community, such as community spokespersons, newspapers, radio, television and websites and encouraging them to increase their coverage of disability-related health issues;
• supporting the development of local health promotion campaigns to address disability-related issues not covered by existing campaigns.

Health information and education enable people with disabilities and their families to build the knowledge and life skills they need to maintain and improve their health. Through individual or small-group structured sessions, they can learn about disease risk factors, such as good hygiene, healthy eating choices, the importance of physical activity and other protective factors.

CBR personnel can:

• visit people with disabilities and their families in their homes and talk about how to maintain a healthy lifestyle, giving practical suggestions;
• collect health promotion materials, such as booklets and brochures, and distribute them to people with disabilities and their families;
• adapt or develop health promotion materials to make them accessible to people with disabilities;
• inform people with disabilities and their families about local health promotion programmes and services that will enable them to acquire new knowledge and skills to remain healthy;
• develop specific education sessions, if necessary, for people with disabilities whose needs are not being met by those targeting the general community;
• ensure that a wide range of teaching methods and materials are used in education sessions to reinforce learning and understanding, such as games, role plays, practical demonstrations, discussions, storytelling and problem-solving exercises;
• focus on assisting people with disabilities and their families to engage assertively and confidently with health-care providers so they can ask questions and make decisions about their health;
• provide training for individuals with disabilities, in partnership with the health sector, to enable them to become health promotion educators.

Self-help groups enable people to come together in small numbers to share common experiences, situations or problems with each other. For many people, the opportunity to receive support and practical advice from someone else who has a similar problem is more useful than receiving advice from a health worker.

CBR can:

• connect people with disabilities and their families with existing self-help groups in their communities to discuss their specific health needs, for instance groups of people with spinal cord injuries, or affected by leprosy, or living with HIV/AIDS, or  parents of children affected by cerebral palsy;
• encourage people with similar experiences of disability to come together to form new self-help groups where suitable groups do not already exist;
• encourage self-help groups, in partnership with others, to participate actively in health-promoting activities in their communities, e.g. by organizing health camps and observing World Health Day, World Mental Health Day and the International Day of Persons with Disabilities.

Learn how CBR in Colombia assisted in the formation of a self-help group of people with spinal cord injuries.

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With the support of a CBR programme in Piedecuesta, Colombia, a group of people with spinal cord injuries formed a self-help group. They felt they had been given inadequate health information – regarding self-care, prevention of ulcers and urinary problems – in the hospitals where they were treated. 

Experienced members of the group were supportive of new members who had recently experienced a spinal cord injury, and helped them develop ways of coping by showing them how to use their residual abilities and assistive devices. 

CBR organized an interactive session with hospital specialists so that group members could ask questions to clarify their doubts

Health-care providers are a trusted source of health-related information and have the potential to influence the health of others positively. CBR needs to work with these providers to ensure that they have adequate knowledge about disability and include people with disabilities in all their health promotion activities.

To do this, CBR can:

• inform health workers, such as primary health care personnel, about the challenges faced by people with disabilities and their families;
• help health workers understand the importance of communicating with people with disabilities in a respectful and non-discriminatory manner,  and provide them with practical demonstrations to facilitate learning;
• show health professionals how they can make simple adaptations to interventions to ensure that their health messages are understood;
• encourage health professionals to use a variety of media and technologies when planning and developing health information and programmes for people with disabilities.

See how the African Blind Union developed a “train the trainer” manual on HIV/AIDS to educate health care providers about the needs of people with visual-impairments.

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CBR organizations can work with disabled people’s organizations to develop appropriate education materials and methods to inform people who are blind or who have low vision about HIV/AIDS and to inform health-care services about the specific needs of this group.

For example the African Blind Union produced a “train the trainer” manual on HIV/AIDS to facilitate the inclusion and participation of blind and partially sighted persons in HIV/AIDS education programmes.

CBR should work with community health centres, hospitals, schools, workplaces and recreational facilities and with key stakeholders to create supportive physical and social environments for people with disabilities, as well as enabling them to achieve optimal health by:

• ensuring that environments promote healthy lifestyles;
• ensuring that specific health promotion programmes and services are physically accessible for people with disabilities;
• creating partnerships between urban, social and health planners and people with disabilities to create and improve physical and architectural accessibility;
• creating opportunities to enable people with disabilities to participate in recreational activities, e.g. supporting wheelchair users in organizing a wheelchair football match at a local sports facility; to learn more, visit the Social module;
• ensuring accessible and safe public transport, as problems with transport can cause people with disabilities to face isolation, loneliness and social exclusion;
• addressing, through education and training, any misconceptions, negative attitudes and stigma that exist within the health sector and community towards people with disabilities and their families;
• organizing cultural events to address problematic health issues within the community through dance, drama, songs, films and puppet shows.

Learn how CBR in Egypt created an annual summer camp for children with disabilities and their families.

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A CBR organization in Alexandria, Egypt organizes an annual summer camp where children with disabilities, their families and community volunteers go together for group holidays.

The emphasis is on:

• Spending leisure time together
• Improving health status
• Playing, and
• Enjoying being together as a larger family or group of friends.

CBR also collaborates with the local Paralympics committee, parents’ organizations and disabled people’s organizations to organize an annual sports day in the city stadium.

Health promotion in the workplace can improve staff morale and skills, job performance and, ultimately, health.

Organizations that implement CBR should focus on promoting the health of their staff by:

• providing training and education for all staff, regardless of the level at which they work, on ways to improve and maintain their health;
• providing a safe and healthy environment, such as a non-smoking environment, healthy meals, safe water and sanitary facilities, reasonable working hours and safe transport options;
• developing policies and practices within the organization which promote health, such as policies against discrimination, prejudice and stigma, harassment, and tobacco, drug and alcohol use;
• encouraging staff to be good role models in their communities, e.g. setting good examples for others by adopting healthy behaviours.