The Arjeplog project: comprehensive health promotion in a community

The municipality of Arjeplog, Sweden, is an example of extensive and successful community participation in the aims of health promotion. At the health care centre, personnel from diverse departments meet on a regular basis to discuss patient needs and exchange knowledge on medical and social matters. Care groups exist in order to enable specialists to discuss and meet community needs: a psychiatric group, a rehabilitation group, a home care group, a child and family care group, etc. The municipality's resources include an old person's home which runs a day centre, A nursery, adult evening colleges, sports clubs, and services such as Alcoholics Anonymous, all serve as centres for the health promotion movement. Preventing ill health among the elderly and encouraging short-term visits to the centre has resulted in the need for hospital beds remaining steady despite an increase in the number of elderly people in the municipality. Preventive work in the form of health education has taken place in schools and through study circles specially formed by health education leaders. Public lectures have been successful and met with requests for further talks. Visits to the outpatient clinic have dropped by about a quarter. Arjeplog has one of the lowest number of people on the sick list in Sweden and the duration of diseases is lower than average. People are generally aware of what a healthy lifestyle involves and often take measures to prevent ill health. A Health Council has been formed and is to initiate future health work through work groups set up to meet health problems identified collectively.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)