Public health is the promotion of health at a community level by the government. It includes prevention of disease through supplying clean water, proper waste disposal, and legislation for clean air, health education programs, and medical care for the whole community through doctors, nurses, and hospitals. Government acceptance of responsibility for public health began in the UK with the Public Health Act in 1848. Now, the welfare state, National Health Service, and health education and protection measures are a government responsibility. The department's approach is to create an environment where people are encouraged and supported to adopt healthy lifestyles. This may be done by providing clear information to enable people to make their own decisions about choices that impact on their health, offering tailored support, personalised services and equal access, and by partnership working across communities even the Prisoners Health in UK.
However, in order to determine the healthcare needs of the people in the prisoners in Britain, it is important to conduct studies which are reliable and credible and generate knowledge which are useful. In doing research, one of the most important things to consider is to determine which methodologies to use. Primarily, the main goal of this paper is to compare two different research approaches and determine the strengths and advantages of these methods for generating knowledge for public health practice, in this case, generating knowledge to identify the needs of the prisoners of Britain.
Research Approaches
Public Health practice is the context of knowing, identifying, and providing the needs for helping people change their lifestyle to move toward a state of optimal health. Optimal health is defined as a balance of physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and intellectual health. Lifestyle change can be facilitated through a combination of efforts to enhance awareness, change behavior, and create environments that support good health practices of the general public. Furthermore, a public health practice consists of development of lifestyle habits which healthy individuals and communities can adopt to maintain and enhance the state of well- being.
After such definition and understanding what have been the purpose of public health practice, it is now time to analyse the development of public health practice theoretically. Researches indicates that public health practice can help to improve health, reduce disease risks, manage chronic illnesses, and improve the well-being and self-sufficiency of individuals, families, organisations, and communities such as the prisoners in Britain. But not all public health practice programs and initiatives are equally successful. The programs that are most likely to succeed are based on a clear understanding of the targeted health behaviors and their environmental context which can be achieved through the conduction of research studies and investigations.
In addition, public health practice will succeed most when problems are analysed and programs are planned, keeping in mind the various levels of influence the ecological perspective comprises. In public health practice, it is a major challenge to determine new prevention, early detection, and treatment methods and to increase the use of programs and curricula that have been found to be successful. Sometimes, purchase decisions, or "adoption" decisions, are made on behalf of large organisations or communities. This happens when a school system adopts a curriculum, a teacher adopts a course textbook, a worksite health manager contracts for screening services, and a city council decides to acquire recycling bins. The challenge of diffusion requires approaches that differ from those focused solely on individuals or small groups. It involves paying attention to the innovation (a new idea, product, practice, or technology) as well as to communication channels and social systems (networks with members, norms, and social structures).
This enters the use of research methods and approaches in generating knowledge for public health practice. Traditionally, research in the field of public health practice has generated knowledge in order to determine ways on how to solve healthcare issues. However, the reductionistic framework of the cause of specific diseases cannot sufficiently describe the complex mechanisms which impacts health behavior. Two of the commonly used research methods in generating knowledge are the qualitative and quantitative approach.
The Quantitative research utilises approaches which are adopted from the physical sciences which are usually designed to guarantee generalisability, objectivity, as well as reliability of the research conducted. These approaches include the manners in which the respondents are chosen randomly from the entire population of the study in an unbiased ways. Herein, the standardised interview questionnaire or intervention that the respondents receive and the statistical methods utilise to test predetermined hypotheses about the relationships between relevant variables. The one who conducts the research is considered an external entity to the actual research, and results of the research are noted to be replicable no matter who do the study (Morris, 1999).
Through the use of qualitative and quantitative approach to public health practice people will be able to be careful in defining what they want to achieve with whom, when and where. The activities may be oriented to individual and collective well-being as outlined by whose definition of health. In an ideal public health practice, healthcare sectors may use both qualitative and quantitative information to give more complete details of the public health issue being addressed, the people involved, and the efficacy of the public health practice itself.
Qualitative and quantitative approach encompasses many strength and weaknesses. The greatest weakness of the quantitative approach is that it decontextualises human behavior in a way that removes the event from its real world setting and ignores the effects of variables that have not been included in the model. And the disadvantage of qualitative approach is that data collection and analysis may be labor intensive and time-consuming (Creswell, 1994; Saunders et al, 2003) In addition, these methods are not yet totally accepted by the mainstream public health community and qualitative researchers may find their results challenged as invalid by those outside the field of social marketing. Through proper use and by merging these two approaches, public health practice may be successful However, if the use of these two are not being utilise this may lead to the intervention of the success of public health practice which may affect not only the theories to be applied but also the practice that the professional health workers. And worse, this may hinder all authorities to have the chance to learn and apply what is really needed for the promotion of health.
In conclusion the literature portrays that a mixture of process and outcome information are used to evaluate all public health practice initiatives, and policy makers should support the use of multiple methods to evaluate public health practice activities. The application of qualitative method in evaluation of public health practice activities derives interactive knowledge from lived experience. Qualitative evaluation is constructionist, naturalistic and ethnographic which emerges meaning and interpretations of events provided by individuals. Its theoretical bases are phenomenology, symbolic interactions and grounded theory that evolve understanding the connections among human beings using truth criteria of credibility, dependability, conformability and transferability (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Working in the field emerges the designs of qualitative evaluation: ethnography approach, Participant-Observation, Observations-non-participants, collecting data, Interviewing-conversational, Narratives-story-telling-transcripts, Constructivism orientation, documentation and analysing and interpreting data. The qualitative evaluator is to try to find meaning and understanding of the phenomena. Finding themes, patterns, concepts, Insights, and comparisons in the data collected (Patton, 1990).
Public health practice comprises a wide-range of health care activities such as community development, social phenomena, biomedical-epidemiological, cultural history, psychological, political and ideological issues and problems. According to Patton (1990) "clarifying the purpose of study will determine what evaluation approaches are appropriate to apply. Qualitative methods are compatible in many fields of disciplines in particular all areas mention above. It can be thought what these disciplines issues or problems all have in common. Key word is people. No representative for the people is contrary to common rights. The burden of the people especially in poverty means nothing they can call their own. A qualitative methods or approach may encourage new creative programs and gives the people the chances to voice their opinions or perspectives. Key concept is effective programs or services to meet the needs of the People. Public health practice interventions of activities should produce the happiest consequences (Polgar & Thomas, 1995).
In combining or integrating methodologies warn outcomes maybe different when using different methods. The qualitative methods from the field of ethnography have been criticised for having insufficient well-define designs and methods (Neuman, 2000). Milbun et. al. (1995) on the contrary, warns that the use of mixed methods may produce contradictory results. I notice in reading about the subject qualitative labels appear to attach different labels to what are essentially comparable evaluation methods and this lack of consensus can be confusing (Neuman, 2000).
Introduction
Public health is the promotion of health at a community level by the government. It includes prevention of disease through supplying clean water, proper waste disposal, and legislation for clean air, health education programs, and medical care for the whole community through doctors, nurses, and hospitals. Government acceptance of responsibility for public health began in the UK with the Public Health Act in 1848. Now, the welfare state, National Health Service, and health education and protection measures are a government responsibility. The department's approach is to create an environment where people are encouraged and supported to adopt healthy lifestyles. This may be done by providing clear information to enable people to make their own decisions about choices that impact on their health, offering tailored support, personalised services and equal access, and by partnership working across communities even the Prisoners Health in UK.
However, in order to determine the healthcare needs of the people in the prisoners in Britain, it is important to conduct studies which are reliable and credible and generate knowledge which are useful. In doing research, one of the most important things to consider is to determine which methodologies to use. Primarily, the main goal of this paper is to compare two different research approaches and determine the strengths and advantages of these methods for generating knowledge for public health practice, in this case, generating knowledge to identify the needs of the prisoners of Britain.
Research Approaches
Public Health practice is the context of knowing, identifying, and providing the needs for helping people change their lifestyle to move toward a state of optimal health. Optimal health is defined as a balance of physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and intellectual health. Lifestyle change can be facilitated through a combination of efforts to enhance awareness, change behavior, and create environments that support good health practices of the general public. Furthermore, a public health practice consists of development of lifestyle habits which healthy individuals and communities can adopt to maintain and enhance the state of well- being.
After such definition and understanding what have been the purpose of public health practice, it is now time to analyse the development of public health practice theoretically. Researches indicates that public health practice can help to improve health, reduce disease risks, manage chronic illnesses, and improve the well-being and self-sufficiency of individuals, families, organisations, and communities such as the prisoners in Britain. But not all public health practice programs and initiatives are equally successful. The programs that are most likely to succeed are based on a clear understanding of the targeted health behaviors and their environmental context which can be achieved through the conduction of research studies and investigations.
In addition, public health practice will succeed most when problems are analysed and programs are planned, keeping in mind the various levels of influence the ecological perspective comprises. In public health practice, it is a major challenge to determine new prevention, early detection, and treatment methods and to increase the use of programs and curricula that have been found to be successful. Sometimes, purchase decisions, or "adoption" decisions, are made on behalf of large organisations or communities. This happens when a school system adopts a curriculum, a teacher adopts a course textbook, a worksite health manager contracts for screening services, and a city council decides to acquire recycling bins. The challenge of diffusion requires approaches that differ from those focused solely on individuals or small groups. It involves paying attention to the innovation (a new idea, product, practice, or technology) as well as to communication channels and social systems (networks with members, norms, and social structures).
This enters the use of research methods and approaches in generating knowledge for public health practice. Traditionally, research in the field of public health practice has generated knowledge in order to determine ways on how to solve healthcare issues. However, the reductionistic framework of the cause of specific diseases cannot sufficiently describe the complex mechanisms which impacts health behavior. Two of the commonly used research methods in generating knowledge are the qualitative and quantitative approach.
The Quantitative research utilises approaches which are adopted from the physical sciences which are usually designed to guarantee generalisability, objectivity, as well as reliability of the research conducted. These approaches include the manners in which the respondents are chosen randomly from the entire population of the study in an unbiased ways. Herein, the standardised interview questionnaire or intervention that the respondents receive and the statistical methods utilise to test predetermined hypotheses about the relationships between relevant variables. The one who conducts the research is considered an external entity to the actual research, and results of the research are noted to be replicable no matter who do the study (Morris, 1999).
Through the use of qualitative and quantitative approach to public health practice people will be able to be careful in defining what they want to achieve with whom, when and where. The activities may be oriented to individual and collective well-being as outlined by whose definition of health. In an ideal public health practice, healthcare sectors may use both qualitative and quantitative information to give more complete details of the public health issue being addressed, the people involved, and the efficacy of the public health practice itself.
Qualitative and quantitative approach encompasses many strength and weaknesses. The greatest weakness of the quantitative approach is that it decontextualises human behavior in a way that removes the event from its real world setting and ignores the effects of variables that have not been included in the model. And the disadvantage of qualitative approach is that data collection and analysis may be labor intensive and time-consuming (Creswell, 1994; Saunders et al, 2003) In addition, these methods are not yet totally accepted by the mainstream public health community and qualitative researchers may find their results challenged as invalid by those outside the field of social marketing. Through proper use and by merging these two approaches, public health practice may be successful However, if the use of these two are not being utilise this may lead to the intervention of the success of public health practice which may affect not only the theories to be applied but also the practice that the professional health workers. And worse, this may hinder all authorities to have the chance to learn and apply what is really needed for the promotion of health.
In conclusion the literature portrays that a mixture of process and outcome information are used to evaluate all public health practice initiatives, and policy makers should support the use of multiple methods to evaluate public health practice activities. The application of qualitative method in evaluation of public health practice activities derives interactive knowledge from lived experience. Qualitative evaluation is constructionist, naturalistic and ethnographic which emerges meaning and interpretations of events provided by individuals. Its theoretical bases are phenomenology, symbolic interactions and grounded theory that evolve understanding the connections among human beings using truth criteria of credibility, dependability, conformability and transferability (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Working in the field emerges the designs of qualitative evaluation: ethnography approach, Participant-Observation, Observations-non-participants, collecting data, Interviewing-conversational, Narratives-story-telling-transcripts, Constructivism orientation, documentation and analysing and interpreting data. The qualitative evaluator is to try to find meaning and understanding of the phenomena. Finding themes, patterns, concepts, Insights, and comparisons in the data collected (Patton, 1990).
Public health practice comprises a wide-range of health care activities such as community development, social phenomena, biomedical-epidemiological, cultural history, psychological, political and ideological issues and problems. According to Patton (1990) "clarifying the purpose of study will determine what evaluation approaches are appropriate to apply. Qualitative methods are compatible in many fields of disciplines in particular all areas mention above. It can be thought what these disciplines issues or problems all have in common. Key word is people. No representative for the people is contrary to common rights. The burden of the people especially in poverty means nothing they can call their own. A qualitative methods or approach may encourage new creative programs and gives the people the chances to voice their opinions or perspectives. Key concept is effective programs or services to meet the needs of the People. Public health practice interventions of activities should produce the happiest consequences (Polgar & Thomas, 1995).
In combining or integrating methodologies warn outcomes maybe different when using different methods. The qualitative methods from the field of ethnography have been criticised for having insufficient well-define designs and methods (Neuman, 2000). Milbun et. al. (1995) on the contrary, warns that the use of mixed methods may produce contradictory results. I notice in reading about the subject qualitative labels appear to attach different labels to what are essentially comparable evaluation methods and this lack of consensus can be confusing (Neuman, 2000).
