A partnership between Northern NSW Local Health District (NNSW LHD) Health Promotion Unit and the Northern Rivers General Practice Network has led to local health promotion programs being promoted directly to general practice patients as they wait for their appointments.
“We deliver a range of free, high quality and evidence-based health promotion programs across Northern NSW for quitting smoking, healthy eating and physical activity, reducing risky drinking and preventing falls”, said Gavin Dart, Acting Health Promotion Manager.
“Working in a more collective and coordinated way with general practice is a priority for us because they have established trust and rapport, and see the people that could benefit most from our programs regularly”.
“Our hope is that having our programs displayed prominently in Northern NSW medical practices will result in more people participating to improve their health, and ultimately prevent the development of chronic and complex conditions”.
The scheme is being trialled at the Goonellabah Medical Centre (GMC), where images promoting the Units program's are intermixed with the Centre's own health messages on the TVs in each of the waiting rooms.
"Unfortunately patients often spend longer in our waiting rooms than we would like. At least we can use that time to advise of patients of important health messages, not only from our own organisation but also from others like the Health Promotion Unit's", said Dr Guest of the GMC.
Displaying health promotion images and brochures can support a general practice’s demonstration of commitment to Accreditation Standard 1.3 – Health Promotion and Prevention of Disease.
NNSW LHD’s Health Promotion program images and brochures are available free to general practices across Northern NSW by emailing a request to
