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Today 21 November 2020 is the National Day of Health Assistants. They are extremely essential figures in the National Health System.
A professional of great importance in the healthcare world: in possession of the degree in Healthcare (L / SNT / 4) qualifying the exercise of the profession of Health Assistant, and registration in the register with the Orders of health technicians of medical radiology and of technical health professions, rehabilitation and prevention (TSRM and PSTRP), is responsible for prevention, promotion and education for health – explains Maria Cavallo, president of the Commission of the National Register of Health Assistants -.
He continues Cavallo, one of the first professional figures he meets in the field of prevention from the first days of life, for childhood vaccinations.
Today Saturday 21 November is celebrated the Health Assistant Day. The date was chosen in honor of the anniversary of the Ottawa Charter signed by all States belonging to the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1986. During that event, in fact, for the first time, the concept of promotion of the health which, after 34 years, constitutes an important, as well as current, point of reference for the development of national and international health policies. The Day is important to turn the spotlight on the fundamental figure of the Health Assistant because, as Maria Cavallo, president of the National Register of Health Assistants, underlines, the functions it performs are countless and it is right that it should be given wide prominence.
The Health Assistant, for example, identifies health needs on the basis of epidemiological and socio-cultural data; designs, plans, implements and evaluates health education interventions in all phases of a person’s life; collaborates in the definition of campaigns for health promotion and education; contributes to the training and updating of health and school workers with regard to the methodology of health education; intervenes in family planning and health, sexual and socio-affective education programs; implements specific interventions to support the family and monitors, as far as it is concerned, the hygienic-sanitary conditions in the families, schools and communities assisted and monitors the hygiene of the environment and of the infectious risk; collaborates in health promotion and education interventions in schools; contributes to initiatives aimed at protecting the rights of citizens with particular reference to health promotion and carries out didactic-training and consultancy activities in services, where his professional competence is required; finally, it acts both individually and in collaboration with other health, social and school operators, making use, where necessary, of the work of support staff. Therefore, continues Maria Cavallo, it is only right that the value of health assistants be fully recognized; a day like this is useful for carrying out this process. In addition, it is necessary to create structures and services that make it possible to offer adequate support for the pursuit of health in all living and working environments and reorient health services, with a view to increasingly enhancing interaction, exchange and collaboration. with other sectors in turn involved in the creation and improvement of health conditions. Finally, it would be necessary to strengthen community support activities, in the choices aimed at achieving and maintaining the health of the citizens who belong to them.
Health Assistants have an important principle in their training: to communicate the culture of health promotion. Improving people’s health and well-being is the ultimate goal of economic and social development. Just as the principles of equity, solidarity, social justice, but also the recognition of sex differences and the fight against racism and discrimination, are part of the profound spirit of health for all, as determinants and prerequisites that underlie it. – Maria Cavallo always declares – and it is essential to always keep this in mind, today that profession day is celebrated but also during the rest of the year.
Historical background: when the Health Assistants are born
The Italian history of Health Assistants begins in 1919, during the great pandemic called “Spagnola”; 101 years later, today this profession is still at the forefront of containing another pandemic, from “SARS-CoV-2”.
A small but resilient handful of operators who are custodians of a long tradition of public health, prevention, and the philosophy of well-being. The birth of a profession is always determined by a social need; in 1919 it was the need to revive Italy, exhausted and weakened not only by the “Spanish”, by the First World War with all the social problems that it left as a legacy, as well as other diseases mainly of an infectious nature. Spreading health assistants in the country meant, at the dawn of the short century, carrying out a historic act of organizational innovation: moving from the hospital-centered model to the implementation of a primitive territorial health care, a true revolution. The health challenges of the 21st century will mainly be characterized by the fight against inequalities, by taking charge of chronic conditions, by climate change and by new epidemic emergencies. And again, Health Assistants will be protagonists in the protection of public health through innovation, in a more modern key, able to exploit what technology can allow. Therefore, in addition to the well-explored professional territories of classic prevention activities (just to name a few: health education, vaccination practice, screening for populations at risk, risk communication, surveillance of infectious diseases, prevention in chronic degenerative diseases, etc …) their action will be oriented towards the future: tele-medicine, digital health, big data, wearable health. The destiny of a historical profession, oriented towards the future and towards young people, our greatest heritage because as William Shakespeare wrote “It is not in the stars that our destiny is preserved, but in ourselves”.
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