Proposal to Expand UWALK's Reach in Rural Alberta Communities (poster)
Abstract
Walking has many benefits and has been established as an ideal focus of public health promotion to increase physical activity. Rural communities, in particular, are an underserved population that have unique barriers and facilitators to engaging in walking and require tailored initiatives. UWALK is a promising theory-informed community-wide eHealth initiative to promote physical activity, which is uniquely suited to support rural communities. The community specific features, free online access, and focus on walking that requires little training and equipment makes UWALK a suitable health promotion tool for the rural context. UWALK was originally developed in 2013 by the University of Alberta with funding from Alberta Health and is being transitioned to Alberta Health Services (AHS) for sustained administration. AHS highlighted rural engagement as a priority during this transition and is developing a strategy to expand the initiative's reach to rural communities. To date the program has not had a specific strategy targeting rural users, however, previous engagement of rural community libraries and in-person promotion has shown promise. To build upon this, various strategies, approaches and resources were identified in the literature and proposed: Develop collaborative relationships with community leaders and local health champions for UWALK promotion and implementation. Learn about where people gather in the community, identify relevant pre-existing groups (including AHS staff in the community), and support local initiatives; Develop communication strategies and materials that can be modified to match the needs of the communities. Specifically, work with community partners to identify which content to market and how to tailor communications to their local experience, and; Develop training for local champions. Support local knowledge and skill development including how to develop community specific walking challenges that are tailored to the local physical and social environment. UWALK is a promising practice; however, to optimize its use in priority underserved populations, strategies are needed to address their unique features. The rural strategy proposes to engage community leaders and champions, target promotional materials, and support local champions to tailor UWALK to their own circumstances to ensure increased awareness and use of UWALK.
- Publication:
-
Journal of Transport and Health
- Pub Date:
- December 2017
- DOI:
- 10.1016/j.jth.2017.11.010
- Bibcode:
- 2017JTHea...7S...6G