Impact of the use of the Red Lotus Critical Health Promotion Model as a pedagogical framework on health promotion graduates’ professional practice: A mixed methods study

Training health promotion graduates involves developing health promotion specific competencies, including knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary for professional health promotion practice.¹

The Red Lotus Critical Health Promotion Model (RLCHPM) is designed to support critical health promotion practice, and is used in health promotion teaching, research and practice in multiple countries. ^2-8 Since 2008, the RLCHPM has been used as the pedagogical framework to teach and assess health promotion competencies in courses within undergraduate and postgraduate health promotion degree programs at the University of the Sunshine Coast.

In this study, we investigated the impact of the model on the health promotion practice of program graduates. We conducted an online survey of all graduates from 2008 to 2016, followed by semi-structured interviews with a subset of respondents. There were 95 survey respondents and 10 interviewees.

We found that the use of the RLCHPM as a pedagogical framework positively impacted on graduates’ practice, particularly at a health promotion program level. There was a lower level of impact reported for workplace policies. In general, impact on practice was significantly higher for graduates with higher levels of knowledge about, confidence in using, and perception of utility of the RLCHPM, and stronger alignment of their practice with critical health promotion values and principles. Graduates’ embodiment of the model’s values and principles in practice enhanced the impact of the model. Factors that limited the impact included the implicit use of components of the model without explicit reference to the model, and the incongruence between graduates’ professional practice ideals and those of their workplace context.

The RLCHPM could be used as a pedagogical framework in universities to develop competency-based critical health promotion curricula to enable graduates to progress critical health promotion practice.

1. Taylor J, Ashford T, Shelley K, et al. Starting With the End in Mind: Future Focussed Curriculum in Health Promotion. In: Trimmer K, Newman T and Padro F (eds) Ensuring Quality in Professional Education. Switzerland: Springer International Publishing, 2019, pp.99-121.
2. Taylor J, O’Hara L, Talbot L, et al. Promoting Health: The Primary Health Care Approach. 7 ed. Chatswood, NSW: Elsevier Australia, 2021.
3. Tretheway R, Taylor J and O’Hara L. Finding new ways to practise critically: applying a critical reflection model with Australian health promotion practitioners. Reflective Practice 2017; 18: 627–640 24 Apr. DOI: 10.1080/14623943.2017.1307721.
4. O’Hara L, Ahmed H and Elashieb S. Evaluating the impact of a brief Health at Every Size®-informed health promotion activity on body positivity and internalized weight-based oppression. Body Image 2021; 37: 225-237. DOI: 10.1016/j.bodyim.2021.02.006.
5. O’Hara L and Taylor J. A critical health promotion research approach: the development and application of the Red Lotus Critical Health Promotion Model. In: Potvin L and Jourdan D (eds) Global Handbook of Health Promotion Research. Cham, Switzerland: Springer, in press.
6. O’Hara L. The extent to which weight-related public health initiatives reflect the values and principles of health promotion: a critical discourse analysis. University of the Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs, 2014.
7. Gregg J. Development of a health promotion model and the impact evaluation of the model on practitioners’ health promotion practice. University of the Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs, 2012.
8. O’Hara L and Taylor J. A critical health promotion research approach using the Red Lotus Critical Health Promotion Model. In: Potvin L and Jourdan D (eds) Global Handbook of Health Promotion Research. Cham, Switzerland: Springer, 2022, pp.541-566.