An ethnography of health-promoting faculty in a Thailand university

Abstract

Universities are important locations to develop best practice in becoming healthy places, within the focus of the Healthy Cities movement of the World Health Organization. This ethnographic study determined the meaning of the concept of 'health-promoting faculty' with 46 key and general informants in two faculties at a health sciences campus in northern Thailand. The campus developed as a healthy campus setting over a 6-year period and so gathering information from informants regarding their understandings about health-promoting faculty (HPF) are important to ensure that common goals are achieved. Data were collected using in-depth individual and focus group interviews, documents and field observations. Spradley's ethnographic approach was employed for data analysis. Findings revealed that those within the faculties of pharmacy and nursing had different meanings regarding 'health-promoting faculty'. Twenty informants of the pharmacy faculty had been encouraged to adopt their own perspectives about health promotion (HP) meanings. However, 26 informants from the faculty of nursing collaboratively considered the meaning to be 'a well-being organization where the members aimed to create holistic health among the faculty's population in an environment supportive of health'. We concluded that how an HPF is to be developed should be taken into consideration, and that goals and directions should be clear faculty members are to share common goals to promote a healthy university. In addition, to evaluate the quality of HPF development, procedures should be processed consistently within the meaning of the concept of HP in relevant settings.