Stefanie Kruse

Background: There are gaps in the research regarding the implementation and evidence of overall strategies for municipal health promotion addressing communities. The aim of this scoping review is to gain initial findings concerning theoretical models, approaches and evidence on strategies of municipal health promotion, which include self-care, mutual aid and healthy environments. The findings can enrich the development of health promotion services.Methods: A systematic scoping literature analysis was conducted in the databases PubMed, Web of Science, SAGE-Journals, Wiley-Online, ScienceDirect, LIVIVO and WiSo database as well as in a German project database. Evaluation studies and research reports on strategies in municipal health promotion were included and analysed qualitatively.Results: According to our predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria, 15 hits were included. Capacity building, planning and the establishment of structures for health promotion were identified as theory-based models and approaches. None of the publications included showed clear evidence of the effects of municipal health promotion measures in terms of classically medically defined evidence.Conclusions: The use of evidence-based theoretical models and approaches is no guarantee for the success of strategies for municipal health promotion. Challenges with regard to evidence are the execution of study designs corresponding to higher evidence classes and the isolation of effects of health promotion measures in complex environments.Trial registration: This scoping review was not registered beforehand.

The link between health, socio-economic status and the living environment is increasingly moving into the focus of public health research and policy. The aim of the European Union’s Project “Joint Action Health Equity Europe (JAHEE)” is to enable countries to identify and implement needs-based measures to promote health equity. In one of JAHEE’s work packages, focusing on healthy living environments as a strategy to tackle health inequities, a Policy Framework for Action (PFA) has been developed. This article gives an insight into the core contents of the PFA, which are valid beyond the project boundaries for all actors that work at the intersection of community health promotion. The PFA was developed as a consensus document in a participatory process between the members of the work package and an interdisciplinary German team of public health experts. Results from project meetings of the partner countries as well as research findings and recommendations from field experts were incorporated. Reducing health inequalities in public health is a cross-sectional issue that needs to be addressed across all policy areas. The municipality setting is of particular importance in this context, as it offers many starting points and can coordinate between all relevant actors with an overarching strategy.

Intersectoral cooperation is regarded as a promising strategy in setting-oriented prevention and health promotion for interdepartmental, joint efforts towards improved health equity. This paper deals with models of intersectoral cooperation in municipal health promotion. It frames the methodology and the central results of a literature and database search (on behalf of the Federal Centre for Health Education, BZgA) and presents the partial results regarding the models of intersectoral cooperation. Of 48 publications analyzed for the review, nine publications each present different models of intersectoral cooperation. The models describe typical processes in the context of the joint work as detailed step sequences and formulate general recommendations as success factors of intersectoral cooperation. With reference to the findings of the review, it can be concluded that models for intersectoral cooperation have not yet been systematized and consequently have not been researched for transferability into specific fields of practice.