Title: Role of HEWs as health educators
Course: Level 3 - Health Education and Promotion > Section: Concept and principles of health education

Many health problems are caused by risk behaviours, such as problem drinking, substance use, smoking, reckless driving, overeating, or unprotected sexual intercourse. The key question is how you can modify and adapt new healthy behaviour? HEWs will do many activities in behaviour change in collaboration with the community. One this activities is providing health education and increase awareness of the community, mobilise the community against unhealthy behaviour, advocate healthy behaviour and the likes. It attempts to help a member of the community to plan interventions that will be effective and enable them to lead healthier lives. As a health educator, HEWs have the following roles and responsibilities:

- Discussing with the individuals and understanding their problems.
- View behavioural actions that might cause cure and prevent these problems.
- Assessing reasons for person's behaviours.
- Helping people to see the reasons for their actions and health problems.
- Asking people to give their ideas for solving the problems.
- Helping individuals to look like their thoughts so that they could see which were the most useful and the simplest to put into practice.
- Encouraging individuals to choose the ideas best suited to their circumstances.