Health psychology and public policy: The political process.

Abstract

During the past 20 years, psychologists have successfully modified federal statutes, resulting in recognition of the profession's clinical and research expertise. Despite these successes, professional psychology's training institutions have largely failed to address basic issues in health policy and the implications of national health policy for psychology. The importance of public health programs under Title VII of the Public Health Act and the significance of full inclusion of psychology in all federal health programs, including Titles XVIII (Medicare) and XIX (Medicaid), are poorly understood by most health psychologists. Federal health policy decisions, including management of excessive federal health spending, will dictate the growth and opportunities for health psychologists. Understanding federal health spending and recent federal initiatives such as Resource Based Relative Value Scale, Diagnostic Related Groups, and practice guidelines will be of benefit to health psychologists.

Editorial: Health Psychology and Public Health—Bridging the Gap

“…This type of public health practice is often quite different from the professional practice and experience of health psychologists (Simpson, Oldenburg, Owen, Harris, Dobbins, Wilson, Vita, Salmon, & Saunders, 2000). More research is required on how to work most effectively with such economic and policy systems (Bryant, 2002;DeLeon, Frank, & Wedding, 1995;Lorion, Iscoe, DeLeon, & VandenBos, 1996;. Of course, working at these 'higher' levels is complex and health psychologists often feel uneasy managing this complexity with the available resources and feel unable to keep enough control over what is going on to get scientific results.…”

Health Policy Perception and Health Behaviours: A Multilevel Analysis and Implications for Public Health Psychology

“…In health psychology, however, health policyeven though being part of APA's revision of Matarazzo's (1980) groundbreaking definition of the discipline (cf. Stone, 1990, p. 5)-has been largely neglected, both in terms of theory, research and practice (Kaplan, 1995;Lorion, Iscoe, DeLeon, & VandenBos, 1996;Marks, 1996), and professional policymaking (DeLeon, Frank, & Wedding, 1995). This is unfortunate, especially considering that health psychology's population-oriented counterpart, public health, directly and successfully relates to policy both by Winslow's (1920) classic definition of the field (adopted by WHO in 1952) and in practice (Baggott, 2000), among others by reference to organized community efforts, organization of health services and development of a 'social machinery' for health.…”

Clinical Practice Guidelines: Should Social Work Develop Them?

“…Although they have proliferated widely due to increasing recognition of the frequently large gap between what can and actually is done for clients (Haynes et al, 1995), guidelines have been greeted skeptically by many practitioners (DeLeon, Frank, & Wedding, 1995). Undoubtedly, Meyer's (1996) assertion that "practice by prescription is not practice based on the assessment of client need" (p. 104) reflects the view of many in the field.…”