Engaging the People through Health Communication

In recent HEDIR discussions, there has been dialog about how health education and similar terms, e. g., wellness, health promotion, health science, and health studies, relate to one another.  One term that did not get mentioned among the messages I read to this point is health communication.  Given that HEDIR represents a manifestation of recent efforts to increase, and possibly improve, communication among health educators and that the HEDIR Award rewards efforts to apply emerging communication technologies within the health education profession, health communication seems to be an important term in our lexicon.

We see a similar evolution in efforts to apply emerging communication technologies in government and politics.  Much of President Obama’s political campaign success is attributed to his ability to apply emerging communication technologies.  This morning’s Yahoo front page carries an AP article about how he is applying new communication technologies to sell his budget.  The following quote from this article seems to capture his perspective:

“Obama aides want to keep the questions about energy, health care and education, the three key priorities in his first budget document. Some of the questions will be from the Web site, others via YouTube and some from an audience of about 100 people representing teachers, nurses and small-business employees.

“The president just thinks it’s another opportunity to talk directly with the American people about the challenges that we have, the choices and the decisions that we’re making, and the path that we’re taking to get us back to prosperous days,” Gibbs said.”

Do health educators see a message in this for them?  How important is applying effective communication strategies to professional health educators?  Is it the core of what we do?  Are we good at it?  Are we getting better at it?