NHV and child public health

Abstract

One of the main interests of the Nordic School of Public Health (NHV) in both education and research was child public health, i.e. an area based on the broad World Health Organisation (WHO) health ideology and on public health methods, while concentrating on the special needs and characteristics of children. The fields of study and action, training, research and service, had the ultimate task to consider the health of children in their full social, economic and political context. Regular courses on child public health were offered as part of the general program in Public Health from 1979 until the closing down of the school, named: Social Paediatrics; Child Health; Child Public Health; and finally, Measuring Children’s Health - A Public Health Perspective. Numerous national, Nordic and international conferences were held, and several textbooks were written and edited. A major research project, NordChild, was initiated as a cross-sectional postal study of a random sample of children aged 2–17 years from the five Nordic countries, performed in 1984, 1996 and 2011. So far, 10 doctoral theses and more than 130 other publications from the studies have been produced. Furthermore, the Nordic Network on Research of Refugee Children was created, and a special interest has been devoted to indicators for children’s health, both internationally, nationally and locally, which has been demonstrated in major EU projects as well as locally in Sweden and Greenland.