This Bachelor’s thesis was conducted as a practice-based project, commissioned by the Welfare Services Division of Turku City. The aim of the thesis was to improve the health counselling skills of the registered nurses and public health nurses as well as standardize the quality of health counselling in primary care setting. As a practical outcome, an electronic instructional material for health counselling was updated and saved in Turku City primary care services’ virtual info and material bank, Opastaja. Many of the risks and protective factors for diseases and conditions that are important public health issues can be effectively managed. Managing these factors can prevent the onset of chronic diseases and conditions. Health counselling aims to engage and empower people to make healthy choices in their lives and make changes that reduce the risk of developing chronic diseases. This universal understanding of health promotion and disease prevention is a vital principle underpinning public health nursing practice. Therefore, it is important to continue developing health promotion pathways also during the health and social services reform in Finland.
In order for health counselling to be effective, it must be goal-oriented and based on effective methods. Individual’s own motivation, willingness and ability to change are in key role in health behavior change. The transtheorethical model of health behavior change places motivation and readiness to change in a continuum. The premise of this model is based on the idea that behavior change is a process, and as someone attempts to change, they move through five stages. The readiness of an individual to change their behaviour varies depending on which stage of the change process they are in. While the transtheorethical model is intended to provide a comprehensive conceptual model of how and why changes occur, motivational interviewing is a specific clinical method to enhance personal motivation for change. Motivational interviewing was initially developed for addiction counselling but has been increasingly applied in public health and health promotion settings. In addition, digitalisation and health technology can provide new resources for health counselling. However, no counselling model or technique alone is sufficient to achieve significant effects. Effective health counselling often consists of many factors in which different methods of operation and contact methods can be combined.