Exploring the use of action research to stimulate and evaluate workplace health promotion

This article descrbes a health authority's approach to setting up and evaluating a coronary heart disease prevention programme through the workplace. The Bedfordshire Healthy Workplace Project was set up in 1992 to 'stinulate interest and activity in workplace health promotion' and has developed an action research model to evaluate the impact of working with local employers on coronary heart disease risk behaviour. Action research as a methdology for health promotion research, and some of the main benefits and barriers are discussed.