ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors provide an overview of what settings are; identify and discuss global directions and trends in healthy settings; and look at some examples of healthy settings. They discuss the challenges associated with the settings approach and introduce concepts related to healthy settings and the future. The health-promoting settings approach has much support globally as a strategy to help combat rising risk factors for chronic diseases. Fortune, K. and colleagues recognise the challenges associated with evaluating and 'proving' the effectiveness of a healthy settings approach. This can be difficult because of the number of agencies or organisations that can be involved in a healthy settings approach. The authors describe what we consider to be a health promotion setting and present a global perspective on settings and discuss a range of health promotion settings as examples of how a settings approach could be implemented.
