Healthy People 2020: Implications for recreation therapy

Abstract

For the past 30 years, Healthy People (HP), a comprehensive set of 10-year national public health objectives, has been used by the public health and allied healthcare communities to guide health planning for the American people. In December 2010, HP 2020 publicized new 10-year goals and objectives for improving the nation’s health, and topic areas of HP 2020 were upsized from 29 to 42 focus areas. The purpose of this article is to provide recreation professionals with information relevant to the profession from HP 2020, to be able to participate in the nation’s health project. Specifically, this article first introduces vision and mission statement, goals and objectives, and other necessary information of the updated HP 2020. Finally, practical approaches on how to effectively use this national health guideline for the recreation therapy (RT) profession are discussed, as well as how the RT profession can proactively contribute to the successful implementation of HP 2020.