Quitting smoking and promoting good health

The community pharmacist is a healthcare professional who is close and accessible to the population. His or her purpose is to help improve patients' health, so the population's well-being must be the main philosophy underlying a pharmacist's work. To achieve this it is necessary to reinforce aspects such as advice regarding medication and the provision of professional services to cover all matters from answering questions about medicines and health to health education.

In 1946 the World Health Organization (WHO) defined health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease. This definition has gradually evolved and been readapted. The 1986 Ottawa Charter defined health promotion as the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health. Health education is the process of enabling people to increase control over their health and its determinants, and thereby improve their health.