Promoting heart health in Hair and Beauty business: Training for Community Champions

What’s in this training for you? As a Community Champion, you play a key role in supporting the BELONG programme as a bridge between communities, primary care, and wider health and wellbeing services. You will be part of a multidisciplinary team working alongside hairdressers, nurses, and community peer researchers to promote local community programmes for cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention, as well as the importance of NHS health checks and annual reviews. As part of the team, we aim to promote interactive engagement and will seek to hold discussions for our teams each 4-6 weeks. Your role focuses on connecting people to information, services, and support. Community Champions are often embedded in their communities and may already act as “natural helpers”. Examples of similar roles in the UK include health champions, community health educators, link workers in primary care, and community navigators. These roles typically involve outreach, communication of health messages, social support, and signposting to services. This training is designed to equip you with the knowledge and confidence to support programme delivery, collaboration, and learning across community and healthcare settings. While you will not have direct conversations with salon clients, you will help strengthen links between community partners and support the sharing of accurate, consistent messages. In the BELONG training you will learn: Module 1: What does the BELONG project entail and your role? Module 2: Understanding Heart Disease and its Risk Factors Module 3: Signposting and Supporting Access to Services Module 4: Supporting Implementation and Digital Engagement