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SOCIOLOGY IN HEALTH

Introduction

According to World Health Organization, health can be considered as a state of complete physical, mental and social well being of a person and not the mere absence of disease or infirmity. This means that the definition of health takes a holistic approach in that it does not assess health in terms of diseases or infirmity alone. This arises from the fact that there are many factors that determine the health status of a person. The well being of an individual is contributed by many integrating factors. The medical definition of health may be more leaned to presence or absence of a disease condition but the social definition of health includes many other factors which affect the functioning of a person. A person may be free of any illness or deformity but the social factors that surround that person may play a great role in determining the well being of that person.

Health of a person can be contributed by factors that affect the physical, mental and social well being of a person. What does this imply? This implies that the state of physical fitness, mental fitness and social life of a person is very crucial in determining the well being of an individual. Let’s take an example of a person where one of his/her closest friend has died. The bereaved will be left mourning for days. The bereaved is left with a great burden of a stressful life which adversely affects his/her wellbeing. This may at the end bring death as an aspect of serious illness due to the accompanying effect of that death. This means that although the person may be physically and mentally fit, the social effect of losing a loved one may be a great factor contributing to the health status of the person. (Department of Health, 2002)

There are two important reports that depicted the inequalities in health care, The Black report of 1980 and the Heath Divide Report of 1987. Both of these reports identified the failure by the HNS to address the issue of inequalities in health opportunities in the country. Both reports came out with clear indications of inequalities in British class system. The outcomes of the reports were further evidenced by the department of Health and Social Security which in 1993 also pointed out existence of differences in social class and geographical locations as reflected in mortality and morbidity rates. This report indicated the life expectancy at birth in 1994 was 78 years for women and 72 years for men. It also pointed out the increased likelihood of men dying from heat disease and women form cancer. Our analysis of the health inequality will be based on these two reports.

Concepts involved in the social construction of health and illness.

Social construction can be considered in terms of patterns of health as expressed in aspects of social class. Social construct tries to define social aspect of health that leads to heath status of individuals. It looks closely to health in terms of various factors like the health of family members, health of communities and heath of nations. Social construction is seen as a broader outlook in the health of a population in above perspectives.

Social construction looks at health in terms of health of family members. Using this outlook it seeks to look at factors that determine the health of family member. It recognizes the family as the basic unit of life in the society. Social construction seeks to look at the factors that affect the health status of member of a family which have an effect on the health of the community and that of the nation as a whole.  Being the building block of a nation, the heath of family members is of paramount importance if a nation is to achieve overall heath well being. In most instances the factors that affect the family of family members will affect the health of the community and that of a nation but not in all instances. Let us look at this closely and the effects of these factors.

In a society, there are different families.  Although there are segmentations in the society, the family can be considered as the basic unit of the society. A society is usually inhabited by different kinds of families in different classes and of different ethnic groups.  In a society there may be two families one in an upper class segment and the other in a lower class segment. Usually the heath status of these families will be different. Looking at the family level, the level of income of these families will be a determinant of health status of its members. Hence at the family level, there will be factors that will be affecting the health status of its members. (Blane et al., 1996

At the society level, a society is affected by different communities that may be defined by different bonding factors.  These factors may be religion, ethnic, class factors and others which may create different communities in the society. Again as there were factors affecting the health status of family members, there will be factors that will be affecting the heath status of different community members. One of the factors that have been found to contribute to health status of community members and which shows inequities in the heath care system has been the issue of ethnic groups and social classes in the society. It has been found out that minority ethnic groups have poor health status as compared to major ethnic groups. This has been found to be contributed by many different factors.

In a broad outlook, the health of different societies affects the health of a nation. A nation is made up of societies which together comprise one society under one name the nation. We may talk of a British society living in Britain but which is made of other small societies living in different parts of Britain. The health of a nation is determined by health policies that have been put in place by the government. It is to be understood that these health polices are very important in determining the health of the family members, communities and the nation as a whole.

It is generally accepted that there are various inequalities in health care provisions. These differences are valid according to various factors.  The patterns of inequality in health care provisions varies depending on place, gender, age, year of births, ethnicity  and many other factors.  However it should be understood that these differences varies with different measure of health that are used in assessing the inequality.

There are different perspectives to health that have helped to shape the modern day’s health system. According to the Marxist perspective, the capitalist society defines health as the inability to work. This definition is mostly envisaged in the hands of the middle class professionals who diagnose who is ill and who is not ill. In this perspective the working class is more likely to be perceived as malingerers. In this perspective, ill health is seen as an objective of physical ailment which diverts attention from the class based inequalities of illness and disease. This perspective puts profit before health which drives the consumption pattern among the working class of the society. This perspective emphasizes more on profit before the health of the individual, which is reflected in the lifestyle.

On the other hand, the functionalist perspective views each institution as a function.  It postulates that ill health is normal and must be identifies and resolved to satisfy the majority. It is this perspective that gives the health professionals high status in the society. Doctors assume the role of monitoring the patients and limiting their absence from work and family roles.  According to this perspective, there are varieties in the health care and people have a choice to the health care to use. Hence the inequality in health here is brought by the fact that some people make better use of health facilities than others.  This perspective puts more hope on the upcoming technology to help resolve the issues of medical care in the future.

According to the interactionist perspective, people derive meaning from events an act on their interpretations. People create meaning in their lives through symbolic communications and interpretations to make sense of the world.  This perspective views health and illness as social constructs which results from labels attached by professionals following a process of negotiation which is actually due to the power of doctors and medical staff. In this perspective, doctors have a role in managing of the patients by restricting the information they give to the patients.

The feminist perspective view biological models which turn women into reproductive machines. According to this perspective there is protection of patriarchy by defining women as abnormal. This perspective represents the inequality in health that women suffer in the hands of men. It fights for gender equity in provision of health care.

The evaluation of the above perspective in health gives critical evidence that it is still difficult for us to exactly define health in the society. This is duet to the different perspective as expressed above which all seems to take one side. While the capitalist perspective will be arguing more on the need to have private health care, other perspective seems to stress the need to have public health care. The approach that has been taken by the government has been more of a capitalist approach although there is evidence that private health care can help in resolving health inequality. The feminist perspective tries to tackle the gender inequality in health care since it takes the biological model of women to emphasize the need to have more women access health care.

The relationship between culture and perceptions of health, including body image

Although there

Diet for health, not for beauty

. Unfortunately, people are intensely human and, to give a new twist to an old maxim, the spirit is willing but the flesh is strong. The result has been a widespread practice of “stop-and-go” dieting aimed not at improved health, but at a more fashionable silhouette.
Nothing could be worse than that kind of up-and-down-the-scales program. In the first place, you benefit from reduced weight only if the normal weight is maintained from that time on. Taking it off and then putting it on again is worse than remaining overweight, because it is in the process of becoming fat that a large part of the damage is done. This damage occurs in the blood vessels, liver, and heart—all critical sites of the body.
Although the process of becoming fat is more detrimental than being fat, carrying around an over-upholstered frame is also a way to shorten the period of your sojourn on earth. As you put on excessive fat, movement of the blood throughout the body is slowed. The heart has to work harder to keep the circulation
going. And the added weight places a greater burden upon your joints, which may develop trouble as a consequence.
Is overweight due to “glandular trouble”? You may often hear laymen express the view that some people are fat because of “glandular trouble.” Such cases actually are very few. The reason most people are fat is simply because they eat more food than they actually need for their activities. The only way to cut down on weight is to cut down on eating, to reduce the number of calories in your daily diet.

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Senate Democrats have managed a compromise on a health care bill that is a fraud on the American public, which is increasingly leery about a government-run health care option.

Instead of a government health service to provide coverage to individuals not covered by company plans, the Senate bill authorizes the federal Office of Personnel Management to contract with a nonprofit insurer to provide an alternative to private health care plans. (The post office is such a nonprofit – it walks, talks and doles out mediocre service just like the motor vehicle office and Veterans’ Affairs Department.)

This public-private plan would have a disproportionate share of participants with expensive pre-existing conditions and chronic problems. Although it would have slightly lower administrative costs than the likes of Aetna or Humana, this adverse selection of clients would compel it to provide inferior service and curtailed benefits – unless the federal government empowered this nonprofit to force doctors, hospitals, pharmaceutical and medical device companies to accept significantly lower reimbursements than they do from most private insurers. Inferior patient care is the more likely outcome.

Just as with the House bill, private companies will find it cheaper to drop coverage and pay a tax, thus pushing their employees into this public-private option.

Ordinary Americans are correct to fear that they will lose their private insurance. Once a few competitors (or even just one large one) in an industry opt to drop their private insurance in favor of paying a tax and pushing employees into the public-private option, other firms must follow or face competitive cost disadvantages.

By adding another 31 million people to the health insurance rolls, the Senate and House bills will add another ,000 to ,000 to the cost of a private family health care plan. Americans fortunate enough to hold onto to their private plans may not be taxed directly, but they will face a combination of higher co-pays, bigger payroll deductions for health care and lower wages to permit employers to absorb higher costs.

Health care will be more expensive and good health care less accessible for many taxpaying middle-class workers.

As for out-of-control health care costs, the Senate and House bills “bend the cost curve” all right – in the wrong direction. By increasing entitlements without truly taking on the special interests – tort lawyers, pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies – these bills would raise the cost of health care.

Americans already pay at least 50 percent more for health care than the French and Germans and perhaps double what the British pay. By pushing health care from 18 percent of gross domestic product to 20 percent, these “reforms” will make the typical middle-class family poorer and the U.S. economy less competitive. More jobs will be lost.

That is not health care reform Americans should accept – and the polls indicate they don’t.

Sadly, Senate and House Democrats believe they know better than most Americans what is good for them. These elitists don’t know much about effectively managing health care or the economy, and we are all losers for that.

lose weight and gain great health for life. Find the right exercise and diet to fit your life style.

It is almost impossible to lose weight permanently with a diet. And there also isn´t such thing as a healthy diet. The truth is that diets do not work. That is why it is so hard to lose weight with diets. They just don´t work. Do understand why they mostly do not work in the long term, we first have to understand what exactly is a diet. Lets see how diet affects health

A diet is a temporary restriction of food or calories. Very low calorie diets are around 1500-1800 calories and 800-1200 calories for women. So if you cut your calories that low you will lose weight. But that happens only in the beginning. And what exactly is “weight.”

The problem with quick weight loss with conventional diets, is that you can´t stay on a diet forever. Not all the weight you lose is fat, in fact most of it is just water and muscle. So if you were very happy that you lost, lets say 10 pounds in 2 weeks, then a small fraction of that was actually fat. And you will also gain all the weight back sooner or later. You can´t keep a low calorie diet, because your body figures out you eat less and it? defencive mechanisms start working to save energy.

The less food you eat the less energy your body gets. So your body tries to conserve energy by slowing down your metabolism. It is just the way our body works. Thousands of years ago food wasn´t always available, when the body got less food it had to adjust itself. If the body continues to burn calories with the same speed, then all the energy will be burned out quickly and you die. Those same survival instincts work the same way today.

Your body can not tell the difference between a diet and starvation, it is the same. If the body can´t get energy from food, then it starts to feed from it? muscle, tissue and internal organs. Diets can´t work in the long term because of these reasons. It is almost completely impossible to diet healthy and lose a substantial amount of fat. If you eat less, then your body burns less. But if you eat more, then you also burn more.