1.Explain the concept of fundamental causes of disease.
The concept of the fundamental causes of disease entails the notion that a relationship exists between death and disease to resource accessibility. This access to resources like information, adequate health care, nutrition, and etc. enables individuals to avoid diseases. Lack of accessibility to these resources, as a result of one’s own socioeconomic status, power, ethnicity, gender, etc, is what increases the risk for multiple diseases and their negative consequences. According to Link and Phelan, fundamental causes of disease can only be eradicated through direct intervention of the social conditions that give rise to them, and not through the intervention of the “individually based-mechanisms,” that link them to that particular disease. An example of this approach could be the establishment of more social equality to allow the prevention of diseases through multiple mechanisms compared to the intervention of an individually based mechanism, like the adoption of vaccination policies to reduce Polio.
2. What is the difference between proximal and distal causes of disease? Give some examples
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Examples of proximal causes of disease include occupational stress, diet, cholesterol levels, exercise, etc. On the other hand, distal causes of disease precede proximal causes in the causal chain, as they may lead to the development of proximal causes of disease. An example of a distal cause of disease would be socioeconomic status. The relationship between proximal and distal causes of disease can be seen in the example of a man suffering from coronary artery disease. His cholesterol levels and high occupational stress were the proximal causes for his disease, but his degrading socioeconomic status, as a result of his recent unemployment, were the distal
I chose not to use any of the prompts provided, but instead connect the article to what I learned in my sociology class lass quarter. In class we watched part one of film series of Unnatural causes, titled Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making us Sick "In Sickness and in Wealth". While reading the article this reminded me about the cases studied in the film to see whether wealth inequality contributes to making people sick. In the film they focused on the social determinants of health, wealth and education. In both the article and part one of the film Unnatural Causes they focused on three different individuals and how their health are affected by they choices they make and the access they have to care.
Social determinants of health (SDOH) are increasingly becoming a major problem of Public Health around the World. The impact of resources and material deprivation among people and populations has resulted in an increase in mortality rate on a planetary scale. Social determinants of health are defined as the personal, social, economic and the environmental conditions which determines the health status of an individual or population (Gardner, 2013). Today’s society is characterized by inequalities in health, education, income and many other factors which as a result is becoming a burden for Public Health around the world. Research studies have shown that the conditions in which people live and work strongly influenced their health. Individuals with high levels of education and fall within the high income bracket turn to have stable jobs, live in the best neighborhood and have access to quality health care system than individuals who have low education and fall with the low income bracket. This paper is to explain different social determinants of health and how they play ...
The Social Determinants of Health are certain circumstances that have an effect on the health and overall well being of humans and their own commonalities in terms of financial and societal situations. The reason why it is essential for us to pass beyond considering women’s health and access to health care as individual or biological problems is because women bear unique health needs yet so much health systems are not even acknowledging them. There are situations only females experience that have bad health affects, such as childbirth and pregnancy, although they aren't diseases, physiological and social tactics carry many health jeopardies depend upon health care. Gender based inequalities
In the Unnatural Causes trailer, one of the speakers said “we carry our history in our bodies”. This statement means that the factors that we come across in daily life impact our health. The decisions one makes will affect his or her body in the future. For example, whether or not one avoids smoking or a poor diet will impact his or her health in the future. During an examination years down the road, it will be able to be determined whether or not that person was able to avoid smoke or junk food. In this way, our past is inscribed into our biology. The history carried in our bodies is not formed solely from conscious decisions-- much of our genetic past is molded by policies and social conditions (“Unnatural causes trailer”, 2008).
Lynch, J. W. (1996). Do cardiovascular risk factors explain the relation between socioeconomic status, risk of all-cause morality, cariovascular mortality, and acute mycardial infarction? American Journal of Epidemiology, 144 (10), 934-942.
Social determinants of cardiovascular diseases are found largely outside the healthcare systems, social factors of cause-and-effect work with traditional risk factors within the health care system to determine ones overall health.
According to Aberth, "disease is a constant force in human history that has had much more than just demographic repercussions"(Aberth 2007, Pg.X). It has created fear, awareness, pain and frustration for the lack of knowledge of it cause. In 1500 through the 20th century, the primary reasons for disease to spread so effectively are animals, trade routes and colonization/ imperialism. The disease was widely spread through warm climate and the geographic of the world because the virus host bacteria was able to grow and attack the human body.
Public health is a concept that will always be subject to conflicting opinion. Over the year’s different ‘models’ of health have been formulated in order to categorise public health into dominant areas of cause and effect. The two models in which this essay will be focusing on are the Biomedical Model and the Lifestyle Theory Model. Although both models have equally arguable advantages and disadvantages, it is difficult to state either model as being ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in defining the correct pathway to resolving the central health issues of today.
“The health of individuals and populations is influenced and determined by many factors acting in various combinations. Healthiness, disease, disability and, ultimately, death are seen as the result of … human biology, lifestyle and environmental (e.g. social) factors…” (Mary Louise Fleming, 2009) There are many unchangeable contributing factors that play a role in a person’s health condition, this can be anything from the gender and location that they were born into, to genetic impairments and the lifestyle that their parents raised them in or even government policies; but for as many unchangeable factors, there are also changeable factors. In Mr. A’s case he was born from Pacific Islander descent, therefore it can be assumed that he was born into an obese family with little money, and was raised in poorer living conditions than the average Australian. Due to this, his health is expected to be worse that the average Australian because his social determinants make it so. He is now a full-grown man with a family, but still lives in problematic conditions due to his upbringing and culture along with the minimal to no levels of prevention shown. There are many risk factors that have affected Mr. A’s health due to the social determinants that he has been faced with such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, arthritis, etc. There are also upstream and downstream factors affecting his health, “While upstream and midstream determinants influence the type, likelihood, number and severity of diseases that affect a person, downstream inequities come into play when a person becomes ill.” (AMA, 2007). These factors have had a major role in the result of his heart attack. Finally, his level of prevention exhibited is a key aspect on how much of an eff...
Over the years, the social determinants of health (SDOH) have been receiving more attention due to its importance in determining peoples’ health access, health quality and health outcome. The social determinants of health have been described by various scholars as the situation or environmental condition in which people are born, or where they grow, live and work; unfortunately these conditions have continued to affect and determine people’s ability to access proper care.1-5 In other words, the SDOH continues to consciously and unconsciously influence people’s access to most opportunities in life including access to healthcare services both in developed and developing countries.2 This issues have continue to deteriorate in most developing countries increasing people’s susceptibility to multi-morbidity among different age groups, with a slight increase among the elderly.6
In so doing it has created awareness and led to a discussion about the implications of social inequalities on health outcomes of individuals over the years. The theory also provides a broad perspective about disease processes. This has allowed health researcher/professionals to design holistic treatment/care plans that does not only focus on the biomedical disease process but to take other aspects of people’s life into consideration (WHO, 2010).
Also the essay will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each approach as this can be an indicator if this approach is applied, whether it can address inequality and improve the health and well being of that individual or society. The essay will use the Dahlgren and Whitehead social determinants of health of need to exemplify the determinants of health showing how these determinants can influence the way health is viewed as holistic or merely an absence of disease. Lastly, the essay will analyse the evaluation with these approaches plus the importance of evaluation to present programs and future programs or activity.
However, among others, when employment or work conditions (social determinants of health) are not favorable, the aforementioned cannot be achieved as health of workers is compromised (Anderson,
The social and economic impact of non-shared diseases threatens progress towards sustainable development. Uncommon diseases are the leading cause of death, resulting in 16 million premature deaths each year. The four major groups of extraordinary diseases - cardiovascular disease, cancer, respiratory illness and chronic diabetic - account for 82% of all non-fatal deaths3. By 2025, the global economic costs of four of these groups are expected to exceed $ 51 trillion. Despite the common belief that unidentified diseases are a "disease of prosperity" affecting only the populations of rich countries, the unknown diseases do not affect people in low-income and middle-income countries. The possibility of premature deaths due to unusual diseases in a low- and middle-income country is four times higher than in high-income countries. For young people, it is important to understand non-shared diseases and their risks. Two-thirds of adult deaths are related to childhood5 or youth behavior: over 150 million young people smoke, 5 81% of young people do not get enough physical activity, 6 11.7% of teens have episodic heavy consumption and 41 million Focused behaviors and unhealthy living conditions are assured that ill-health continues to affect
Not everyone is born into a life of the rich and glamorous. Those who are fortunate enough know that they are very lucky to be in their position. Others however are totally in different situations. They need to fend for themselves and having meal is something which comes only once a day. Malnutrition is the obvious result of not consuming the right amount of food. This therefore will lead to outbreaks of diseases but in poverty stricken countries there are no hospitals to cure this. Lacking infrastructure means lacking educational rights. People who are living in poverty can not afford to send their children to school so this will mean an unclear future for their children. Furthermore, living in crowded areas, this has a tendency to increase the chances of disease as people are drinking from unsafe sources of water. People around the world are not aware of how immense this issue is and sometimes hesitant to believe the scale that it has risen to. Without understanding for people living disadvantage from the rest then there is no cure for the problem.