What is health and well-being? How do we know if we are healthy or not? Everyone wants to be healthy but how do we know if we are or not? Health and well-being will mean different things to different people. This is because different factors affect our health and well-being. People look at being healthy in different ways. Some people think they are healthy if they don’t have any illness or disease. For example and older adult may consider themselves healthy if they can just get up in the morning. The definition of health involves a broad view of health including physical, mental and social well-being.
Well-being
Well-being is how a person feels this is affected by different influences; social health, emotional health, intellectual health and physical health. These are known as the aspects of health. Physical health- how are body is functioning if we are healthy and fit. For example if you drink and smoke, how much exercise you do etc. Intellectual health-what we know and learn our ability to think, make decisions this is maintained by everyday activities such as reading, watching TV and to listen and learn- this all effects our intellectual health. For example if you read often, do any activities etc.
Emotional health – this isour ability to understand and recognise our own feelings i.e. sadness happiness anger and fear. We show these in different ways how we feel depends on what is happening around us. For example if you are stressed this could cause you to feel unhappy and depressed affecting what you do physically, emotionally, and socially as well. Social health- this is relationships with people, we are all in relationships with our friends and family they can influence how we feel and think. For example do you have lots of friends.
If one of these areas are been affected badly then this could cause others too as well. Diseases and illnesses can affect our health and well-being but what is the difference between an illness and a disease? A disease- this is an observable change in the body’s structure, or something that causes the body to change this means you can see it. For example Chicken pox you would have spots. A person would be able to see the symptoms and realize the person has a disease. The flu and TB are disease to prevent disease we can have vaccines these give you a little bit of the disease so your body can fight the disease.
Illness- this is what the person is feeling you cannot see an illness this is the affect of the disease. A headache is an illness you can’t see the headache but you can feel it. We can measure different aspect of our health- height and weight these can be a good measure of a person health. Our weight should be proportional to our height. A person is considered obese when they are 20% or more above the weight of an average weight of a person that size. BMI (body mast index)
Pulse and breathing rates the average resting pulse of an adult it between 70-80 beats per minute if an adult is very fit it could be as low as 60.our pulse rate can be affected by heart disease and lung functions. An increase in the rate can be caused by blood not getting round the body. These can give us a good overview of a person’s health and fitness, peak flow and pulse and recovery (this is when you measure your pulse rate then exercise and then measure your pulse again I see how long it takes for your pulse to get back to normal.)
Exercise We ALL need to exercise to stay healthy if we fail to exercise we could suffer from many problems including: Obesity Muscle and joint problems Coronary heart disease
Exercise relives stress, makes you stronger and gives you stamina. But exercise can be dangerous if you do it in excess amounts. There are two different types of exercise aerobic and anaerobic. Aerobic includes walking jogging swimming and cycling. Involves muscles moving through their full range of time period, exercises the whole body. Aerobic exercise should be planed to increase a person’s heartbeat by 70% of maximum the maximum is 220-bmp persons age. Anaerobic includes weight lifting; anaerobic exercise is for building and developing muscles.
It is important to promote health and well being. Why people shouldn’t drink and smoke why they should eat healthy and exercise regularly. This is important so we don’t become obese. Being unhealthy can cause many problems. Health promotion can make the general public realise how it is important to be healthy. Health promotion occurs all over on TV, on the radio in magazines and newspapers. The advertisements are targeted at a lot of various people such as: The government spend lots of money every year promoting health and well-being, but why would they spend so much money on promoting health for the general public? This is because the prevention is cheaper than the cure it’s a lot cheaper for the government to spend money on promoting health than money on the NHS curing people.
Balanced diets What we eat affects our health. Having a balanced diet is vital in been healthy. A balanced diet consist of 7 main aspects: These help maintain build and repair the body, provide energy and control body functions. Protein- this helps build and strengthen our body. When we are younger we need lots of protein to help u to grow. Protein is made from amino acids (chemicals) these are essential for a balanced diet. For example fish, cheeses peas beans and nuts etc.
Fats- fat is good for you in a small proportion but eating too much could cause obesity. Fat provides us with energy. They are two different types of fat, saturated and unsaturated. Saturated fats are things like chocolate. Unsaturated fats include things like olive oil. The difference between saturated fats and unsaturated is that saturated fats (if eaten in excess amounts) can cause high cholesterol which can lead to a bigger risk in heart disease.
Carbohydrates- this like fat also provides us with energy but not as much as fat. Most of our carbohydrates come from food such as bread, biscuits, pasta, potatoes and cakes .We can measure the units in both fat and carbohydrates known as Calories or Kilojoules. We can also use this to measure we burn of during exercise. Water- This is the most important of our diet. Water helps us digest our food and help us dispose of waste products. To find out how much water you need a day you should half your body weight.
For example if you weigh 100 pounds you therefore should drink 50 fluids oz of water a day. Fibre- fibre helps us move our food move from the digestive system to the bowel. Fibre is in food such as bran, fruit and vegetables. Vitamins- vitamins are found in basically everything that we eat these help boost out immune system, strengthen muscles, prevent infection, increase red blood cells helps good eye sight, helps strengthen teeth and combats the effect of strength. Vitamins are found in things such as fish, carrots, nuts, eggs, dairy products, beef and liver.
Minerals- minerals are also found in lots of food that we eat. Minerals such as calcium help the body to grow. Minerals help build stronger bones, help heal and development of new cell’s minerals are found in foods such as meats, milk, cereal, fish, onions, egg and flour.