Mr Jones is 56 years old. He is a care worker and works in a care home for the elderly and the disabled. He started smoking at the young age of 16 and hasn’t stopped since then. He used to smoke about 20-25 a day and sometimes it could go up to 30 on a really stressful day. He is epileptic and also suffers from hypertension but these illnesses are under control by means of medication. He has a family history of diabetes and coronary heart disease but fortunately personally he does not suffer from any of them.
He also doesn’t drink alcohol. Mr Jones is a father to 5 children and has never seen the need to stop smoking even when his wife was pregnant or when their baby were very young. In spite of his involvement in health care has never considered stopping or reducing his smoking habit until he was very ill in hospital. One of the varicose veins in his legs had burst and was not healing properly due to the constriction of the vein which was initially caused by smoking. This was Mr Jones’ wake-up call but he could not give up smoking entirely.
So, he reduced the amount to 5 cigarettes a day in 3 months and is still smoking 5 a day to this date. These perspectives on health might be useful to some individual but not to everyone. The service user might not agree with these perspectives of health because some individual fine it very hard to be positive when they are very ill. Some people are in denial and they don’t accept the fact that they have been causing the damage to their body over this long period of time.
Other individuals might find it very helpful and live their life in a way that would be good for their own body therefore being in good health and well-being. That would help them recover from previous diseases or prevent the appearance of diseases. Effects of ill-health on the service user and their relativesOne government initiative that I think could help Mr Jones and many others is increasing the price of cigarettes and regulating the amount being sold.
This will help because he doesn’t have a lot of money to spend on cigarettes because he has 5 children to take care of. I agree that he will not stop completely but he might reduce the amount he smokes everyday which in turn will reduce the amount of money he spends on smoking. This initiative could affect Mr Jones positively by gradually decreasing the amount he smokes until he actually stops completely. This will have a positive effect on his health and also his family’s health and well-being.
It could also have a negative effect that is; he will continue to smoke the amount he now smokes and spend more and more money on cigarettes which will lead in him being indebted which will affect his health and also his relationships with his family. How could this initiative affect the service provider? These government initiatives will have a positive effect on the service provider by reducing the numbers of patient that are affected by smoking related diseases. The NHS will not have to spend a lot of money on these and instead can spend more money to help people who need it more.
Other Initiatives that the government could use The government has already put in motion another campaign to stop smoking and I think that it will help a lot to those who don’t smoke. In 2004, a Public Health report proposed a smoking ban in almost all public places in England. The Health Act 2006 is an act of parliament that brings in a smoking ban for enclosed public spaces in England. It started with a ban on smoking in NHS and government buildings and the government hope that by 2007 it would extend to pubs, bars and restaurants.