1. Discuss the reasons for the increase of life expectancy over the last century. Life expectancy is ‘the expected number of years of life remaining at a given age’ (Sullivan 2003). There are a number of factors why life expectancy has increased in the last century. One of the reasons is because there is better health care then there was 100 years ago. Health a century used to be poor. In the last century health care has improved greatly including managing diseases better and now they have an improvement in technology that can detect illness earlier and therefore become treatable.
’ Today doctors have access to a greater number of equipment and tests to assist in diagnosing illnesses as little a common cold to a rare genetic disorder. ’(2012) When we are born and growing up we now have vaccines to protect us from diseases and this is another example how health care has improved. There is also better medicine nowadays. A hundred years ago there was hardly any medicine and therefore when people caught diseases they would die from lack of care. Now a doctor can diagnose you and then treat the illness or disease affectively with medication.
Medication can now help with the recovery of a disease or stop it completely, whereas a hundred years ago the types of medicines given where poor and did not help the patients properly. Another reason for life expectancy is a hundred years ago there was wars happening and people was dying because of this. Even if they didn’t get killed their wounds wouldn’t heal properly because of the lack of health care and therefore they would die anyway. And when wars were going on the living conditions were poor so there was a higher risk of catching diseases and therefore lowering the life expectancy.
In conclusion the reason there has been an increase in life expectancy is because there is overall better care then there was a century ago. ‘In 1901 females would expect to live to 49, and men to 45. Now we can expect to live till we are between the ages of 77 to 81. ’(PCT 2012). 2. Outline the current causes of mortality in men aged between 65-84 years? The main cause of mortality in men aged 65-84 years is diseases of circulatory systems. But there are other causes such as heart disease, cancer and strokes that cause mortality in men.
The circulatory system is your heart and blood vessels and elderly are more likely to get diseases and problems with their heart. ‘As the body ages the heart cannot respond to an increased workload as it once did. ’(Beth Celli: 1999-2012) and this can cause problems, which could then lead to death. ’ ‘In 2002 there were 1754 deaths in men that were caused by the circulatory systems’ (Dr Kathleen England: 2004). The other problems with the circulatory system are heart disease and 84. 6 percent of people who die of heart attack are age 65 or older.
Another cause of mortality in men is cancer, most likely to be lung cancer or prostate. In men lung cancer is the biggest killer of cancer deaths. Around 24% of deaths in men is lung cancer and has a big impact on the mortality rate. ‘In 2010, there were 34,859 deaths from lung cancer in the UK: 19,410 (56%) in men. ’ (Cancer Research: 2010). Prostate cancer is the second biggest cancer killer in men. Prostate cancer is usually diagnosed in younger people and can be treated. When cancer is diagnosed in the 65-84 age range they can’t have treatment and their bodies are too frail to cope with the treatment.
Strokes are another cause of mortality. BBC (2009) states that ‘the audit of death figures found that there was 29 deaths per 100’000 men over 65’ Stroke is the third biggest killer in the United Kingdom and most of the deaths from stroke are linked to poor lifestyle and smoking. 3. Describe the potential causes of an increase or decline in future life expectancy? There is a lot of reasons for an increase in future life expectancy. Leading a healthy lifestyle is one of the reasons. There is ways to keep your lifestyle healthy.
These include cutting out smoking and drinking alcohol, have a healthier diet and exercise. A study was taken out in 2004. Researchers followed more then 1500 elderly aged between 70-94. They investigated the single and combined effects on life expectancy of four factors previously shown to have positive effects on health. All are a risk of death. These are discussed above. Physical activity was the biggest single protector against death, with a 37% lowering of risk, while not smoking cut the risk by 35%, eating a better diet 23% and moderate alcohol consumption by 22%.
This study shows that if you enjoy a healthy life style that you will have a better chance of living longer and this can increase the life expectancy in the future. Other potential causes of an increase in potential life expectancy are better living conditions and better medicine. Living conditions used to be poor and improved and will continue to improve. The atmosphere is a lot cleaner then it was, as there used to be wars and people could catch diseases quicker and die from their injuries. As now they are better medicine diseases can now be treated quicker and more effectively and this will increase life expectancy as well.
Causes of a decline in future life expectancy will be if you don’t look after your self properly and don’t follow a healthy lifestyle. If you smoke and drink you can catch diseases such as cancer or liver disease and if people continue to smoke and drink as they are getting older there risk of dying is high. Another reason of a decline is obesity. Obesity causes life expectancy to drop by 9 years and if you are obese you are a big chance of catching other health problems which could cause death. Obesity is known to cause a number of deaths in the UK and if people don’t follow a healthy lifestyle they could be decreasing life expectancy..
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