Economic Policies For Health Promotion, Wellness, And Prevention

As stated by the World Health Organization (WHO), ‘health’ is defined as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (WHO, 1948). The health and wellbeing of individuals is generally determined by their circumstances and environment, a phenomenon referred to as the social determinants of health. WHO describes the social determinants of health as:

The determinants of health are economic and social conditions that affect people’s health status. These influence the living and working conditions that impacts people’s everyday living condition. Factors such as the place and the environment we live in, genetics, educational level or work status and income, as well as friends and family are some of the aspects that affects our health condition. On the other hand, the people that have an access to good health care and have financial stability are less susceptible and are often less affected. (NANB, 2009)

According to the World Health Organization (WHO, 1978), health can be defined not only in terms of absence of disease, injury or infirmity, but also, as a state of mental, physical and social well-being. Over the last decades, many studies have emphasized the role of social circumstances on health status. The tight link between health and a wide range of socioeconomic, environmental and demographics factors have been increasingly recognized and proffer an alternative perspective on how to consider public health, social justice and even restructuring of the health care system (Daniels et. al., 2004). The increasingly acknowledgement that health is also a result of cumulative experience of social conditions and exposure to environmental

“Failure to acknowledge, and more importantly, to understand the role of Social determinants of Health (SDH) in health and access to health and social services will hamper any effort to improve the health of the population.” (Ompad, Galea, Caiaffa, & Vlahov, 2007). Unemployment, unsafe work environments, globalization and the inability to access health systems are some social determinants of health. Social factors would be considered place of residence, race and ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status are also part of social determinants of health. According to “Social Determinants of the Health of Urban Populations: Methodologic Considerations’ Place of residence and an individual’s status within the place are important determinants of health in urban settings. It is important to recognize that the place of residence is

Medical repatriation, a practice commonly termed as the transfer of uninsured immigrants with particular long-term care needs to facilities abroad. This has been considered as an economic requirement by the hospital administrators and as an unethical behavior of dumping patients by the lawyers. It is hard to analyze the number of medical repatriations as no state or federal agencies of the government track these deportations. In spite of such numbers, current government and state laws don 't specifically address repatriations. Rather, movement and Medicaid changes over the previous decade have made a true administrative system in

Indeed, “Social determinants are relevant to communicable and non-communicable disease alike”¹. The healthcare system work and is different among the countries and some parameters that help to maintain these inequalities are the poor control of major diseases which influenced directly on the life of expectancy. Second poverty which is linked to infectious diseases and third the poor conditions where people live and work which contribute to the mental, physical and violent deaths¹.

Wellness is about you. It is about learning to love your whole self. It is about assuming charge of your life, living in process, and channeling life energy. It is about choices. It is about the one way to wellness - your way. Wellness is a priority in my life. In my opinion as a nation we manage our weight incorrectly. One may work out for 7 days then weigh themselves at the end of that week expecting a change. Moreover, one may only manage their weight when getting an annual checkup. One may eat healthy for a couple of weeks then began eating unhealthy all over again. I do believe we are active as nation. Whether we attempt for a week or month, everyone at least tries to be active. According to the Fast food, Fat profits: Obesity in America

Fitness and wellness are related to the prevalence of certain diseases (Fair, 2011). Most diseases that are strongly associated with risk factors or behaviors are preventable (Bezner, 2015). These diseases when not prevented may lead to decreased quality of life, disability and even death. It is better to prevent the occurrence of certain diseases by addressing modifiable risk factors, than to wait for the patient to suffer the consequences before we take action. Health promotion through prevention and wellness is therefore a vital component of health care system in any community. Bezner (2015) defined health promotion as the process of empowering a person to change his lifestyle and behavior, with the purpose of improving the overall health of people living in the community. According to Bezner (2015) physical therapists are ideal messengers and role models in health promotion and wellness. In line with this, physical therapists should participate in creating a health promotion initiative for the community to decrease health care costs, decrease mortality and to alleviate the risk of having chronic diseases (McGinnis, Williams-Russo, & Knickman, 2002). One example of a health promotion initiative that can be created by physical therapists is a wellness and prevention program for the elderly.

One of the primary objectives of NURS 503, Managing Population Health, involved critically examining the current healthcare system and exploring ways to promote a more efficient delivery structure that focuses on health promotion and disease prevention. In the US, two programs that are currently involved in improving the lives of its citizens are the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and population health. NURS 503 did an excellent job of presenting material on these two programs. Population health is a comprehensive platform which examines the health factors that impact the wellness of people in the US (United States Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion [USDHHS ODPHP], 2016, June 3). The Affordable Care Act is an organized piece of legislation that stresses the importance of providing affordable high-quality health care to the entire Nation (Nash, Fabius, Skoufalos, Clarke, & Horowitz,

Over the past 8 years, healthcare has been a major topic of debate. President and governmental elections, school systems and districts, local communities, and even cartoons have centered their focus on what seems to be one of the US’s major dilemmas: Healthcare. While our country has vast resources and often leads the world in advanced technology, healthcare and its access remains something we have yet mastered (Collaboration Health Care, 2015). As defined by WHO, the World Health Organization (2015), healthcare promotion is the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve their health. It moves beyond a focus on individual behavior towards a wide range of social and environmental interventions. While the concept of health promotion, its accessibility, and its maintenance are easy to understand, sometimes things easily understood aren’t as easily implemented into the general populations and their lifestyles. Unfortunately, there are many obstacles standing between the general population and complete access to healthcare. Some of the major hurdles include:

Kothari, Wendt, Liggins, Overton, & Sweezy (2011) stated that despite decades of public health focus and intervention the U.S. continues to lag behind other industrialized countries, with high fetal and infant morality rated with the gap continuing to widen. Center for Disease Control & Prevention (2013) reported premature births affect nearly 500,000 babies, which 1 in every 8 in the United States. Prenatal care services have been proven beneficial and needed in assisting with improving birth outcomes. Kothari et al., (2011) reported there is evidence that have identified maternal obesity,

Health inequality is related directly to income inequality and countries with the highest wage disparity perform the lowest of health measures. (Gudrais, 2008). This factor creates a cyclical pattern that low wage earners become

The mission of public health in America is to encourage mental and physical health, while at the same time, preventing injury, disability, and disease; resulting in healthy people and communities (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2014, p. 6). Public health is defined as, “what we, as a society, do collectively to assure the conditions in which people can be healthy” (as cited in Stanhope & Lancaster, 2014, p. 7). Therefore, in order to achieve this goal, public and private groups, individuals, as well as the government, need to ensure that the mission is addressed and all the vital elements are in place (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2014, p. 7).

Health economics can be used also prospectively together with the programmer or individually to inspect the influence of health promotion and health promotion procedures. For example, independent examination of the influence of a strategy can be used to measure the effect of tax changes on smoking behavior between unalike social groups. review the likely influence of an increase in the excise tax amount on cigarettes on the number of adolescent smokers, telling that a 23% rise in the price of cigarettes would result in a discount of 16% in the number of adolescents who would then smoke, and a decrease in the number of cigarettes smoked by adolescents of 14% ( December 1,

The health of poor people is affected most around the world. Studies suggest that the health of any individual is badly imfluenced by low socioeconomic status of that person. There is a social gradient in health that runs from top to bottom of the socioeconomic spectrum. The social gradient in health means that health inequities affect everyone (WHO 2014).