Contemporary Health Issues And The Role

Introduction

The contemporary health issues highlight the present debates, public opinions, views and thinking regarding current health issues experienced by the individuals. They are required to be discussed so that proper healthcare services, as well as support, can be made available for resolving and managing the current health issues. In the UK, it is seen that the NHS plays a major role in developing care services and support to manage and resolve the contemporary health issues for ensuring better healthcare of the population. This assignment is going to discuss history as well as development of the NHS and its reforms and the impact they have on UK health and social care in contemporary society. The local, national and global healthcare policies are also being discussed to understand the way they are helping to control the contemporary health issues. Later, the global, national and local trends in relation to illness and well-being are also discussed. Lastly, the contemporary cultural, social and environmental factors that influence the health are discussed.

The National Health Service was established on 5th July 1948 and it was the first healthcare system in the UK that offered free medical care to all the individuals who are in need of healthcare. This service was paid from the tax collected and was not based on the principle of health insurance (www.nhs.uk, 2018). Before, the NHS, there was not proper policy related to health that could protect or support the UK individuals. In 1911, the Liberal government introduced the National Health Scheme in which workers are forced to contribute to a special fund from their earnings to avail remuneration for illness. This scheme was only available for the workers and not their families (www.bbc.co.uk, 2018). Thus, the scheme was unable to provide effective health protection to all individual and the force pay made many workers face economic crisis. Further, after the World War I, many medical facilities, as well as hospitals services, are required which was unable to be managed by the UK as they do not have proper amount of money left to provide the services (www.bbc.co.uk, 2018; labour.org.uk, 2018). This conditions and policies lead the Labour Party to think of establishing a healthcare organisation that would be funded and managed at the national level to offer healthcare services to all (Snow, 2018).

The Great Depression in 1930 showcased how much vulnerable the poor individuals in the UK are in regard to healthcare services. This is because at the time there was no healthcare policy at the national level which many poor individuals to suffer from lack of economic and social ability to bear healthcare services for them (www.economicshelp.org, 2017). This condition and lack of policy also preceded the thinking of developing a national health organisation at the national level. In 1942, the Beveridge Report was published where it was clearly mentioned that the UK citizens are in dire need of healthcare services after the war so that they are capable to contribute in rebuilding the UK (www.bbc.co.uk, 1942). These conditions, report and lack of structured policy lead the Labour Party to develop the NHS in 1948 as the national healthcare institution that would offer free medical services and support to all.

In the NHS, there are various policies that have been formed to ensure they work methodically to achieve success. The Standards of Business Conduct Policy framed for the NHS guides them regarding the way they are to offer healthcare services to the public. It has influenced them to work in a systematic manner to offer healthcare services to all in a potential and successful way (www.england.nhs.uk, 2017). The Standard Financial Instruction informs the NHS regarding the way they are to plan the expenditure and management of finances for the public. This has helped the NHS now as well as in coming future to logically spend expenses to offer effective medical care services to the UK individuals without fail (www.england.nhs.uk, 2017). The Health and Safety Policy of the NHS guides them and has influenced them to offer proper healthcare services to the services users and protect them from harm to ensure safety and well-being while accessing care within the NHS (www.england.nhs.uk, 2017). The Equality Policy in the NHS has helped them to offer equal services for all which has influenced them to avoid discrimination in offering healthcare support and services for any UK individual (www.england.nhs.uk, 2017). The Data Protection Policy, Confidentiality Policy and others have helped the NHS to ensure proper management of data of the patients (www.england.nhs.uk, 2017). This has influenced the NHS to offer satisfactory care to the service users without making them fear of loss or exposure of their personal health information in the public that may lead the service users to face humiliation, harm or abuse in the society.

In the local areas within the UK, there are various health issues that are bothering the health of the individuals. For instance, the prevalence of obesity which is a potential health issue is seen to be at an increased level within Rotherham. This is evident as 43.5% of the people are overweight and 32.6% are obese people in the area which is more than any area within England (www.telegraph.co.uk, 2017). In relation to this condition, it was seen that the NHS Rotherham developed a Healthy Weight Commissioning Framework for children and adults across all tiers. They developed it to provide effective support in the form of providing GP, Community Weight Management Service, Specialist MDT Obesity services for the overweight and obese people (www.networks.nhs.uk, 2017). This support has made many individuals in the area to feel ease of access to healthcare services for controlling and managing obesity, in turn, offering them better health development.

In another instance, in Leicester, it is found that 14% of individuals in the Belgrave and Spinney Hills ward and 13% of individual in Rushey Mead, Wycliffe and North Evington ward are affected by diabetes of which most are type-2 (commonslibrary.parliament.uk, 2017). This informs that many areas of the Leicester locality are affected by increased prevalence of diabetes. In response to this, the Leicester City Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) offers a number of services to mitigate the health disorder from the area. In relation to this, the CCGs have participated in a local agenda for diabetes “Transforming Diabetes Care” which has the aim to provide improved care, health literacy and better health outcome of the patients. Moreover, the local council at Leicester have arranged GP services and has framed Integrated Community Diabetes Services to offer effective medical in relation to diabetes to the individual to help them control their health condition (www.leicester.gov.uk, 2017). This has result many individuals in the area to access effective medical care to resolve or deal with diabetes in leading a healthy life.

The analysis of the local areas in the UK informs that the healthcare policies are mainly developed based on the health situation, health literacy, social and environmental circumstances and others in the area. As mentioned by Li et al. (2018), at the local level the prevalence of the disease in the area leads to development of specific healthcare policy to develop better health outcomes for the individuals. This is evident from the instance of Leicester and Rotherham were based on the prevalence of the disease the local council developed healthcare policies to support the individual to cope with the disease. As argued by Baker et al. (2018), at the national level the health policies are developed based on the social and environmental issues being faced by the service users or the population that is negatively affecting their aces to healthcare services as well as health. This is evident as at the national level in the UK there are Health and Safety Policy, Data Protection Act 1998, Safeguarding of Children Policy, Policy for Equal care and others are developed to support the UK individuals access proper medical care in need without any form of barriers or issues.

The local policy at the Rotherham has helped many individuals in the area to get easy access to health support in relation to obesity. This is evident as the Healthy Weight Commissioning Framework at the place led to reduce inappropriate referred for surgery leading to more effective care of the obese people (www.networks.nhs.uk, 2017). At the national level, the Safeguarding Policy for children has helped to create proper healthcare access and assure safety to the children during care which has influenced the children to get proper care support in need in a safe and sound manner (www.england.nhs.uk, 2015). Further, the Data Protection Policy at the national level has helped individuals to protect their personal data from being misused. This has affected more individual to prefer to get healthcare services to resolve their illness as they have been able to avoid the fear of getting exposed in the public which may make them face abuse or harm (www.gov.uk, 2018).

Understanding tends in illness in global, national and local areas

Epidemiology is referred to the branch of medicine which mainly deals with the distribution, incidence and possible control of diseases and the factors that are related to the health (Victora et al. 2016). The epidemiological information is important in planning as well as evaluating strategies for preventing illness and works as a guide to manage the patient condition those have already developed the disease. The Health trends refer to the current conditions or tendency regarding health issues, symptoms of disease, disease management and others (Rolland et al. 2016). The knowledge of the health trends is required so that proper healthcare approaches can be arranged to offer effective support for improved health outcome of the individuals.

On a global basis, it is seen that from 1990-2017, the life expectancy estimated at birth has improved by 7.4 years that is 65.6 years in 1990 to 73 years in 2017 (Kyu et al. 2018; hvousa.org, 2017). This means that globally effective health interventions are taken with implementation of innovative medical technology and improved medical sciences as per trending health issues to improve the life expectancy expected at birth. The WHO informs that the global trend of non-communicable diseases such as lung diseases, cancer, diabetes and others are affecting many and in 2015 nearly caused 40 million deaths which attribute to 70% of the total deaths occurred in the year. Moreover, majority of these deaths have occurred in the low and middle-income countries (Cooper, 2018). At national level, the health trends inform that in the UK the most prevalent diseases are coronary heart disease, respiratory disease (COPD), stroke, cancer and others. This is evident as nearly 74,000 deaths occur each year in the country as a result of coronary heart diseases (borgenproject.org, 2017). At the local level, the health trends inform that in the UK the most number of people affected by obesity lives in Rotherham (www.networks.nhs.uk, 2017). This informs that increased health care intervention and support is required in this area related to prevention of obesity to tackle the health issue in an effective manner.

According to WHO, Health is referred as a state of complete mental, physical and mental well-being and it is not just the lack or absence of any disease within the body (Stoddart and Evans, 2017). This means that lack of illness or injury do not mean the person is healthy in nature. There are various factors that influence health such as biological, environmental, lifestyle and social factors. The biological factors such as genetic condition, microorganisms and others are seen to disrupt the normal body function that influences health to get deteriorated (Glymour and Spiegelman, 2017). This is because the body as a result of the factors is unable to execute their function to help the individual lead a normal life. The environmental factors such as water, air, soil and others influence the health the individuals to get deteriorated (Lucas et al. 2015). This is because the microorganisms that are harmful to the body enter the body through polluted water, contaminated foods and others.

The nurses require being aware of the social determinants of health so that proper healthcare services can be provided to the service users irrespective of any discrimination, social conditions and others. Moreover, it is required to be known by the nurses to educate individual about different illness so that they are able to prevent health disorder (Wilson et al. 2016). According to functionalist perspective of health, a person is healthy if they are able to function properly in the society (Boden et al. 2016). According to conflict perspective, illness occurs as a result of differences in economic as well as political structures in the society (Boz et al. 2016). However, the interactionist perspective informs that health and illness are constructed socially (Briceño Morales et al. 2018).

The social determinants of health are referred to the condition in which the individuals are given birth, grow, live, work and age. The determinants are seen to be shaped by distribution of power and money along with resources at local, national and global level (Garg et al. 2015). The social determinants of health that are regarded nationally and globally are social status, income, education, employment, physical environment and others (de Andrade et al. 2015). The lack of proper education results individuals to be unable to have proper knowledge regarding the way disease and illness can be prevented and controlled. It impacts on the individual’s health to be prone to get infected and develop disease as they do not know the way to prevent and manage health by using medical care and implementing healthy activities to avoid illness (Marmot and Bell, 2016).

The lack of proper income makes individuals remain economically poor that lead them to be unable to spend finances required for accessing effective healthcare services (Sommers et al. 2016). This impacts the individuals to suffer from health issues without having properly availability of medical care to resolve their suffering. The people who belong from the lower social status are often discriminated and are not allowed by society to have access to proper healthcare (Zell et al. 2018). This influences the deterioration of health of the socially deprived individuals as they are unable to avail proper healthcare services needed to improve their health. The unemployed people and deteriorated working condition makes individuals develop stress and physical illness (Staiger et al. 2016). This is because lack of proper employment makes individual to be unable to have secured future and availability of proper finances required to access healthcare services for improved health outcomes.

In relation to gender, women are considered lower in society in comparison to men. Thus, as a result of social status, women are often deprived of their access to rightful healthcare services. Moreover, in most cultures, women are avoided proper education and training in comparison men as a result of their lower social status (McCloskey, 2016). This results women to lack proper health literacy regarding the way to control effective healthy activity making them prone to get affected by disease. The sick role is referred to the term used in medical sociology related to sickness along with rights and obligation of the patient (Cockerham, 2017). This is a sociological perspective of health according to which the right of the sick person is that the individual would be exempted from normal social roles and they are not to be considered responsible for their illness. The obligations inform that the sick individual is to be made to get well and require to seek technical competence and develop cooperation with the medical professional to develop improved health outcome (Russ, 2018).

The social determinants of health influences public health by making them face deteriorated health condition. The public health is referred to the science that is involved in protecting the safety as well as improvement of health of the communities through policy making, education and research regarding disease and prevention of injury (Adler et al. 2016). In relation to public health, health promotion activities are performed. The health promotion is the activities that are performed for improving health literacy and increasing the control of the individual towards their health to ensure health and well-being (Naidoo and Wills, 2016).

Conclusion

The above discussion informs that before the NHS there was not effective healthcare policy to help the individual have proper healthcare support and the schemes present then do not provide health improvement assurance to all communities and families. NHS was established in 1948 with the initiative of the Labour party in the UK. The key activity of the NHS is to provide free healthcare services to all without any form of discrimination. The health issues such as obesity and diabetes are seen to be more prominent among local areas such as Rotterdam and Leicester. The global trends inform that at the present non-communicable disease such as cancer, heart disease and others are causing most death in the middle and low-income countries. There are three key sociological perspectives of health that are functionalism, conflict and interactionist. The social determinants of health are social status, income, employment and others. In relation to gender, it is seen that since women are considered as lower in the society in comparison to men thus they are not provided require healthcare services. The health promotion in this aspect may result to resolve the inequality as health promotion is referred to the activity performed in helping individual to develop knowledge to have increased control of their health.

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