A)The original concept of the NHS in 1948 was to improve the health of Essay

A)The original concept of the NHS in 1948 was to improve the health of the nation. It was perceived that this would result in - Essay Example Prior to this report, the biomedical definition of health held precidence, and this suggested that health need only be the absence of disease. This is not always the case, however, as an individual may state that they are healthy in biomedical terms, but their social class or lifestyle may cause them to be more susceptible to certain diseases or even just to have a lower quality of life than another individual. The aim of this essay is to discuss the effect that the NHS has had on the health of the UK and how these definitions of health have helped shape the British awareness of health and how it is to be maintained. This essay aims to explain how the success of the NHS has caused it to have more problems – the successful nature of the service has allowed people to live for such a long time that they now require more epensive medical care for longer than ever before. The NHS believed that it would reduce the need for provision, but instead has enhanced it. There are several as pects of an individual that determine the standard of health he/she can enjoy. These range from the unalterable – age, sex and genetic factors, for example – to the areas which health promotion aims to improve and which should not be an issue in the sphere of health – lifestyle, housing and social class. Age is evidently a determinant of health, in that the chronic diseases (cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, heart disease) that have come to define the modern West occur increasingly with age . Age is also generally associated with being slower and weaker and as such the elderly may believe themselves to be in ‘suboptimal health’ (Ubel et al., 2005, p1054) and be more inclined to seek healthcare. Sex is another obvious determinant of health, with various diseases affecting either sex more than others. Autism, for example, affects men more than women , but depression affects more women than men (Nolen-Hoeksema, 2001, p173). The same can be said for various cancers that simply cannot occur in a certain sex because of the missing anatomical parts. Hereditary factors such as genetic disease (Huntington’s, Fragile X) or genetic predispositions (posession of the BRC1 gene [Xu, 2008, p460], susceptibility to early-onset Alzheimer’s) also affect our health. However, it is those things that health promotion can have an effect over, such as lifestyle, housing and social class. Lifestyle is probably the biggest killer, with smoking, lack of exercise and over-eating still being common in the UK (Office for National Statistics, 2009) and the resulting diseases associated with these conditions being more deadly than ever. Housing and social class have less of an effect than in the past, with benefits and, of course, the NHS providing an equality of care for all people in the UK. Unemployment is also considered dangerous in the health stakes. This is due to the fact that it reduces longevity and health, particularly amongst m en (Carvel, 2002, p1). It is also reported that the NHS could help reduce unemployment by recruiting in the local area and thus save costs to itself. However, unemployment used to be a much bigger worry than it is today, with healthcare having to be paid for up front, making it particularly inaccessible to the masses of people on low income. However, this all changed with the start of the NHS and the availability of the