Health refers to a state of well-being and is more than just the absence of disease. Health includes many dimensions including emotional, mental and physical wellbeing. Health can be improved by making changes to everyday lifestyles such as diet, exercise and sleep patterns. It also involves seeking regular medical care and avoiding unhealthful activities or situations. Health can also be promoted through the support of family and friends, social programs and community initiatives.
While the traditional definition of health as “freedom from disease” remains valid, a new emphasis on the importance of personal choices and environmental factors has brought to light an array of challenges. For example, the increasing number of people living with chronic conditions and a shift to sedentary lifestyles have contributed to higher health care costs and decreased life expectancy.
The current period of health care reform requires an acknowledgement of limited resources, a restructuring of methods for financing and delivery of services and a deeper examination of the roles and responsibilities of patients, providers and society in the protection of health. It also calls for a new focus on decision making and a rebalancing of values in which accountability is not based solely on the technical proficiency of professionals but on the outcomes achieved by consumers.
Changing health care begins with a renewed understanding that the human body is a complex system of interconnected parts. The concept of health is a fluid and dynamic one that incorporates the capacity to adapt to change, uncertainty and adversity, as well as the ability to self-manage. This approach echoes the concept of resilience and sense of coherence (Schulkin, 2004).
While some aspects of health are within our control, such as eating well and being active, other factors are beyond our influence. These include the effects of the economy on families and the availability of adequate healthcare services. In addition, some aspects of health are not easily measured, such as a person’s sense of purpose in their lives or the satisfaction they have with their relationships.
An important step in improving health is ensuring that all individuals have access to affordable healthcare. This is accomplished through the creation of an environment in which information can flow freely and in a timely manner to the appropriate audience. It involves a shift from an approach in which accountability is based solely on the technical proficiency of clinicians to an approach that includes the capacity of consumers and outside evaluators to recognize good and bad care, as well as a strategy for using information to improve quality overall rather than simply to isolate and punish outliers. It also involves promoting the development of systems for sharing knowledge between diverse disciplines. It further involves developing and maintaining systems of quality assurance that are capable of measuring the impact of health care interventions on a population basis. These systems should be able to respond rapidly and appropriately to the needs of individual patients, as well as to the implications of new developments in medicine.