Health - Looking After Ourselves

I am a great supporter of the health service in the UK and strongly suspect that were it not for the creation of the National Health Service when I was three years old I would not be so fit and healthy at the age of 78. For poor families like my family of origin vitamin supplements, orange juice, cod liver oil, dental treatment and access to medical care all free at the point of need was life changing. Conditions caused by malnutrition and many common diseases were virtually eliminated in the first twenty years of the NHS. It saddens and angers me that we once again see the illnesses of poverty rising once again in the UK. Immunisation programmes from 1948 onwards eliminated or drastically reduced infectious diseases that were previously major killers. The Nuffield Trust have a detailed history of our national heath service here.

 Today we have a medical profession that is generally  prepared to engage with a patient’s felt experience  and many people want to have active control of their  health and to see the health service as one of many  health resources. So let’s explore what leads to good  health and what control we have in later life. Here  are some of the major factors that effect our health,  Click on a link below to explore that topic:

On a personal level two major changes in my lifestyle were to stop smoking 24 years ago and ceasing to drink alcohol some seven years ago. Another important change which has contirbuted to my well being was establishing a regular meditation practice.

• Diet
• Exercise
• Stress
• Nature
• Shelter
• Community
• Purpose and Meaning
• Genetics

See also the health section of the Ageing page

Health Resources