Question

• Describe two identities that make you “you” and how they have influenced your health. These identities can include any found in the course text (gender identity, age, etc.) or identities not described in the text.

• Describe how these identities have influence your health, health behaviors, and interactions with health professionals (health educators, public health professionals, and/or medical providers).

• What did these professionals do that either helped or hindered your education, health, and or/care?

• What recommendations would you make, based on your experiences, to health professionals to ensure that they practice healthcare in inclusive, respectful, and culturally competent ways.  Provide at least three (3) reommendations.

Answer 1

Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, expressions, and identities of girls, women, boys, men, and gender diverse people. It influences how people perceive themselves and each other, and how they act and interact. Gender is usually conceptualized as binary (girl/woman and boy/man), yet there is considerable diversity in how individuals and groups understand, experience, and express it.

Gender identity is a person's sense of identification with either the male or female sex, as manifested in appearance, behaviour, and other aspects of a person's life.

Most health conditions affect both men and women in varying degrees and ways.

Many male health risks can be traced back to behaviour: In general, men engage in behaviours that lead to higher rates of injury and disease. They also tend to eat less healthful diets.

Among men age 65 and over, more than 39 per cent have heart disease, compared to about 27 per cent of women in the same age group.

Men don't have the protection of estrogen. Estrogen may keep women's cholesterol levels in check, reducing a key heart disease risk factor. However, once women hit menopause, their heart disease risk goes up.

This disabling neurological disease affects about 50 per cent more men than women.
Researchers suggest that this may also have to do with estrogen, which protects neurological function by activating certain proteins or interacting with molecules called free radicals. Men's relative lack of estrogen leaves them with less protection.

Nearly 80 per cent of the estimated 10 million Americans who have osteo­porosis are in females.

Women start out with thinner, smaller bones and less bone tissue than men. Through most of their lives, women's bones are protected by estrogen, which may block a substance that kills bone cells.

However, when women begin to lose estrogen during menopause, it causes loss of bone mass (osteoporosis). This loss takes a toll: Nearly 50 per cent of women over 50 will break a bone because of osteoporosis.

The number of people affected by heart disease increases with age in both men and women. About four out of five people who die of coronary heart disease are 65 or older.

Because heart disease becomes more common as age increases, it's important to have regular checkups and watch heart disease risk factors.

As age increases they become less flexible, making it harder for blood to move through them easily. Fatty deposits called plaques also collect along your artery walls and slow the blood flow from the heart. These things, along with poor nutrition and exercise habits, can increase your risk of heart disease. Add other risk factors such as high blood pressure, smoking, and diabetes and it's likely that you will have a greater risk for a heart attack.

The health care professionals are work with the patients in a collaborative way, they have to consider the identity of each and every individual patient, it will help for the benefits of patients improved safety and in order to provide the highest possible standard of care.

What did these professionals do that either helped or hindered your education, health, and or/care?

The health professionals have to know the identities of each and every patient very well. They have to consider the identity of the patient very well while giving care and as well as give proper education. The health care professionals have to consider the age and gender very well and how it affects the health and give proper education and counselling for the health benefits of the patients.

The elderly typically have lower levels of literacy and have had less access to formal education than younger populations. Older patients with chronic diseases may need to make multiple and complex decisions about the management of their conditions.

Low literacy may affect patients’ ability to read and understand instructions on prescription or medicine bottles, health educational materials, and insurance forms. People with chronic conditions require more health services, therefore increasing their interaction with the health care system.

Issues of health care quality and satisfaction are of particular concern for people with chronic conditions who frequently come into contact with the health care system. As health care professionals we have to know the different identities of different patient and take efforts to improve it and would contribute to improving the quality of health care for all consumers.