Health Diary Project, Essay Example

While most people who are ill do visit a doctor, some who have symptoms at home or in another more discreet setting may forego medical attention. Therefore, health diaries provide a clear picture of people’s health practices and disease behaviors in addition to medical information. The iceberg model successfully depicts the frequency with which people experience various health problems. As a result, there is more information about unmeasured mortality in health diaries. Keeping a health log or journal allows one to record all aspects of their health, both positive and negative. By shedding light on underreported health behaviors, they empower people to take ownership of their health. A health journal is kept and updated daily throughout the relevant period. Researchers use them to gather comprehensive information about how people in a certain population deal with health issues. Several situations call for the use of a health notebook. Comparative methodological studies have analyzed the reporting frequencies of retrospective and prospective procedures.

Consequently, it is crucial to remember that individuals may make varying decisions about disclosing incidents. Additionally, keeping a health diary can help with recalling critical medical occasions. Having a written medical history record and access to long-term memory makes it much easier to evaluate past illnesses and medications during medical checkups. For example, suppose one keeps a health diary. In that case, they can easily recall the date of their last period and any symptoms they were experiencing or medications they took in the event of a fall or other emergency. Individuals’ medical records also represent a valuable primary data source. One can still gain insight into a person’s health habits and coping strategies even when ill.

Summary

Keeping a health journal can help one prioritize four areas of care for themselves. Include entries about the four types of self-care (regulatory, preventative, reactive, and restorative) that one does in their health diary. The amount to which variables other than medical treatment contribute to a person’s health should be ascertained using the information gathered from the health diary. Daily habits in self-care and health behavior illuminate indicators of our health. Health behavior involves an individual’s perception, analysis, and response to issues related to their own and other people’s health. My definition of illness, my assessment of its severity, and my decision to take medication are all reflected in my health journal entries. I was able to deal with the back pain that came with being a young woman in today’s society. Understanding my body’s inner workings helped me make sense of and deal with the negative feelings that come with this fatigue. Because of this, I refrained from seeing a doctor or therapist. As a result, I started keeping a log of every time my body hurt during that week. My back hurt on Wednesday, and my stomach started cramping on Monday.

Health behavior encompasses two primary types of self-care: control and prevention. Self-care that regulates our physiological and psychological states includes performing these routine, routine, routine actions without conscious effort. Two excellent examples are going to bed and eating. The health log highlighted that I routinely receive less than the recommended sleep. Usually, I sleep anywhere from six to eight hours every night. Sleep duration and quality indicators are important because of the negative effects of sleep deprivation on one’s health. The importance of sleep to overall wellness cannot be overstated. It was important to take care of myself; I did so by keeping track of the food I ate. I kept a food log, tracked calories, and ate at least two servings of fruit and vegetables daily to ensure I was getting enough of the essential nutrients. I also took into consideration how often I exercised. When I was not feeling well, I slept on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays, but on the other days of the week, I worked out hard for around two hours a day, doing things like cardio and weight training.

Keeping a record of our daily self-care has helped us spot the early warning symptoms of the disease. They can also help us determine how active we need to be to achieve the desired results. Taking measures to protect one’s health and reduce the likelihood of developing a disease is known as preventative self-care. Many of these habits are also part of regular living, but they are geared toward avoiding the onset of illness. That is to say; preventative measures will have an effect if we do them to keep ourselves healthy. The health diary data shows several preventative self-care practices, such as brushing one’s teeth to avoid gum disease and cavities that destroy teeth. If you maintain a healthy lifestyle with regular physical activity and a ketogenic diet, you can reduce your chances of developing obesity-related cardiovascular disease and respiratory problems.

Health Status Designation Interpretation

A person’s general health can be determined, in large part, by their capacity to go about their regular lives and deal with the unexpected, such as health problems. Patient’s medical records are confidential, which proves that health care is highly important in our culture. Therefore, consistently making healthy food and drink choices has become a vital component of modern living. This permits us to maintain our health and extend our lives for as long as possible. The state of our physical and mental health has a role in our social standing, which is an aspect of an ongoing social process. In addition, a person’s state of health is less of a static goal and more of an ongoing path than you might think. To repeat, nobody is in perfect health, but we all want to achieve the highest potential degree of health that our resources will allow us to, and we are working toward that goal. The state of an individual’s health might be anywhere on a continuum, from being healthy to being in a terminal state of illness.

Even the healthiest person can have a common cold or headaches from time to time. This makes it impossible to achieve true health. The approach used to determine a person’s state of health takes into account the existence or absence of symptoms and the effect these symptoms have on the capacity to perform one’s responsibilities. The functional levels, evaluation methods, and normative norms are all important factors. Classifying someone as healthy begins with an evaluation of their functions. A way people can determine how healthy they are is by thinking about how much they can do the typical activities they do every day. When an individual first becomes aware that anything is wrong with their health, the process of classifying their health state can begin. Unless you experience a time in your life when your mental, physical, or social health starts to suffer, it will be difficult to understand what it means to truly be healthy.

I kept a health journal when I started feeling discomfort in my abdomen, back, and head. At first, I thought I was sick because of the agony I was experiencing. To put myself in a position where I could become sick, I first examined my body for indications that I was, in fact, ill. Because I was in so much physical pain, I felt irritable and depressed at the same time. At first, I suspected an illness because there were certain days when I felt isolated. By being attuned to these warning signs, I can take early steps to address any potential health problems. Whoever is evaluating a patient’s health determines the criteria by which we judge that patient’s health. We consult physicians, attempt the treatment on our own, or seek the advice of reputable family members or friends. With more and more people using the internet to research medical conditions and possible treatments, we are increasingly turning to hospitals and doctors for help when we feel powerless in the face of a health crisis. These facilities and practitioners include hospitals and doctors. When we are at home, we frequently rely on our self-care routines and earlier experiences in administering medication and treatment for various illnesses.

When I was younger and encountered a stomachache, back discomfort, or headache, I would reach for an Advil rather than go to the doctor. If I needed to rest, I would go to sleep, but if I had a headache or stomachache, I would use a hot water bottle to alleviate the pain. When I was not in the best mood, I tried to perk myself up by doing anything and everything I could think of. Unwinding and temporarily forgetting about my problems was made easier by conversing with my significant other, working out, or even just having a glass of wine. The next step of the process typically involves disclosing these health issues to the other people involved in the surgery. After disclosing my disease to my spouse and my sister, I noticed a significant improvement in the quality of my life.

Comparison with Literature

Although health diaries contain a history or biography of the patient, the information that they may obtain might vary widely, and each contains this information. It includes details about the individual’s health in addition to their gender, name, age, ethnicity, and socioeconomic standing. It is essential to have a complete patient history because this can shed light on the patient’s general state of health. This knowledge is essential for making important medical decisions, such as selecting the appropriate diet or medication to administer. When determining a person’s health, it is critical to have a solid understanding of their social status because our health visibly reflects our social status. The socioeconomic status, gender, age, and ethnicity of a person can provide insight into both their overall health and their capacity to deal with health issues. It is frequently emphasized how essential it is to maintain a health journal to understand how people make sense of their symptoms and document how they practice self-care.

Reducing sugar, salt, and carbohydrates is imperative to maintain excellent physical health and steering clear of conditions such as diabetes. Abstinence for an extended period reduces the risk of death and liver damage. Sickness behavior refers to how a person responds to and manages their illness and the associated signs and symptoms. The perception and evaluation of the meaning of daily symptoms and the reaction to self-care measures, such as self-medication and activity constraints, such as sick days, are examples of illness behavior. Illness behavior is defined as the perception and evaluation of the meaning of daily symptoms. Reactive self-care is a subcategory of disease behavior that refers to how individuals evaluate and treat their symptoms in the absence of a diagnosis from a qualified medical professional (Roghmann and Haggerty, 1972, 148). People have become accustomed to the recurrence of symptoms each month, so they have stopped looking for a cure in favor of self-medicating as a means of coping. Individuals should treat themselves with the same over-the-counter medications that medical professionals recommend for common ailments such as the common cold and headaches. The final method of self-care is portraying oneself in a sickly manner. The individual assumes the role of the sick person when they give up on taking care of themselves and instead place their recovery in the hands of others. The fact that individuals do it because they believe they are ill and require time to recover is the primary contributor to the prevalence of this method of self-care. Whether you are working to recover from an acute illness or managing a chronic condition, engaging in restorative self-care is crucial for regaining and maintaining optimal health. However, “restorative self-care” refers to how individuals generally manage illnesses.

The perspective people consider when looking at things is also quite important. People give examples of changes in their biology, emotions, and abilities. The factors that distinguish health from illness require being subjected to in-depth analysis. Indicators of one’s total health can be found in one’s mental, bodily, and social well-being (Twaddle, 1974, 33). As a direct consequence of taking into account biological shifts, paying great attention to the messages that people’s bodies provide them is essential. This highlights the importance of paying attention to obvious symptoms when conducting a health evaluation. The mental state of an individual might be affected by the feelings they feel physically. When people are ill, their capabilities can shift in various ways. It has the potential to throw them off their normal schedule. Changes in how one goes about their daily life can indicate their deteriorating health.

By keeping a health journal and including their symptoms, an individual can identify if there is a relationship between their illness and the headaches they experience in subsequent days. The capacity to recall the specific days one’s symptoms all happened is a phenomenon called telescoping. It significantly facilitates the development of a deeper awareness of the symptoms associated with one’s condition (Segall and Fries, 2011, 287). Access to this data is beneficial because it assists in acquiring the appropriate knowledge, which is essential for maintaining one’s health. Considering the devastating effects of seemingly insignificant mishaps, having this information at one’s disposal is helpful because it helps one acquire the proper knowledge, which is crucial for maintaining one’s health.

Keeping a health journal is not without its share of potential downsides. One of the difficulties may be that initially, persuading people to keep or start health diaries may be difficult. Keeping a health notebook regularly can be a time-consuming endeavor. Another drawback associated with retaining health data is the possibility that doing so will condition the user. In order to accurately answer the questions and due to the way the questionnaire is set-up, it is required that you submit an answer. Because of the researcher’s authority, participants may be dishonest in their journal entries. For instance, if someone is aware that they will be questioned, they might decide to write down the fact that they skipped brushing their teeth that day. The information acquired may be of very poor quality due to irrelevant data or the haziness of emotional data. Compared to other types of surveys, such as interviews, the cost of conducting health diaries is extremely expensive. In conclusion, the difficulty of acquiring, processing, and interpreting data may work to the advantage of people if it enables them to understand better and use the currently available data.

Conclusion

The significance of keeping a health journal is brought into focus by the findings of this research. There are advantages to maintaining a health journal but also disadvantages to doing so. Keeping a health journal can be beneficial because it can provide valuable data for medical research. People learn very little about an individual’s beliefs or behaviors regarding their health due to the breadth restrictions imposed by hospital data collection. [Citation needed] [Citation needed] Medical sociologists continue to rely on health diaries as a foundational tool and a source of optimism. I attribute my overall good health to the fact that I pay close attention to my personal hygiene, consume a well-balanced diet, and take any medication that my doctor has prescribed me on a consistent basis. The health journal of an individual is where one can find the very tip of the iceberg, that is, their current state of health.

The primary benefits of health diaries are that people respond to them frequently, they require minimal effort to set up, and their data is easy to understand. People who keep health diaries tend to develop a fondness for the practice, which suggests that they are starting to appreciate the benefits of doing so. A health journal may be superior to an interview when providing in-depth information on health occurrences. With the assistance of my health journal, which I used to evaluate myself, I was able to draw correlations between my emotional and physical well-being. Some of the information that I jotted down for an interview would not have been relevant to include.

Similar to how keeping a health journal can help with recollection problems, diaries can help with the problems that arise when remembering to remember to write down important information. Keeping a health journal can also help with recollection problems. When the facts are written down, it is much simpler to recall the specifics and draw conclusions from the facts. If you have a memory lapse, such as forgetting about a recent illness or a significant life event, keeping a health journal can serve as a helpful reminder.

References

Roghmann, Klaus J., and Robert J. Haggerty. 1972. “The diary as a research instrument in the study of health and illness behavior: experiences with a random sample of young families.” Medical care: 143-163.

Segall, Alexander, and Christopher John Fries. 2011. Pursuing health and wellness: Healthy societies, healthy people. Oxford University Press: 285-294

Twaddle, Andrew C. 1974. “The concept of health status.” Social Science & Medicine (1967) 8, no. 1: 29-38.