Lifestyle disease
The term ‘lifestyle’ simply means ‘the way people live’. It represents a whole range of cultural & social values, behaviors, personal or group habits or attitudes and social/ personal activities.
Lifestyles are learnt through
– Social interaction with immediate family (micro-environment),
– Community exposure such as Friends, School and Place of work
– Mass media (macro-environment).
Lifestyle diseases (LSD)
Lifestyle diseases are preventable non-communicable and it takes years to develop, also known as chronic disease. Occurrence of lifestyle disease is primarily based on the Regular habits of people and Result of an inappropriate social relationship
We are all looking for quick-fix solutions, Health cannot be “bought” in a pharmacy. Let us take an example – I have a headache. What is my response? I will take painkiller. The pain will go – for the moment. A few hours, a few days, a few weeks later it will return. I will take some more pills. At each recurrence, the pain gets worse, the frequency is greater and the duration is longer. Soon I have to increase the number of pills I take because the pain is no longer “responding”. This goes on getting worse until I am a full blown case of “migraine”. Worse still, I will develop hyperacidity (which is a side effect of pain killers) and maybe a full-blown ulcer. For this I will in turn start taking antacids which over a period of time will destroy my liver. The kidneys will be next in line – all quick-fix “solutions” have a domino effect until all our vital functions are destroyed.
How should we respond to disease?
Let us go back to the example of a headache given above. Pain is NOT a disease. It is the body’s way of telling me that a problem at deeper level exists
What does the body expect us to do?
The body expects me to respond in a more intelligent and responsible manner. Headache may be due to constipation or may be due to clogged up sinuses or may be due to lack of proper sleep, if we want relief from headache we should take care of all this causative factors rather treating headache by painkiller.
Indeed, more than physical ailments, mental diseases are growing limitlessly. Mental sickness caused by tension and worry gives us so many bodily ailments. Man today is afflicted with discontent. As one set of desires is satisfied, other desires go on cropping up if desires are reduced contentment will grow. The most common source of illness amongst people today is “Tension”. What is the cause of tension? It is indulgence in excess of various kinds. “Hurry, worry and curry (fatty food)” are the causes of various lifestyle diseases. Men must learn to moderate the hectic pace of living. Hurry causes worry and worry causes disease. Stress is often the trigger most of lifestyle disease. It is not enough to be physically healthy A healthy mind is needed for a healthy body.