Lifestyle diseases which generally have their roots in the life path that one lead have become a common problem as far as the health of people in the community is concerned. Diseases such as cancer, obesity, hypertension, diabetes, stroke, just to mention a few, are major diseases brought about by and are associated with the life that an individual leads in the day to day engagements. Cancer as a lifestyle disease has become an area of concern since it has a unique feature in that it can be controlled, unlike other diseases that come as a result of reasons or things that are difficult to adjust or to control the intensity and the magnitude of their occurrences.
Addressing this issue in a manner by which intervention programs are laid down so as to initiate matters of concern both in the community and at the national level is a very key idea. Resource allocation by the government for that purpose, therefore, needs to be strategic. In the sense, resources from the national government need to be channeled towards set programs and initiatives that are geared towards providing good interventions to dealing with cancer cases in the general population.
These resources include beginning with, community partnerships. This involves the provision of a close working environment between the clinic and the community to enhance the ease of delivering the health services to the people. This is because the cancer patients live and interact with each other in an environment that is outside the health setups and through this close interaction with the health facilities, the caregivers will have a conducive atmosphere in deducing the specific problems and the needs of actions and hence there will be a boost in care delivery through the support that the clinics get from the public (Coyne et al, 2010).
Through community partnerships, the target group for cancer intervention can be easily identified and the program rolled down, this ensures that the best results are obtained at the end of each program in a given geographical area. For example clinic-community partnerships produces desired clinical outcomes, increases the capacity for the community outreach services, improves access and utilization of community resources by the people, enhances the engagement of the community in cancer support and finally at the end, leads to reduced morbidity and mortality improving the quality of life in relation to cancer.
The community partnerships may be beneficial in the following ways:
The traditional services like the education sessions on the cancer therapy can be an extension of health practice of patient care from the hospital to the households thereby creating a whole round healthy environment for patients and the general public.
The partnerships help spot cancer patients with special needs or from marginalized groups with limited resources from their specific households and necessary support provided to them to ensure that they also have access to healthcare.
The partnerships can also be non-traditional yet supportive for example, beauty and barber shops may have access to hard-to-reach populations, the shoes stores may partner to raise foot care awareness and while doing this, increases their sales at the same time improving the health of the people, faith-based organizations can also offer support group opportunities to generate resources.
Another means of locating resources to be used in combating cancer is the rolling down of national campaigns against deep-rooted traditions that are detrimental to the health of the people and in one way or another limit the fight against cancer. These traditions include the ones that bar people from seeking medical attention in cases of illness, others put people to lifestyles that make them at risk groups of certain lifestyle diseases like obesity among other illnesses due to the type of foods that they take on a daily basis. These other diseases increase the negative effects of cancer. The campaigns need to reach the doorstep of every person in the country whether they are at risk group of people or not. The campaigns, however, should find the best approach for reaching different communities and impacting their life since other communities especially the strong preservatives of the culture would not easily accept change unless a strategic and informed approach is used on them (Pappachan, 2011).
Another crucial area where much resources need to be channeled on is the nutrition. This is because the nutrition status of people largely determines their health in as far as the lifestyle diseases is concerned. Most lifestyle diseases come as a result of the food intake of people and too much intake of certain foods or low intake of certain foods leads to certain lifestyle diseases. Setting up of nutritional centers or departments in all facilities across all the tiers of healthcare will to some extent a solution to basic nutritional needs if not the absolute nutritional needs of the people.
The availability of the nutritional departments in these health set-ups ensures that each and every patient that visits the clinic is assessed for the nutritional needs and they are provided with appropriate advice on the type of foods to take that will meet their nutritional needs. Apart from assessing and providing for the nutritional needs of the patients in these nutritional departments, there can be nutritional sessions conducted in the facility by the experts in nutrition and nutritional educators. This practice will ensure that, with time, all patients know the basics about the nutritional needs of themselves and their young ones thereby limiting cases of cancer disease brought about by poor nutrition practices (Sharma & Majumdar, 2009).
At these nutritional centers, vulnerable groups can be identified as, those with limited resources that they cannot afford the required nutritional needs. It is at this point that these people are given free nutritional commodities so as to meet their health needs.
These resources for the cancer disease are designed in order to meet the economic needs of the people in that the fee charged for them is affordable to all and the groups which cannot meet those costs are given free of charge. The eligible persons for these interventions are all the people since any healthy person can assume a lifestyle that makes them contract cancer. However, cancer patients are assessed in the clinics through screening and from the results, an appropriate referral system is facilitated.
In conclusion, cancer is a disease that can majorly be controlled through behavior change, taking one’s health a priority is key in ensuring cancer cases are identified early enough and are treated before it spreads to other organs of the body. Therefore it’s a responsibility of one to ensure that he or she leads a cancer free side of life by ensuring that all the requirements of healthy living is achieved. This involves regular cancer screening and being vigilant of strange symptoms in the body.
References
Coyne, T., Hughes, R., & Langi, S. (2010). Lifestyle diseases in Pacific communities (No. 219). Noumea: Secretariat of the Pacific Community.
Pappachan, M. J. (2011). Increasing prevalence of lifestyle diseases: high time for action. The Indian journal of medical research, 134(2), 143.
Sharma, M., & Majumdar, P. K. (2009). Occupational lifestyle diseases: An emerging issue. Indian journal of occupational and environmental medicine, 13(3), 109.
