What is Health?
- kgolden13
- Oct 12, 2020
- 3 min read
What is Health?
What comes to mind when you think about the word 'health'? Is it The Merriam-Webster online dictionary (2020) definition of health: "the condition of being sound in body, mind, or spirit" or perhaps it is the ability to cope with all the demands of daily life? There are and can be many definitions of health. What being healthy means can vary from person-to-person and day-to-day.
A Very Brief History of Health
In the review be Badash el al (2017), they discuss how the definition of health "has evolved many times, often reflecting the specific beliefs and the levels of scientific and medical understanding of that particular era." In ancient times, health was rooted in religion. Religious healers believed that in order to be healthy, you were to pray and sacrifice to the gods (Badash et al., 2017). In 400 B.C. Hippocrates moved away from believing that health was based on religion and worked with the understanding that all forms of illness have a natural cause. The Roman Empire, Galen, further expanded on Hippocrates' definition of health by including temperament and personality, resulting in a more holistic idea of what it means to be healthy, including the mental and emotional state. Also, through innovations in sanitation and public health, the Roman Empire began to shift the focus of healthcare from a single individual to an entire society (Badash et al., 2017)
"It is more important to know what sort of person has a disease
than to know what sort of disease a person has."
- Hippocrates
The WHO Definition of Health
In 1948, the World Health Organization (WHO) defined health as "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity." Although this definition is more than 70 years old, it is still considered the most established modern health definition.
Criticism of this Definition
Much of the criticism with the WHO's definition of health centers on the word "complete" (Oleribe et al., 2018). Is it possible for a person to be without any physical, mental, or social challenges? Leonardi (2018) believes the "WHO definition of health has become unfit for dealing with the new challenges arising from the growth of the ageing rate and the increasing number of people with chronic illness (due to improvement of the survival rates for several diseases)." The increase in chronic disease and an ever-ageing population would mean that a large percent of the people would be considered ill. Therefore, it may be time to abandon the WHO's definition and redefine health to align with today's health view.
How should health be defined today?
Despite the many changes in how society views health, there have been no amendments to the WHO's definition. I believe there is a need to move away from a description that prioritizes being absent from disease instead focuses on managing disease and more inclusive of those with chronic illness and ageing.
For example, Bradley et al. (2018) recognize that disease and disability can often co-exist with health. "In this new conception, health is transformed from a state that requires the absence of disease to a state where the central theme is the fullness of life. Health involves the integration of body, mind, and spirit and recognizes the significant influence of sociologic, environmental and behavioural factors".
I like this definition as the focus shifts from health being the absence of pain, discomfort, or disease to a quality of life.
In conclusion, despite the numerous arguments for the change in definition, no alternative has been able to reach a broad level of consensus (Leonardi, 2018). However, I believe that a new definition of health should be more holistic and defined by the individual person. Or, perhaps we should move away from defining health and instead move towards a general concept or conceptual framework of health (Huber, 2011).
Reference:
Badash, I., Kleinman, N. P., Barr, S., Jang, J., Rahman, S., & Wu, B. W. (2017). Redefining Health: The Evolution of Health Ideas from Antiquity to the Era of Value-Based Care. Cureus, 9(2). https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.1018
Bradley, K. L., Goetz, T., & Viswanathan, S. (2018). Toward a Contemporary Definition of Health. Military Medicine, 183(suppl_3), 204–207. https://doi.org/10.1093/milmed/usy213
Huber, M. (2011). HEALTH: HOW SHOULD WE DEFINE IT? In Medical Journal (Vol. 343, Issue 7817). https://www.jstor.org/stable/23051314?seq=1&cid=pdf-
Leonardi, F. (2018). The Definition of Health: Towards New Perspectives. International Journal of Health Services, 48(4), 735–748. https://doi.org/10.1177/0020731418782653
Oleribe, O. O., Ukwedeh, O., Burstow, N. J., Gomaa, A. I., Sonderup, M. W., Cook, N., Waked, I., Spearman, W., & Taylor-Robinson, S. D. (2018). Health: Redefined. Pan African Medical Journal, 30. https://doi.org/10.11604/pamj.2018.30.292.15436
Preamble to the Constitution of the World Health Organization as adopted by the International Health Conference, New York, 19-22 June, 1946; signed on 22 July, 1946 by the representatives of 61 States (Official Records of the World Health Organization, no. 2, p. 100) and entered into force on 7 April, 1948.
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