assignment c health and social care

• Exercise-

      Karen doesn’t do much exercise except for her job. She joined a gym but quit after a few months as she found she wasn’t going enough to make it worth her money. She goes for walks a few times a week. Exercise is important because, it helps your heart and cardiovascular system work more efficiently, it helps control weight and reduces body fat, it helps keep muscles, bones, and joints healthy, it improves balance and flexibility and helps stress and anxiety. These are the targets I would give her to improve her exercise:

• Flexibility-

The achievable distance between the flexed position and the extended position of a  or muscle is called its flexibility. Flexibility can also be described as something that is capable of withstanding stress without injury. Karen has a flexibility of 4cm which means she is quite flexible, however to improve her flexibility I would give her these targets:

• Health Monitoring-

Three factors that must be assessed before a health improvement plan can be written are: -

1. Dietary information
2. Exercise pattern
3. Amount of sleep    

   Health, behaviour and lifestyle can be assessed as part of a health improvement programme by keeping an honest record of what you eat and drink, the amount of sleep you get, your exercise patterns, how many cigarettes you smoke and any other substances you consume such as drugs or alcohol. Health assessment is a necessary part of planning health improvement because it helps me to identify health problems and to know what advice I could give to improve the person’s health. Here are the targets:

           

 

• Smoking-

Karen does not smoke and never has which is good as it is the cause for many deaths. Smoking can damage your lungs and is very addictive. Also it causes emphysema and causes thousands of deaths each year.People that smoke have a higher risk of getting lung cancer, strokes or other illnesses that can kill you.If Karen did smoke these are the targets I would suggest:

• Environment-

Having a good or positive environment is good for your health. If your not happy in your environment at home or work it can cause stress or anxiety or make it worse. Karen’s work environment and home environment are the same as she works from home and she is happy in both. If Karen wasn’t happy in her environment I would give her these targets:

• Stress-

Stress is bad for your health. It’s a response to demands made on a person and when a persons demand outweighs the ability to cope it causes stress and anxiety. It can also be pressure or feeling tense and common symptoms are; headaches, disturbed sleep, trembling and lack of concentration. It can be caused by exams, money worries, relationships and the environment you are in (home, workplace). Karen does suffer from some stress from her work and looking after her children but it isn’t major.

• Alcohol-

Karen only has alcohol on special occasions which are rare. This is good because alcohol is an addictive drug which people get easily addicted to. Karen knows when to stop and knows the effects of too much alcohol. Karen should drink no more than 14 units of alcohol per week and no more than three units in one day. 

If Karen did drink too much alcohol these are the targets I would give her:

 

• Avoiding hazards and staying safe-

Accidents are responsible for 10000 deaths a year which makes staying safe even more important. Life can never be risk free but there are many ways of staying safe and preventing accidents. Karen feels safe in her own home and knows how to keep safe and when a situation isn’t safe. Here are the targets I would give if she felt unsafe in her home and in many situations:

• Sleep-

On average a normal adult needs eight hours of sleep a night to make sure they have enough energy and don’t lose concentration during the day. Enough sleep every night recharges the brain. But if you don’t get enough sleep it can cause drowsiness, lack of concentration and headaches. Karen usually gets 7-8 hours of sleep a night but sometimes doesn’t, so I am going to give her these targets: