Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Biomedical Concept
• Health means “absence of disease.”
• It was felt that human body is a machine and disease is
an outcome of the breakdown of the machine, and one
of the doctor’s tasks was to repair the machine.
• Developments in medical and social sciences led to the
conclusion that the biomedical concept of health was
inadequate.
Ecological Concept
•Ecologists viewed health as a dynamic equilibrium
between man and his environment, and disease – a
maladjustment of the human organism to environment.
Psychosocial Concept
•Advances in social sciences showed that health is not only
a biomedical phenomenon, but one which is
influenced by social, psychological, cultural, economic
and political factors of the people concerned. Thus
health is both a biological and social phenomenon.
Holistic Concept
•Holistic concept recognizes the strength of social,
economic, political and environmental influences on health.
•It has been variously described as multidimensional
process involving the wellbeing of the person as a whole
•The emphasis is on the promotion and protection of
health.
Social economic
Health
Health Health protection
promotion
Envirnmental
Political
Holistic concept
DIMENSIONS OF HEALTH
• Health is multidimensional and are interrelated, each has
its own nature
Physical Dimension
• “Perfect functioning” of the body.
• It conceptualizes health biologically as a state in which
every cell and every organ are functioning at optimum
capacity and in perfect harmony with the rest of the
body.
Mental Dimension
• Ability to respond to many varied experiences of life with
flexibility and a sense of purpose.
• Mental health has been defined as “a state of balance
between the individual and the surrounding world, a
state of harmony between oneself and others
Social Dimension
•Harmony and integration with the individual, between each
individual and other members of society, and between
individuals and the world in which they live.
Spiritual Dimension
•Spiritual health refers to “something” that transcends
physiology and psychology.
Emotional Dimension
•Relates to “feeling.” it reflects emotional aspects of
humanness.
Vocational Dimension
•Work often plays a role in promoting both physical and
mental health.
•Physical work is usually associated with an improvement
in physical capacity, while goal achievement and self-
realization in work are a source of contentment and
enhanced self-esteem.
Others
•A few other dimensions have also been suggested such as
philosophical dimension, cultural dimension,
socioeconomic dimension, environmental dimension,
educational dimension, nutritional dimension, and so on.
CONCEPT OF WELLBEING
Standard of Living
• As per WHO, “Income and occupation, standards of
housing, sanitation and nutrition, the level of provision of
health, educational, recreational and other service and
collectively as an index of the ‘standard of living’.”
Level of Living
• As per United Nations documents “level of living”
consists of nine components: health, food consumption,
education, occupation and working conditions, housing,
social security, clothing, recreation and leisure, and
human rights.
Quality of Life
• Quality of life as defined by WHO, “The condition of life
resulting from combination of the effects of the complete
range of factors such as those determining health,
happiness , education, social and intellectual
attainments, freedom of action, justice and freedom of
expression.”
Positive health
Better health
Severe sickness
Death
DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH
Biological
Behavioral &
Other sociocultural condition
factor
Socioeconomic
Aging
Health services
Biological Determinants
•Physical and mental traits of every human being are to
some extent determined by the nature of his genes at the
moment of conception.
Environment
•Environment has a direct impact on the physical, mental
and social wellbeing of those living in it.
• Environmental factors range from housing, water supply,
psychosocial stress and family structure
Socioeconomic Conditions
● Economic status: Economic situation in a country is an
important factor in morbidity, increasing life expectancy
and improving quality of life, family size and pattern of
disease
Environmental Indicators
•Environmental indicators reflect the quality of physical and
biological environment in which diseases occur and in
which the people live.
•They include indicators relating to pollution of air and
water radiation, solid wastes, noise, exposure to toxic
substances in food or drink.
Socioeconomic Indicators
•indirect indicators of health.
•These include rate of population increase, level of
unemployment, dependency ratio, literacy rates, especially
female literacy rates, family size, etc.
Rehabilitation includes
•Medical rehabilitation (restoration of function),
•Vocational rehabilitation (restoration of the capacity to earn a
livelihood),
•Social rehabilitation ( restoration of family and social
relationships),
•Psychological rehabilitation (restoration of personal dignity
and confidence).