HOW ARE PRIORITY ISSUES FOR AUSTRALIA’S HEALTH IDENTIFIED? HEALTH PRIORITIES IN AUSTRALIA

Measuring Health Status  Role of epidemiology  Information on the health of a nation is gathered in many areas, including life expectancy, infant mortality rates, morbidity rates and the use of health care services (for example, hospital admissions and Medicare claims)  The study of information is known as epidemiology.  Epidemiology provides information on the distribution (or patterns) of disease, illness and injury and on the likely causes (or determinants) within groups or populations.

What can epidemiology tell us? Epidemiology serves many purposes. These include:  Monitoring the major causes of sickness and death to identify and emerging issues and equalities between groups  Identifying areas of need so that specific prevention and treatment interventions can be specifically targeted  Determining priority areas for the allocation of government funding  Monitoring the use of health care services and facilities  Evaluating the effectiveness of any prevention and treatment programs.

Who uses epidemiology? Epidemiological information is used to inform the decision making of many groups within the community. These include:  Policy developers at all levels of government  The manufacturers of health products  The providers of health services  Individual consumers

Measures of epidemiology The major measures used to determine the health of a population are:  Mortality rate – This is also called death rate, and is a measure of the number of deaths from a specific cause in a given period of time (usually a year).  Infant mortality rate – This is a measure of the annual number of deaths of children under 1 year of age per 1000 live births.  Life expectancy – This is the average number of years a person of a given age and gender can expect to live.  Morbidity rate – Provides information about the level of disease in specific populations. The main indicators used are prevalence and incidence.

Life expectancy, morbidity & mortality Describe the current trends in life expectancy.  Read the handout ‘Risk factors & chronic disease’  Identify major causes of morbidity (sickness). Account for differences in morbidity rates for men and women  Refer to pages 10 and 11 from textbook.

Life expectancy, morbidity & mortality Read handout ‘Mortality’.  Describe current trends in mortality. Ratios of mortality:  Indigenous twice as likely as any other Australian to die.  Low SES 1.13 times likely to die.  High SES, less likely to die. Account for differences between mortality rates based on population group.

Measuring health status Friday 21 st November – Period 4 Summary:  Revision activities  On completion of the previous lessons, complete the following revision questions.  Outline the measures of epidemiology.  Evaluate the effectiveness of using epidemiology to define health status of a population. Should you complete ALL questions, read handout ‘Identifying priority health issues’ social justice principles.

Potential for prevention and early prevention Thursday 27 th November The identification of priority issues is based on the potential for prevention and early prevention. Identify two lifestyle-related conditions. With the use of a table, identify behavioural and environmental modifications which may reduce the incidence of such conditions. Identify ways in which we can reduce the incidence of non-lifestyle related conditions. Prevention and early prevention in relation to these major conditions is more complicated than simply identifying the behaviour that contributes to their incidence. Health problems are social issues that are directly related to the society in which people live. Prevention for many people is limited and, in some cases, non-existent. To blame individuals for their behaviour ignores the social, economic, cultural and political forces at work in society. Q – Several environmental factors affect the health status of the population. Select two of the national health priority issues and discuss how the following can affect the prevalence of the two areas that you have chosen:  Physical environment  Economic environment  Cultural environment  Political environment REMEMBER – YOUR WORKBOOK IS DUE TOMORROW!

Costs of ill-health to the individual and community Friday 28 th November Read pages 16 – 18 of textbook ‘PDHPE – Application and inquiry’. (Handout) Q – Outline the difference between a direct cost and an indirect cost. Use examples to support your answer. (5 mins) Q – Discuss how serious injury or illness can impact on an individual. Use examples to support your answer. (10 mins) Q – Explain why it is difficult to measure the social cost of ill-health. (15 mins) Q – Describe four reasons for a possible future increase in health care costs to the community. (10 mins) Q – Discuss how Medicare has affected health care costs. (10 mins) ALL questions must be completed by the end of the period. Use estimated time limits to complete questions.

A growing and ageing population Healthy ageing  Older Australians are people aged 65 or older.  This group makes up approximately 13% of the population.  The proportion of the population age over 65 is projected to rise by between 27% and 30% by 2051  Ageing of the population is caused by two factors:  Australian families having fewer children  We are living longer.  With population ageing and people living longer, there are more people, particularly those at older ages, who have a disability and are limited in their ability to participate in physical activity.  Healthy ageing is concerned with quality of life, independence and lengthening the number of healthy years, not just the years of life, enjoyed by an individual. Q. Identify benefits of adopting a healthy lifestyle at an older age.  Australian males aged 65 can expect to live to be 83.1 years, while 65 year-old females have an expected lifespan of 86.4 years.  These life spans are about six years more than were experienced during the beginning of the twentieth century.  Males and females aged 85 years can expect to live for a further 5.9 and 7.1 years, respectively, which is about two years more than for those living in the early 1900s.