Health care assignment: What Causes Cardiovascular Disease among 20-35 age groups?
Question
Task: Develop a report on health care assignment discussing the rising cases ofcardio vascular disease among people from age group 20-35 in detail.
Answer
(i) Introduction to nutrition issue/health problem
Heart disease is one of the common health issues undertaken in the present context of health care assignment that is caused due to poor diet pattern of the people. Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of death among the population of western countries. Cardiovascular disease is a greatest health problem in Australia with more and more people dying due to severe heart disease (Casas et al. 2018).
The rising number of cardiovascular diseases in the past 25years has become one of the leading public health priorities. The most common cause of cardiovascular disease among the population of today is the poor dietary pattern that leads to excessive production of proinflammatory cytokines that creates heart problems. People today are engaged in excess intake of sodium and processed foods, unhealthy fats, added sugars and low intake of healthy fruits and vegetables, whole grains, fiber and other health nuts. Moreover, people today areeating more sweet and savory food that causes pressure on their cardiovascular processes (Gonzalez13 et al. 2015). Such poor dietary pattern is the major cause behind cardio vascular or heart disease. Cardiovascular disease also arises from genetic problems and aging among the population.
There are number of barriers that have resulted in poor dietary habits among the population. The poor dietary pattern among the population is resulted from the changing lifestyle such as lack of exercise, overweight, stress, excess alcohol consumption and smoking habit. In the western world the people are becoming quite busy and this ai acting as a common barrier to healthy eating (Hoare et al. 2017). Moreover, lack of knowledge about nutrition and health food also cited as a common barrier to healthy eating. Lack of availability of healthful foods is identified as a potential barrier that drives unhealthy eating and causes cardiovascular issues. Other barriers that result in undesirable dietary habits among the people are the adulterated food sold by big companies (Aihw 2021). The processed food from big companies is highly exploited by adding large amount of sugar and sodium.
(ii) Describe the extent of the issue in Australia
As of 1995 an estimated 16% of the Australians or 2.8 million people were diagnosed with cardiovascular conditions. Most of them were diagnosed with high blood pressure as the most common condition among males and females with heart disease. The high blood pressure is caused from inadequate and unbalanced nutrients consumption. Since then the issue of cardiovascular disease has been increasing among the Australians. As of 2015, it is evident that 7.3% of the total burden of disease in Australia was due to poor diet and most of them suffering from heart problems. Further, in 2017-18 about 5.6% of the Australian adults were diagnosed with some or the other health conditions related to heart or vascular problems (Aihw 2021a). There were more than 1.2 million people in Australia hospitalized in 2017-18 for heart problems. From the graph below it is seen that heart disease was more in men than in women. Moreover, particular at-risk groups in Australia are person above the age of 25years and it grows as the age increases (Abs 2021).
Figure- Cardiovascular disease in Australia according to age and sex
Source- (Aihw 2021a)
The trend below shows the acute coronary events among the people aged 25 and over 2007 to 2017. The trend shows that the acute coronary events are decreasing over the years. In 2017-18, one in every five Australians aged above 25 has measured high blood pressure reading that is approximately 4.3 million people (Abs 2021a). This shows that the riskiest groups in Australia to suffer cardiovascular problems are peopling aged 25 to 45. This is because this age group people consume more unhealthy food and unhealthy living habits such as smoking, alcohol consumption and sugar sweetened foods. From the research of Aihw (2021b), it is seen that the riskiest age group to face heart problems in Australia are 30 to 59 years with most of them facing risk factors like poor diet, physical inactivity and smoking.
Figure- Trends in acute coronary events
Source- (Aihw 2021a)
Reports show that the number of people with heart, stroke and vascular diseases in Australiahas increased tremendously from 2005 to 2018 and estimated to reach 1.16 million (Statista 2021).
(iii) Describe and appraise the nutrition and health data sources
The data source used to collect information on the extent of cardiovascular disease in Australia and the age group facing the maximum risk is highly valid and reliable. The source such as past journals is used as a source to collect data and is written by trustworthy scholars that are a part of department of internal medicine and molecular sciences. Moreover, the journals used to collect the data are published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences and are recent. The data collected are also collected directly from the source and are primary in nature (Ruan et al. 2018). This further improves the validity of the source used. Along with journals of International Journal of Molecular Sciences, the research also collected data from peer reviewed sources published in Elsevier.
Other than journals, the paper also used government sources such as Australian Bureau of Statistics and Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. This is a reliable and valid source because it is an official source that provides independent and reliable information free from any kind of biases. Similarly, Statista is also an official data source that provides valid and up-to-date information in several events.
The data collected have various strengths such as the information such as number of people facing cardio related disease in Australia and the age group having the maximum chances to face the issue are robust enough to explain the complex health problem related to nutrition. Moreover, the data is reliable, consistent and precise in explaining the extent of cardiovascular risks among the Australians.
However, the data has few limitations such as there are missing values or lack of information about the number of individuals facing cardiovascular disease within each age-group. Moreover, some of the data used are from surveys and thus can be inaccurate in nature sometimes. This is because individuals often face biases and restrict themselves from giving accurate information.
(iv) Range of strategies undertaken in Australia and ONE other country
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Strategy (intervention/programme) Describe the components of the strategy, target group, duration etc. |
Which social theory/framework underpinned the strategy? |
Evaluation indicators |
Outcomes of the strategy |
Comment on success (or not) |
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Australia |
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Components of the Strategy National Strategic Framework for chronic conditions. Aim- to reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease in Australia. Aims at encouraging healthier lifestyle among the Australian through prevention of chronic conditions. Objective tools- make use of multiple tools including regulations, education, health care programmes and incentives to develop healthy lifestyle choices for Australians (Yu, Malik and Hu2018). Target group- 18-30 Time- since 2015 |
The structural functionalism social theory has underpinned the strategy where the society together functions and contribute to the whole improvement of the chronic health conditions in the economy. The strategy saw the society as a structure with interrelated parts where the improved in regulations and education will directly help in reducing chronic health conditions in Australia. |
The indicators that were used to evaluate the success of the success of the strategy included changes in lifestyle choices of the people, rising crowd in fitness centres and changes in eating habits of people. |
The outcomes of the strategy were seen from several spheres: Proportion of Australians living with preventable chronic health conditions is reduced to great extent. Australia has been able to meet the global targets stated by WHO Global Action Plan for controlling chronic diseases from 2013-2020.
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The strategy is highly successful in controlling the rising incidents of chronic health conditions in Australia and aims at reducing the heart disease even further by 2025. |
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Component of the Strategy Increased investment in public health in improving health system and access to health in the country. Aim- to increase the access to health and encourage prevention of disease. Objective tools- disease prevention programs that focus on increasing physical activity, improving nutrition and reducing smoking. Provide funding to public health that can prevent the increase in disease (Oecd2021). Target group- 25-45 Time- 2012 |
The structural functional theory underpinned the strategy that was designed for cumulative benefits to the individuals in the society. This is because the program is interested in studying the social factors that cause the cardiovascular diseases among the population such as poor nutrition, poor lifestyle and others. |
The evaluation indicators of the program include: Number of patients with cardiovascular diseases being treated in public health centres. Reduction in the number of deaths due to cardiovascular diseases. |
The outcome of the strategy was to improve access of Australians towards public health centres. Moreover, the outcome of the program is to prevent the increase in cardiovascular disease among Australian aged 25-45. |
The program has not been much successful in Australia because the current funding for public health is inadequate and needs to be increased to a sufficient level to support huge rise in chronic diseases in hospitals. |
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Another country: Canada |
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Strategy (intervention/programme) Describe the components of the strategy, target group, duration etc. |
Which social theory/framework underpinned the strategy? |
Evaluation indicators |
Outcomes of the strategy |
Comment on success (or not) |
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Component of the strategy The Heart Health Strategy was a health strategy taken in Canada and included all kinds of vascular disease. Aim- to reduce chronic heart diseases of all type in Canada. Objective tools The strategy made six major recommendations such as:
Target audience- 18-59 Time- within this year. |
The structural functional theory underpinned the strategy that focused on reducing health problems among the entire population of Canada that are under heart disease risk. Moreover, the strategy can help in providing impressive economic returns and thus based on structural functional theory. |
The evaluation indicators of the program include: Reduction in number of Canadians with myocardial infarction or stroke. Reducing high blood pressure prevalence. Reducing the smoking rate. |
The outcome of the strategy is to reduce the rate of myocardial infarction or stroke rate by 600,000 along with cumulative health cost savings by $75 billion.
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The success of the strategy is highly dependent on the timing of policy development and the budget of the federal government. Moreover, the wider recommendations made by the strategy makes it complex and difficult to monitor for success. |
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Components of the strategy Heart and stroke strategy Aim- improving the health for more Canadians Objective tools Improving quality of lie of people with cardiovascular disease. Reducing risk factors upstream (Heartandstroke 2021). Target- all age group Time- 10 years. |
The structural functional theory underpinned the strategy. |
The evaluation indicators include: Lengthening of life. Reduction in mortality rate.
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The outcome of the strategy is to improve the wellbeing of the Australians with heart issues. |
The strategy can be highly successful in addressing the biggest challenge of heart and stroke over the next 10 years. |
(v) Identification of target population group
The target population group that the new program will target includes 25 to 35 years age group and all kind of cardiovascular diseases that they are suffering. This is because most of the issues and unhealthy living and eating habits are evident within this age group such as alcohol consumption, smoking and consumptions of junk foods. Moreover, this age group is more exposed to stress and anxiety that causes heart problems. The identified strategies implemented in Canada and Australia will work in this age group because the strategies have been designed to reduce health risks among wide group of society. Moreover, better awareness and education from such policy will help this age group to live a health lifestyle and eating habits. However, more streamlined strategy is needed to focus on this particular age group such as regulations on unhealthy food and cigarettes that can directly impact this age group. This is because this is an adult age group and preventing unhealthy habits among this group is a challenging task and cannot be tackled by implementing only educational or improvement in health system programs. Thus, a direct legal strategy is required to prevent unhealthy eating and living habits among this age group. This will help Australia to improve the habits of their people and tackle the most critical group of people.
References
Smith, E.R., 2009. The Canadian heart health strategy and action plan. The Canadian journal of cardiology, 25(8), p.451.
Casas, R., Castro-Barquero, S., Estruch, R. and Sacanella, E., 2018.
Nutrition and cardiovascular health. International journal of molecular sciences, 19(12), p.3988.
Yu, E., Malik, V.S. and Hu, F.B., 2018. Cardiovascular disease prevention by diet modification: JACC health promotion series. Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 72(8), pp.914-926.
Gonzalez13, D.M., Yusuf, S., Willett12, W.C. and Popkin15, B.M., 2015. Food Consumption and its impact on Cardiovascular Disease: Importance of Solutions focused on the globalized food system. J Am Coll Cardiol, 66(14), pp.1590-1614.
Aihw, 2021. Poor diet. [online] Aihw. Available at: < https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/food-nutrition/poor-diet/contents/dietary-guidelines > [Accessed 31 March 2021].
Aihw, 2021. Cardiovascular Disease. [online] Aihw. Available at:
Abs, 2021. National Health Survey: First results. [online] Abs. Available at: < https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/health-conditions-and-risks/national-health-survey-first-results/latest-release > [Accessed 31 March 2021].
Aihw, 2021. Cardiovascular disease. [online] Aihw. Available at: < https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/heart-stroke-vascular-diseases/cardiovascular-health-compendium/contents/how-many-australians-have-cardiovascular-disease > [Accessed 31 March 2021].
Abs. 2021. Heart, stroke and vascular disease. [online] Abs. Available at: < https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/health-conditions-and-risks/heart-stroke-and-vascular-disease/latest-release > [Accessed 31 March 2021].
Hoare, E., Stavreski, B., Kingwell, B.A. and Jennings, G.L., 2017. Australian adults' behaviours, knowledge and perceptions of risk factors for heart disease: A cross-sectional study. Preventive medicine reports, 8, pp.204-209.
Ruan, Y., Guo, Y., Zheng, Y., Huang, Z., Sun, S., Kowal, P., Shi, Y. and Wu, F., 2018. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) and associated risk factors among older adults in six low-and middle-income countries: results from SAGE Wave 1. BMC public health, 18(1), pp.1-13.
Oecd, 2021. Cardiovascular Disease and Diabetes: Policies for Better Health and Quality of Care. [online] Oecd. Available at:
Statista, 2021. Number of people with heart, stroke and vascular diseases in Australia FY 2005-2018. [online] statista. Available at:
Heartandstroke, 2021. Strategy aims at improving health for more Canadians. [online] Heartandstroke. Available at: < https://www.heartandstroke.ca/articles/strategy-aims-at-improving-health-for-more-canadians> [Accessed 31 March 2021].
