The current status of life-style related diseases and policy directions

Abstract

This study is a compilation of four issues related with the lifestyle-related diseases. The lifestyle-related diseases such as cerebrovascular diseases, cancer, and heart diseases rapidly increased around the age of 40. And the prevention of such diseases required considerations based on the one’s lifestyle and risk factors of the lifestyle-related diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure. The second chapter showed the economic and health burden due to the lifestyle-related diseases. The third chapter estimated the prevalence of multimorbidity of people with hypertension or diabetes in outpatient settings. It also examined the longitudinal patterns of transition from hypertension or diabetes to other chronic diseases. Findings suggested comprehensive and integrated health policies and/or programs for people with multimorbid chronic diseases. The fourth chapter examined the treatment compliance and risk factors of non-compliance among patients with hypertension or diabetes. The non-smoking rate and physical activity rate was not high, while the compliance rate of medication was about 72%. Gender, marital status, self-rated health, the duration of disease, stress, and the interaction with physicians influenced the compliance of the patients. The fifth chapter investigated the impact of risk preference on disease management and health behavior. The findings of this experiment survey described that more risk averse individuals showed significantly lower treatment compliance with high health risks. The study of risk preference is important because the risk attitude plays a significant role in the lifestyle-related diseases management behaviors and health status.