A study from the University of Maryland School of Medicine sheds a little bit more light on why it is so important to detect health issues early on. A recent study from this institution indicates that high levels of cholesterol when someone is in their late teens and early 20s is a strong risk factor pointing toward that individual suffering from a stroke or heart attack later on in their lifetimes.
Now, looking at health issues like this really isn’t a concern for most people at this age. But as this study indicates, perhaps younger folk should be monitoring their health more closely. Early detection gives someone more time to rectify an issue before it becomes chronic. It gives them more time to improve their health before it has a lasting negative impact on quality of life or becomes life threatening.
Detecting health issues sooner rather than later increases the likelihood that there won’t be complications related to these health issues as someone ages. This is good news for younger individuals, but there are also benefits for older people, too. Although the positive impact might not be as great when healthy changes are made later on in life, they are still palpable.
Early detection goes way beyond things like cholesterol levels. There are a whole host of health issues that can be fixed when they are found early on. And things that don’t have a cure–like Alzheimer’s disease or Parkinson’s–can be alleviated for longer periods of time when found early.
The coronavirus has put the importance of early detection in the spotlight. If someone with COVID-19 notices that they are beginning to show symptoms, isolating yourself as much as possible early on can help you to keep others safe. While a lot of the health issues that the senior population faces are not necessarily contagious like the coronavirus is, the concept of early detection is still pretty similar. If issues can be spotted early on, lives can be saved. With COVID-19, those lives tend to be other people’s. With health issues like high cholesterol, the life that is saved by early detection is that of the person being diagnosed. The sooner an issue is spotted, the better the overall outcome for everyone involved becomes.
Early detection and prevention go hand in hand. But this means that better data is needed for us to really see the full benefit of this. The more we know, the more we can do to fix visible issues. And the better lives that people will live as a direct result of that.
Prevention is important, but it’s certainly not the only thing that can be done to help someone live a better life. Would you like to learn more about how senior care might help someone that you love live a higher quality of life? Please feel free to reach out to us. We can walk you through the care services that we provide and how they might help. Our consultation service is 100 percent free and there’s no obligation. Our goal is to help.
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