Physical, Psychological, Social, Intellectual and Environmental Stressors that Impact Health - Essay Example

The environment is a major influence on a person's overall functioning. Because of this, a care provider must have an understanding of how the internal as well as external environments impact a person's everyday life. The environment consists of both an internal and external environment that continuously interface with each other. Health refers to the ability of the person to function effectively, physically, socially, psychologically, spiritually, and intellectually. Effective physical functioning refers to the ability of the body structures to change and adapt to the changing environment.

To different levels of physical stress, the body responds to all parameters of physiological functions, such as heart rate, neural function, musculoskeletal function, and others. The physical stressors may be of many categories. Of them, the most important are muscular exercises, ambient temperature, and sound levels at work. The psychological stressors may be economic conditions, housing conditions, and family environment. The psychological stressors at work also influence an individual's health status.

Psychological stressors suppress cardiac parasympathetic nervous system activity leading to heart rate variability and eventually cardiovascular disease. Serious disease and treatment experiences affect psychological, interpersonal, and spiritual well-being. It should be mentioned that this might yield both negative and positive outcomes. This affects interpersonal relationships, reduces appreciation of life, leads to disordered life priorities, affects empathy and self-esteem, and most importantly disturbs spiritual health.

A patient's social circumstances and the stress resultant may affect an individual who is socially related to the patient. For example, mothers of children with childhood asthma often suffer from depression, and the more the severity of maternal depression, the more the severity of asthmatic symptoms in the child. Today's schooling system looks into competitive growth rather than the general holistic growth of the individual. This puts both the children and their parents under intellectual stress.

Disability or chronic illness in a child in the family creates stressors that are mostly intellectual and tell upon all the family members. Environmental stressors such as changes in temperature, atmospheric pressure, and humidity, all affect the health of the individual. A sudden spike in blood pressure arising out of acute environmental stress is believed to play role in adverse cardiovascular incidents. Considering all these factors, a strategy would assume a health promotion approach that encompasses all the associated factors that lead to a spectrum of stressors.

The health promotion approach is grounded based on the theory of healthcare where all aspects are taken care of. This will include physical and physiological changes in the individual, social approach, environmental changes, psychological adjustments, change in housing, change in a housing environment, safe water, change in the work environment, promotion of spirituality, and improvement of social interaction of the individual. To be able to do this, the healthcare professional and the patient in question would work hand in hand, and the most significant tool to achieve this is education, and lack of knowledge promotes most of the stressors to take effect, or even, most of the stressors produces imbalance of health due to lack of knowledge about how it produces an unacceptable health status.

The health promotion approach that involves understanding these factors would restore balance when both the promoter and the promotee are not ignorant about these factors and they both welcome changes and adjustments that produce health.