Men's Health - A need a more flexible NHS
By Norma Beavers
It is almost universally accepted that men go to see their GPs less often than women do and fewer still go to see their local pharmacist for a quick discussion about their health problems.
One result is that men are much more likely to be diagnosed with life-threatening health conditions and often it is too late for them to get the type of treatment they would have received if they had sought professional help earlier.
Doctors leaders in Wales say this situation has to change and The Mens Health Forum is pushing for “a more flexible NHS” in which many services traditionally delivered in NHS settings, such as basic health checks, screening services, routine GP appointments, are instead taken into the workplace. Such a scheme would be funded by business and the NHS.
A survey by The Men’s Health Forum found one in ten men admitting they avoid seeking help from a health professional because they are scared it might end in a hospital visit. An additional ten per cent said they would rather ignore the problem and save themselves from the embarrassment of discussing their health issues with a doctor.
Dr David Bailey, Chairman GPC Wales, said: “All the evidence shows that men are much more reluctant to admit to health problems than women. Just go into any GP’s surgery or hospital ward and women appear over-represented. Then go to a Well Man Clinic and you will probably find it empty. All this might not matter, except for the fact that men are less healthy than women. Their life expectancy is less than women’s and at every age up until 79 more men die than women.”
Stroke and heart attacks are “the big killers of men aged 40-60,” Dr Bailey said. “We must find ways to reach them and it has to be done through major advertising campaigns and government guidance.”
This is where policy makers and the Welsh Assembly Government have a duty to act, he said. “For whilst it seems they’re willing to tackle testicular cancer – and rightly so, they—like the men who don’t visit their GPs—are content to bury their heads in the sand to the bigger health picture.”
Dr Bailey said routine screening of men is poor because the number of men attending is low and local efforts by GPs are just not succeeding in breaking down men’s natural tendency to avoid seeking help. “You might say it’s a Venus and Mars thing,” explains Dr Bailey, “But we have got to find a way to change men’s attitudes to their own health and get more of them coming in to seek medical care sooner rather than later.”