Lack of Reality: Positive Self-Perceptions of Health in the Presence of Disease

Abstract

The aim of this study was to determine if adults in Central Queensland have accurate self-perceptions of health. Data were collected as part of the 2010 Central Queensland Social Survey (N = 1289). Overweight/obesity is considered a health disorder and was determined using body mass index. Disease states were determined by asking respondents if they have: heart disease, high/low blood pressure, high cholesterol, high triglycerides, thyroid disorder, diabetes, and osteopenia/osteoporosis. Self-perceptions of health were assessed by asking, “Would you say that in general your health is” poor, fair, good, very good, excellent, don’t know, and no response. An accurate health perception occurred if: (1) A respondent with a disease/health disorder reported that their health was poor/fair or (2) A respondent without a disease/health disorder reported that their health was good/very good/excellent. The proportions of people with an accurate health perception by disease/health disorder were compared using a χ2 test. A proportion ratio (PR) with a 95% confidence interval (CI) was calculated for each disease/health disorder. A logistic regression analysis was performed to examine the association between each disease/health disorder and health perception using gender, age, education, physical activity level, and smoking status as covariates. More than 50% of residents with each disease/health disorder reported their health to be good/very good/excellent. Residents with each disease/health disorder were less likely to have an accurate health perception than those without the corresponding disease/health disorder prior to (p < 0.001) and following adjustment of the covariates (p < 0.001). Our results suggest that overweight/obesity and prevalence of disease are not being recognized as unhealthy, which contradicts established definitions of health.

Residents of Central Queensland, Australia Are Aware of Healthy Eating Practices but Consume Unhealthy Diets

“…Results from our work support the work of others who reported lack of knowledge is unlikely the primary cause of overweight/obesity [ 16 , 17 ]. We do not dispute the importance of nutritional education; however, we support the suggestion of others who proposed nutritional education alone is typically unable to facilitate behavior change as personal, behavioral, and environmental factors are overlooked [ 16 , 18 , 30 , 31 ]. Future research should utilize longitudinal experimental designs to determine optimal intervention strategies to help residents maintain a healthy body weight.…”

“…Meeting recommended nutritional guidelines has numerous health benefits including maintenance of healthy body weight and reduced risk of developing chronic disease [ 27 ]. The knowledge deficit model is commonly used to explain the cause of obesity [ 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 ] but research suggests factors other than knowledge contribute to overweight/obesity [ 16 , 17 , 18 , 29 , 30 ]. The primary findings from our study were: (1) Independent of BMI, residents had a good understanding of general nutritional knowledge related to macronutrients; (2) Independent of BMI, residents had a better understanding of kilocalories than kilojoules required to maintain current body weight.…”

“…The primary finding from Hendrie et al [ 15 ] was key dietary guidelines such as eating more fruit and vegetables were acknowledged by the community but detailed knowledge of nutrient content in foods and converting nutritional knowledge to food choice was poor. Given the belief that increasing nutritional knowledge is required to improve nutritional behaviors and the conflicting evidence suggesting nutritional knowledge does not appear to be the cause of overweight/obesity [ 14 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 ], it is important to determine nutritional knowledge and behaviors of normal weight, overweight, and obese adults residing in Australia.…”

Autopercepção de saúde de mulheres com excesso de peso

“…Resultado de estudo qualitativo apontou que mulheres que não se sentiam saudáveis tinham o dobro de comorbidades em comparação com as mulheres que se percebiam como saudáveis, e que as doenças mais comumente referidas eram a hipertensão arterial, a hiperlipidemia e o excesso de peso, e que uma mulher que referiu sentir-se não saudável contou como se sentiu consumida por suas doenças (Rathbun, Loerzel & Edwards, 2020). Por outro lado, é preocupante também o fato de parte das entrevistadas, com presença de 3 a 4 comorbidades, terem referido sua saúde como boa, pois esta percepção também pode contribuir para a não compreensão da necessidade de modificar fatores de estilo de vida que melhorariam saúde, como a implementação de uma dieta mais saudável e exercícios (Dalbo,Teramoto, Roberts & Scanlan, 2017).…”

Factors Associated with Changes in Health Perception in Patients with Heart Failure

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Health perception in patients with heart failure (HF) is considerably poor (Eastwood et al, 2012;Nguyen et al, 2008). Approximately 58.2% of patients with HF perceived their health as fair or poor, while 27.1% of patients with thyroid disorder, 40.9% patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and 42% of patients with diabetes perceived their health as fair or poor (Dalbo et al, 2017;Eastwood et al, 2012;Nguyen et al, 2008). Health perception in patients with HF can be poor due to HF symptoms and impaired functional status.

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