NATIONAL MEN'S HEALTH WEEK 2007


One in three men in the UK is currently living with a long-term medical
condition
 

Men are often reluctant to visit a doctor or engage with other health services and health promotion campaigns often fail to take account of the need for "gender-sensitivity" in reaching male audiences. The Men’s Health Forum, a charity that aims to improve male health in England and Wales, will highlight these issues during this year's Men's Health Week.

The sixth annual National Men's Health Week will take place from June 11 to 16 and will be on the theme of Men and Long Term Health Problems.
with a view to developing effective ways of reaching men with long-term medical conditions and increasing men's capacity for self-care.

To mark the week a series of 'mini manuals' (information booklets designed like car maintenance manuals) on a broad range of long-term conditions will be published to help improve self-care by men. The manuals will also include information on making better use of the NHS.

The Week will open with a major regional launch at the Sage Centre in Gateshead on June 11. As in previous years, more than 1,500 events are likely to be organised up and down the country, including health awareness days, free check ups for men, conferences and sporting events.

Men's Health Forum is drawing attention to five major health issues where it expects the NHS to take action
 

• Weight management: more men than women in the UK are overweight (67 % of men compared to 57% of women) but men are much less likely to be offered help and support in weight loss programmes in GP surgeries. Analysis of 1256 patients across 58 GP practices in 2004 found that only 26% of those attending weight loss programmes at local surgeries were men, despite the service being - in theory - equally available to both sexes. Evidence suggests that men who are offered support lose weight as effectively as women.

• Cancer: men are almost twice as likely as women to die from virtually all the cancers that affect both sexes, mostly because of preventable causes such as smoking, poor diet and alcohol use. This suggests that local and national cancer prevention programmes are less effective with men than women.

• Smoking: smoking is the single most important preventable cause of heart disease and causes virtually all cases of lung cancer. Historically, men have always been much more likely to smoke than women and although numbers of smokers have declined among both sexes - and more sharply among men - it is still the case that men are more likely to be smokers (28 % of men, 26 % of women). NHS smoking cessation programmes are much less likely to succeed in attracting male participants. In 2002, only 98,000 men took part in NHS programmes compared with 130,000 women (i.e. only 43% of participants were men).

• Use of Primary Care Services: men are much less likely to visit their GP than women. It is only in the elderly that the gap narrows significantly - and even then women see their GP measurably more frequently than men.

• Depression: although men and women suffer equally from depression, men are less likely to seek help, clinical diagnoses are skewed towards women and more men end up killing themselves, going missing and drinking heavily.

Visit www.menshealthforum.org.uk  for info on ageing and alcohol, bladders and brains, penises and prostates, stomachs and stress.

Fast, free independent health information from the Men's Health Forum is available now at www.malehealth.co.uk

Under an Act which comes into force on April 6, primary care trusts and other NHS and public bodies will be legally required to "promote equality of opportunity between men and women" when planning and delivering services. Visit www.mhfgenderduty.org.uk

The Men's Health Forum will be monitoring the performance of the NHS and will not hesitate to use the new legislation to ensure compliance.

 

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