Referring to the interviewed family, the family had a simple structure. The man was the family's breadwinner, with the wife and the child under the man's leadership as the wife assist in other family chores. It was also noted that the family is Christian based falling under the middle-class social group. However, it is also essential to consider the family's social determinants of health, impacting the family's health outcome. Therefore, this paper will describe the social determinants of health affecting this family's health status and recommend an age-appropriate screening for each family member based on the information gathered through family assessments.
Social determinants of health are essential aspect for any family settings since it is an environmental condition in which people are born, learn, live, worship, and play, affecting their health, functionality, life outcome qualities, and health risks. One of the social determinants of health that impacts this family's health outcome is access to economic and income opportunities. In this family, it was noted that the father is the breadwinner, falling in the middle-class social group. However, the wife is not employed. That means that the father provides all financial support for the family to help them meet their health needs. A family's income is an essential factor in a family's health outcome. It determines that family's health across several physical and physiological status. Besides, a stable income improves the family's connection and shapes overall living conditions, affects physiological functioning, and influences health-related behavior for any family. In that aspect, the breadwinner father falling in the middle-class social group manages to help the family improve their health outcomes by providing better foods and resources needed to access better health.
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Furthermore, it was noted that the family is affected by a lack of a properly balanced diet, and this has affected their young child's eyesight. That explains their focus on having more fruits and embracing proper healthy lifestyles to improve the child's health and prevent similar occurrences in the future. For instance, the family understands the nutritional benefit of fruits and makes it part of their diet. According to Fernández-Verdejo et al. (2020), fruits are an essential element in meals since they provide necessary vitamins to the family. Therefore, the family's consideration of fruits in their meals means that they are interested in having a healthy lifestyle.
Health screening is an essential factor for any family member. However, the screening tests may vary based on the age of each family member. This family comprises three people, two young parents (father and mother) and their four-year-old child. For the two young parents' screening, a cholesterol check needs to be completed in their twenties. Once both parents turn 35 years, the family physician should be doing a cholesterol check yearly. If they have risk factors, the screening should be done annually. However, if they are found normal, then the screening will be done after every five years. Besides, there should be a full-body skin screening to examine any suspicious moles or skin lesions for both parents. Specifically for the mother, the physician should assess for any breast lumps and pelvic screening. Breast lumps may be brought by infections, injuries, non-cancerous growth, or cancer.
Additionally, the family physician should also conduct a pap smear every three years. That would help in detecting cancer in the woman's cervix ( Ashtarian et al., 2017 ). On the other hand, the physician should perform a testicular examination of the man in the family. That would help detect any changes in the man's testicles to know if there is an upcoming common benign condition or testicular cancer. For the child, the physician should conduct regular blood pressure screening. The family child also requires vision and hearing screening regularly. That is because the 4-year child had been identified with vision impairment. Although it was a treated condition, more screening should be carried out.
It is essential to use the collective action model to create a plan of action for this family. The model takes account of the relationship that exists between an individual and the environment. It is based on the view that factors that operate out of control of an individual are responsible for their health outcome (Flood et al., 2015) . This model is essential for this family since it considers the determinants of health. The model will emphasize this family's health determinants responsible for their family's health outcomes, such as diet and income. Furthermore, the model is based on authentic needs. Therefore, this family's exact health needs, such as the child's vision problem, will be given priority.
While using a collective action model to improve this family's health outcomes, the first step will be to open communication with the family. The physicians will encourage the patient's participation in the health improvement process while maintaining privacy rights for the family child and respect the child's ability to make the decision appropriately. Furthermore, the physician will also agree with the family members on the project improvement and sharing of information. The next step will be recognizing familial importance, collaboration and organization of the family, enabling family members to support treatment, and then finally, the physician will encourage cultural literacy.
In a nutshell, social determinants of health, such as family income and diet, are the significant factors that impact this family's health outcome. For that matter, the family requires age-appropriate screening for each family member based on their different health risks due to gender and age differences. Besides, the family also needs a collective action model to be employed to promote their health outcomes.
References
Ashtarian, H., Mirzabeigi, E., Mahmoodi, E., & Khezeli, M. (2017). Knowledge about cervical cancer and pap smear and the factors influencing the pap test screening among women. International journal of community based nursing and midwifery , 5 (2), 188.
Fernández-Verdejo, R., Moya-Osorio, J. L., Fuentes-López, E., & Galgani, J. E. (2020). Metabolic health and its association with lifestyle habits according to nutritional status in Chile: A cross-sectional study from the National Health Survey 2016-2017. PloS one, 15(7), e0236451. Obtained from https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0236451
Flood, J., Minkler, M., Hennessey Lavery, S., Estrada, J., & Falbe, J. (2015). The Collective Impact Model and Its Potential for Health Promotion. Health Education & Behavior , 42 (5), 654-668. https://doi.org/10.1177/1090198115577372
