1. The first thing Melissa mentioned to me was that young people are increasingly more foolhardy and perform risky, dangerous, or reckless behaviors. The more time that she spends in the ICU, the more she sees extreme injuries due to radical activities such as parkour, extreme sports, daredevil stunts etc. She mentioned that society these days seems to promote such activities as acceptable and even praiseworthy because the "you only live once" and "seize the day" disposition seems to be taking the young population by force. We see it everywhere in the media, such as commercials promoting stunts and thrill seekers performing seemingly impossible feats. This is dangerous because the more young people think they are invincible and all powerful with their bodies, the more they tend to injury themselves sometimes even permanently.
2. The second thing Melissa alluded to was that obesity seems to be grasping our nation in a death grip. About 70% of our adult population is overweight or obese and those numbers are increasing at an alarming rate. What's even worse is that the percentage of children who are obese are on the rise throughout the country including here in Utah. This puts an enormous strain on the healthcare system that financially burdens families, friends, and loved ones. Obesity is not only an issue solely due to excess fat but it also opens the gate to a flood of other health issues such as diabetes, heart failure, atherosclerosis, etc. Melissa mentioned that the hospital where she works at no longer is able to buy beds from a manufacturer that only guarantees to support 450 pounds because they're receiving patients who weigh much more than that. In fact, recently they had a patient come in who weighed 917 pounds!
3. The third trend Melissa sees in our community is an increasing number of underage drinking and drinking problems in general among adults. Drinking impairs judgement and this encourages reckless behavior as mentioned in the first topic. More and more teenagers are drinking at parties, social gatherings, etc. and are allowing their irresponsible natures get the better of them. Underage drinking causes accidents, injury, and even death to both parties involved, often involving one or more innocent bystanders. Melissa attested to the long lasting consequences that can occur due to one night of fun or pleasure such as guilt for having injured another, serving jail time, destroying lives etc.
4. Next, we talked about the problem of internet self-diagnostics. In other words, people are reading and believing too much of what is on the internet and trusting in qualified health professionals too little. Individuals who google a certain disorder often come into hospitals and clinics who think they know just as much as a nurse, physician, or specialist. Not only does this complicate matters when appropriate treatment must be initiated, but it also causes problems before the patient even comes to a health care professional at all. Because people trust the internet too much, they often delay seeing a provider to take care of a health concern because they think their symptoms are treatable at home, and often participate in residential remedies. Thus, their treatment and care is often procrastinated and causes challenges for a health care provider to cope with when they finally do arrive. Technology can often do more harm than good for patients.
5. The last tendency that Melissa talked about was that people in our society seem to be too busy for their own good. Often, in church talks and conferences, we hear the counsel to slow down, simplify our lives and enjoy life. But more and more these days we see individuals who are fast paced, driven, and motivated to do more, work harder, and perform faster. Melissa mentioned that even when stricken with an illness or disease, people do not allow themselves adequate time to recuperate, rest, and heal. They don't allow their bodies to heal naturally and instead depend too much on medications or procedures to fix their ailments. She recounted a story of a patient who had a surgery performed and the next day was playing frisbee with her co-workers at a work party. What people don't realize is that in our society, we are pushed to "go go go" too much and fill up our lives with work, appointments, activities, hobbies and not enough time for quiet time, rest, and relaxation.
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