What does it mean to be healthy?

We can’t go anywhere without hearing or seeing messages telling us to be healthier. Social media is flooded with fitness and diet influencers. And magazines fill check-out counters with covers screaming at to lose weight, eat healthier, exercise, sit less and get more sleep. Every week it seems a new life-enhancing diet comes out. Even celebrities are pitching their brand of healthy, regardless of whether it works or not. But what does it mean to be healthy? And how do you know if you’ve achieved it?

What is health?

The most common definition of health is simply the absence of disease. This seems to make sense at first; if you’re sick, then of course you can’t be healthy, or can you? But with 60% of adults having at least one chronic disease, that would mean a small number of people who are truly healthy. Yet many of people with a disease would argue they feel healthy.

This happens often in patients who’ve completed cardiac rehabilitation. These programs treat people who’ve had a heart attack. They combine exercise, nutrition and stress counselling along with medical management of risk factors. Many people leave these programs feeling better. They’re fitness is higher, they’re eating better, they lost weight and are managing their stress better. Often I’ll hear these patients say they’re in the best shape of their life. Couldn’t these people be considered healthy?

While the traditional definition of health is the one we’re most familiar with, it isn’t the only one. Back in 1948, the World Health Organization defined health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. Unfortunately, this definition is unclear as to whether one can have a disease and still be healthy. Many people have chronic diseases that don’t interfere with their physical, mental and social health. People with diabetes, asthma or osteoporosis continue living life to its fullest without their diseases interfering.

How Healthcare Defines Health

Health care professionals seem to follow an even different definition of health. Often doctors work to get their patients back to some sort of condition they deem is reasonable. When this vision of health matches what the patient has, it works quite well. But this isn’t always the case.

I’ve heard from numerous patients who’ve had discussions with their doctor about being told they’re doing fine when the patient asks when they can get back to their same way of life. This is often from people who are used to being active, travelling or have a large network of friends, but their disease or treatment has got in the way. It’s as if for some healthcare professionals, if you aren’t among the sickest of the sick, there shouldn’t be anything to worry about. If the person continues to press the doctor, they’re often made to feel like they’re wasting everyone’s time.

It’s possible the doctor is correct. Perhaps these patients won’t ever get back to same way of life as before. But we’ve all heard of stories of people, athletes or celebrities who are told they may never get back to having an active life again and managed to do what doctors said couldn’t be done. A recent example is Jeremy Renner’s accident in which he was told he would never run again. But just over a year later he was back running. This doesn’t mean the doctors were wrong to tell him that. And of course, Mr. Renner had the determination to get back to running. It’s just that doctors spend more time with sick people than healthy, so that’s what they know.

What does being healthy mean to you?

It’s quite possible that being healthy can mean different things to different people. And it may really matter more how you feel and how you wish to go about your life. For some people that may mean being able to walk around the block a few times or continue to live independently. For others who challenge their bodies and minds more rigorously, their expectations may be higher. By any objective performance measure, these two groups of people will likely differ, yet they may equally think they are healthy. And maybe that’s fine.

What does being healthy mean to you? Let me know if the comments below.

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