An estimated 84.3 percent of American adults had contact with a healthcare professional (Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2018). People should visit healthcare professionals to get periodic health examinations for the eyes, ears, teeth, and heart, and screenings for conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, and types of cancer. Adults should consider having regular screenings and tests to prevent and reduce illness and disability.
Women should visit obstetricians and gynecologists to receive women’s health treatment or long-term prevention of health conditions. Women who need an obstetrician can seek a board-certified, skilled physician at Advanced Obstetrics and Gynecology, LLC, in New Jersey.
Having medical coverage can help people afford medical treatment and preventive care. People who don’t get employer-backed coverage or experience other circumstances have a convenient solution to getting the coverage they need: temporary health insurance.
Short-term medical coverage allows people to maintain their current physician or consult any medical professional at any hospital or health facility. Having such a plan can be beneficial to anyone who experiences catastrophic illnesses or injuries.
To learn about short-term health insurance, people can consult Agile Health Insurance, the leading web resource on temporary health plans. Agile Health Insurance provides users with individual insurance quotes, helping them choose a health plan that best fits their needs.
Physical Exams And Immunizations
Women should have regular physical exams and have their height, weight, and body mass index (BMI) measured. Doctors recommend that women get annual flu shots, especially if they’re older than 65 or have risk factors that increase their susceptibility to the flu.
Other recommendations include the varicella vaccine for women who haven’t had the chickenpox, the tetanus-diphtheria immunization every ten years for women 19 years and older, and the HPV vaccine for women 26 years and younger.
Depression Screenings
Depression screenings are crucial, as the National Alliance on Mental Illness reports that one or more major depressive episodes occur in over 17 million American adults in a year. Compared to men, women have a 70 percent greater likelihood of experiencing depression.
Blood Pressure And Cholesterol Check-Ups
Hypertension, high blood pressure, can cause other health complications. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommends that women with high blood pressure get frequent hypertension and prediabetes and diabetes screenings.
The American Heart Association suggests for women 20 years and older to get baseline screenings for cholesterol and triglycerides every few years.
Cancer Screenings
Women in their twenties and thirties should begin visiting gynecologists for pelvic exams and pap smears. Pap smears reveal signs of cervical cancer by showing precancerous and cancerous cells on the cervix. In addition to pap smears, the USPSTF recommends testing for human papillomavirus (HPV) in women aged 30 and older, as HPV can cause genital warts and cervical cancer.
To prevent and combat breast cancer, women should seek mammography. Mammograms, x-rays of the breasts, help doctors find tumors and cancer. Annual breast exams allow health care providers to manually and visually check patients’ breasts to look for lumps, dimpling, and rashes, and any differences in size and shape.
As women age, they’ll need colon cancer screenings, which doctors do for adults ages 50 to 75, through stool tests or colonoscopies. Colonoscopies enable doctors to discover precancerous polyps or lesions.
Women should get cancer screenings for lung cancer, and visit dermatologists and other medical professionals for skin checks to detect skin cancer.
Tests for Sexually Transmitted Infections
Visits to the gynecologist may consist of pelvic exams and discussions about menstrual periods, sexual activity, and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Urine samples or swabs of the vagina, cervix, urethra, or rectum enable gynecologists to make diagnoses of STIs such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, and HPV. Women should be sure to contact their primary care physicians, medical professionals, and women’s health experts to receive consistent care as their medical needs change across the lifespan.
