Men’s health slips off the radar, says health expert

New Zealand men play Russian roulette with their health, says a leading lecturer in men’s health issues.

“New Zealand men tend to ignore their health issues in the hope any problems will go away,” says Dr Stephen Neville of the College of Nurses Aotearoa (NZ).

Age Concern New Zealand is leading celebrations of International Men’s Health Week this week in partnership with the college. The key message for men this week is:

Keep connected: with your community, your friends and family, and with your healthcare professionals.

“Men can delay treatment for fear of what they might learn, or have to go through when, in many cases, getting advice early will not only deal with the problem easily and painlessly, it will also stop all the worry and prevent simple health issues becoming bigger problems.”

Dr Neville said nearly a quarter of New Zealand men smoke, 27% have potentially hazardous drinking patterns and around 20% of men are obese.

Men over 45 also have a high risk of bowel, skin and prostate cancer, sexual dysfunction and psycho/social ailments.

“Men need to have an annual health warrant of fitness. They could live healthier, happier and longer lives if they did.”

More also needs to be done at Government level to promote the importance of men’s health, Dr Neville said.

“A lot of emphasis has been placed on improving women’s health in the last 20 years, but men’s health has slipped off the radar”.

“There is no political advocacy for improving men’s health, there are still exceptionally few health providers catering specifically for men, and men’s health doesn’t always feature on the curriculum for nurses’ education and professional development.

“As nurses are the largest group of health professionals, and usually the first point of contact in the primary health sector, it is essential that they are better educated to deal with, and have more awareness of, men’s health issues.”

Dr Neville is a doctor of nursing and a lecturer in men’s and older person’s health at Massey University’s School of Health Sciences. He is also a board member of the College of Nurses.

ENDS

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