Contents:
- Medical Video: Knowing your Medical History
- Knowing your family's health history can predict your health
- Diseases that are usually inherited in the family
- Where can I get family health history information?
- What information should I get to find out a family health history?
Medical Video: Knowing your Medical History
When you consult a doctor for a particular complaint or disease, one of the first things a doctor asks is your medical record and family health history. Unfortunately, many people don't know what their own family history looks like. Even though it is important to know the health pedigree and hereditary diseases in your family. Why is that important, and how do you know it? See the following explanation.
Knowing your family's health history can predict your health
Family health pedigree is related to your health. Because, there are several diseases that can be passed down from ancestors to posterity.Unlike influenza or dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF), genetic diseases are not solely caused by bacterial or viral infections from the outside. The reason is damage to the genes in the body due to free radicals and chemicals which then change your genetic code. The manifestation of genetic damage to posterity can be either congenital physical defects or hereditary diseases.
The genes in your body are formed from a combination of father's genes and maternal genes. Later, the dominant genes will determine your physical and psychological condition. Suppose your father likes to smoke since you were not born. Toxins and chemicals from cigarettes cause damage to father's genes. This damage eventually triggers lung cancer.
The father's damaged gene will be carried away by sperm cells. If this gene is strong enough and dominant, this gene will survive in the fetus which is formed by fertilizing sperm cells and egg cells. So when you are born, you have inherited lung cancer talent from your father's gene. Damaged genes will continue to be passed down through the family tree.
The risk of lung cancer increases if you live a lifestyle that can trigger this disease. Suppose you are exposed to cigarette smoke from your father since childhood or you smoke yourself. So, by knowing your family history in detail, this can help doctors diagnose your health condition, if you are experiencing a particular health disorder.
After all, even if you don't have certain health problems, by knowing your family's health history, you will be more vigilant and pay attention to your health condition.
Diseases that are usually inherited in the family
Some diseases are known to be caused by genetic factors. Diseases that may be caused by congenital genetic factors are:
- Cancer
- Diabetes
- Asthma
- Heart and blood vessel disease
- Alzheimer's and dementia
- Arthritis
- Depression
- High blood pressure
Where can I get family health history information?
It's not easy to know the health history of all family members, especially if you have a very large family. You can get all this information from family members who have blood relations with you.
Here are some questions that you can ask your family members:
- Are there family members who have died from chronic diseases? What illness did he suffer and at what age did he get sick?
- Are there health problems that have been passed down for generations?
- Is there a history of miscarriage or birth defects in the family?
- Are there certain allergies in the family?
You can start asking and gathering information from core family members, such as father, mother, and siblings. If you still have grandparents, this is even better because you can get more information from both.
What information should I get to find out a family health history?
Maybe at first, you think it's quite difficult to gather information like this. But, actually you don't need to dig all the information from your family. not necessarily, they also remember the information you need. So, focus on important things like:
- The main health problems experienced. You don't need to ask all the diseases that have attacked your family one by one. Focus on the main disease which is usually a chronic disease that your family is experiencing. Ask him what type of illness and severity he experienced at that time.
- Cause of death. You must find out what caused the death of some of your previous family members. Remember, if the cause is a chronic disease. This might be a genetic disease and cause you to experience it.
- Age at disease. Not only the type and severity of an illness, but you also need to know at what age your family has the chronic disease.
- Ethnicity. You have to know what your family's ethnicity is, because ethnicity is a risk factor for certain health problems.
