Your Health Strategy For 2018

Time To Organize

Start the new year by dedicating some time to record a health history for you and your family members. This will consist of major injuries, surgeries, and disease. Also include needed medical history from relatives. This is helpful with hereditary conditions. A thorough history can help your medical provider when treating you. Once this is started, updating is easy with current information.

Also, the new year is a perfect time to clean out and restock the medicine cabinet. Safely dispose of expired medication, both over-the-counter and prescriptions. Make sure all basic supplies are stocked for minor injuries and illness. This could include age appropriate restocking with growing children. And also consider your storage of medication by exploring kid safe options.

Checkups and Programs

The holiday season from October to December might have brought an unwanted weight gain. Start the new year with a focus on nutrition. Setting up a program to follow for the year can keep you on track. A program can be as extensive as meal planning or as simple as eliminating a few things from your diet, such as soda or fast food. Along with nutrition, add an exercise program for 2018. Fitness is nothing new, but setting a program will help to organize and achieve your goals.

Valuable checkups are also needed each year for optimal health. Schedule your appointments. You will want to add having your vitals checked and blood tested to such things as annual vision and dental checkups. Hormone regulation and blood pressure are important in maintaining overall health.

Write It Down

Besides recording a permanent medical history, adding a daily or weekly health journal will not only help your health providers, but help you understand yourself. For instance, when you journal your food consumption along with headaches, you may discover a sensitivity to a certain food or additive. Record sleep, all you consume, your activity, and how you feel physically.

Accountability is also included when you write it down. If 2018 is the year you focus on improving your health, recording what you ate and how you exercised is extremely helpful when it comes to losing weight or improving your health. Do you want to lower your blood pressure? Or is this the year to quit smoking? Whether you use an app, write on paper or your computer, accountability has been proven to help achieve goals.

Here’s to a healthy 2018!