From the very beginning of their lives, since they are children, little boys are educated to be "tough" and not to cry.
This kind of social training results in middle-aged men who ignore chest pains that can constitute the first sign of heart disease that is approaching.
"Our culture prizes stoicism and bravery among men, and educates men to be somewhat insensitive to their own physical pain," explains Jean Bonhomme, MD, president of the National Black Men’s Health Network.
And here we come to what eventually means: "Simply stated, men live more ill and die earlier than women," claims David Gremillion, MD, director of the Men’s Health Network.
However, congressional players and some health supporters are trying to get the government into the business of making men tuned in to wellness.
Such disparity hasn’t always been there. In 1920, for example, men and women’s life spans were only a year apart – even though women currently live approximately six years longer on average.
Moreover, men are three times less probable to have seen a healthcare provider in the previous year, even after factoring out women’s prenatal doctor’s visits.
What’s more, men also have a greter death rate than women for each of the nation’s ten major causes of death.
Prostate cancer, a disease that kills over 32,000 men annually, is the most commonly diagnosed cancer striking men- however a lot of men are not acquainted with it sufficiently to say it properly. Prostate cancer accounts for 37 per cent of all cancer cases, but gets only 5 per cent of research funding.
"Women have more cultural freedom to talk about things that hurt them," Bonhomme explains to WebMD. "Unfortunately, we do not have enough public information about male health problems like prostate cancer."
What’s Afoot on Capitol Hill
A very experienced lawmaker Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.) is a decorated fighter pilot who was shot down in enemy territory in the course of the Vietnam War. However, he tells WebMD that the greatest scare of his life was when he heard from his physician in 1998 that he developed prostate cancer.
Cunningham claims that his getting cancer was a part of the catalyst behind his introduction of legislation that would establish a new office in the United States health department to "coordinate and promote the status of men’s health."
Cunningham’s partner on the bill, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), MD, explains to WebMD, "Men usually deny that they suffer from anything, and they have this ‘he-man’ attitude which stops them from going for checkups and makes them not do the things that would improve their health statistics. We are trying to make people more aware of what could be done if they would allow people to know they had a serious problem."
The bill gained seventy six co-sponsors in the House, including both women and men, Democrats and Republicans.
The initiative is to follow in the footsteps of women’s health offices; there are at least six such bureaus scattered through the federal health bureaucracy.
So far, nobody has stepped up in the Senate with the bill, however the Cunningham legislation has been granted an approval of the Society for Women’s Health Research. "Our quest to improve medical care needs to include a sex-based approach to meet the unique treatment requirements of both men and women," claims the society’s president, Phyllis Greenberger.
But Who Picks Up the Check?
However, the National Women’s Health Network is not endorsing the bill, claims Amy Allina, the group’s program and policy director. At the same time, she claims, "We are convinced that there are health issues that are particular to men and we encourage health supporters who are interested in men’s health to work to get more attention for those issues."
That given, claims Allina, "We constantly think that it is absolutely necessary across the medical field to work in order to get more interest in women’s health. We are convinced that women’s health has been under-examined. Both clinical trials and the historical medical practice model have assumed male as normal and female as a small version of men."
However, Allina adds that "If we have a possibility to fund offices of men’s health without detracting from the work that is being done for women’s health, I’m all for it."
But money - or lack thereof - is perhaps the crucial problem in getting a new office going.
"There are evidently a lot of people keen on these issues, however nobody is willing to put any money up," explains McDermott. "And that is going to be our greatest challenge, getting anybody to be really serious about putting any money forward for this."
"This is something that could be done by the [U.S. health] secretary, just by means of reorganization," claims Tracie Snitker, spokesperson for the Men’s Health Network.
According to Cunningham, a men’s health office would not take anything from the pockets of the women’s offices.
"That’s not the intent, and I can assure you, that it will not be the ultimate outcome either," he claims. "I am just as dedicated to women’s health as I am men’s health. It’s just that men’s health information has been restricted and I would like to bring it up to parity."
Avoiding a Battle of the Sexes
Allina explains that politically, the bill’s supporters are on more solid ground this year. In the previous Congress, she informs, the legislation first appeared "from the perspective of stating that women are getting too much attention and men require more of it. Apparently though, we experienced several problems with that. I appreciate that they have altered their approach to recognize that they can support for men’s health without detracting from women’s health."
Some people are of the opinion that the American health department is already one gigantic office of men’s health, however, Bonhomme claims that "The government in fact spends more on gender-specific programs for women than they do on gender-specific programs for men.
"The majority of men’s health problems have a negative influence on women and children as well," Bonhomme says. "When men get ill and die prematurely, then families lose loved ones and income."
Cunningham is a member of the House’s health appropriations panel, therefore he is able to have special sway over some health study matters.
But he is careful about declaring that the men’s office bill is very probable to become law this year.
"Unluckily, things don’t move quickly around here," he explains to WebMD. "You learn that if you are willing to run through a brick wall the very first day, you are obviously going to come out with a lot of scratches, and you’re going to look down the road and you have got many walls to run through, so you’d better pace yourself."
Running Your Own Office of Men’s Health
Indeed, Washington very rarely astonishes us with fast action, so as the politics swirl, what are some do-it-yourself steps for remaining healthy as a man?
For starters, claims Bonhomme, never overlook pain.
"As men, we have been taught to ignore pain," he states. "Sometimes it may be good, but the same tolerance for pain that can help you win on the football field or the battlefield does not help you out when you are coping with the healthcare field."
McDermott believes that "Ordinary folks ought to have a physical once a year and have their blood and urine examined, and a chest X-ray, so that they have a latest baseline for the time when something takes place. If someone comes in to the physician with a major catastrophe and they haven’t seen a healthcare provider for about twenty years, it is extremely difficult for the physician to figure out what happened."
And do not forget clean living. A July research that was published in the Archives of Internal Medicine proved that male, vegetarian Seventh-Day Adventists in California lived about ten years longer than other Californians. Even non-vegetarian male members of the religion, that emphasizes exercise and avoidance of alcohol and tobacco, lived approximately more than 7 years longer than other citizens of California.
And in the end, there’s always marriage, for you single men. Research has indicated that being married is healthful for men, as wives may prompt their husbands to take better care of their health and to visit the healthcare provider more regularly.
