The Nonchalant Health-Seeking Behavior of Nigerian Parent For Themselves

A lot of African parents do not like going to the hospital, maybe I shouldn't use the word African rather Nigerian would be appropriate. They prefer to stay at home, and form hard to break until they get broken for the illness. When you are able to take them to the hospital, the next thing they tell the doctor is they are fine.

These people are always fine even when it looks like they are far from fine. The only reason why these parents go to the hospital is when they have some serious ailment. They will tell you they are fine and do not need checkup. Sometimes, you would want to agree with them that finance can be a force hindering them from going to the hospital but in the long run you would realize that they intentionally do not want to go for regular checkups even for those who are able to afford it.

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Majority of our parents come down with body pain and they come up with excuses that a body that works will feel pain once in a while and they attribute it to stress after which they will come up with story of how they get better when they take one thing or the other. My grandma complains about all type of pains, from waist pain, joint, headache, back pain and so on but they still say it is normal and that itself is surprising.

Simple vitals on these grandparents of ours will show that they have increased blood pressure among other things and with more checkups, and tests doctors can begin to diagnose other conditions such as autoimmune diseases. In the case of blood pressure, simple lifestyle attitudes like salt reduction can go a long way.

A lot of Nigerian parents and grandparents do not know that their lifestyle actions affect their health in return. They take stress for exercise and when they come back to the house, they immediately go for alcohol which contributes to blood pressure in the case of high blood pressure. One thing that majority of our parents lack is rest. The inability to rest often contributes to the problem on ground.

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A man was telling me that he was fine enough and didn't need to visit the hospital but from what I was seeing, he needed a 101 tests and checkups because he looked damaged even from his physical appearance. When you ask people to come for checkups more often, they often don't and while some people are nonchalant, the system of paying for medical fees is also worrisome as people have to pay out of pocket.

It is disturbing how a lot of Nigerian parents do not take their lives very serious but are willing to go to the hospital at the slightest sign of ailment in their children only unless they have financial issues. As we celebrate mother's day, and just as we conclude the women month, it is important to state that we check ourselves just as we check on other people like our children.

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^{For Further Reading}

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^{https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7114808/}

^{https://journals.lww.com/njom/fulltext/2021/30050}