As the saying goes, family is a priceless treasure. Therefore, every family member needs to know how to maintain good and proper family health. Thus, the family will be protected from the threat of various types of diseases.
Maintaining family health is not as easy as one might think. Differences in age, daily activities, gender, and even the health condition of each family member can be a challenge in maintaining optimal family health.
When health is neglected, the risk of various diseases, ranging from flu, diarrhea, COVID-19, even to long-term diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease, can lurk for you and your beloved family members.
How to Maintain Family Health
In order to maintain health together, there are several ways that you and your family members can apply in your daily lives, including:
- Exercise regularly
Ideally, everyone should exercise for 30 minutes a day or 150 minutes a week. But sometimes, setting aside time to exercise every day is difficult. Especially when each family member has different daily routines and free time.
If this is the case for your family, you can try scheduling your exercise routine on the weekends. After that, choose a type of exercise that is easy to do together, such as jogging, cycling, or a leisurely walk.
Not only will it keep you and your family fit, but it can also serve as a way to strengthen and maintain a warm and harmonious relationship.
- Get enough rest
Adequate sleep provides a myriad of health benefits, from refreshing the mind and body to return to activities, improving memory, to maintaining heart health.
Conversely, lack of sleep due to staying up late can increase the risk of various health problems, ranging from weight gain, memory loss, to long-term diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease.
Therefore, to avoid the risk of these health problems, each family member needs to fulfill the sleep or rest time according to their respective needs, which is 7-9 hours for adults and 10-13 hours for children.
- Maintain body hygiene
Maintaining good body hygiene is one of the most effective ways to protect yourself and your loved ones from various diseases, such as diarrhea, scabies, and trachoma.
Some things that can be done to maintain body hygiene are regular bathing and shampooing, brushing teeth twice a day, cutting nails, changing clothes after outdoor activities, and washing hands properly, especially before eating and after using the toilet.
You should encourage your child to do these activities from an early age so that he gets used to them later. Also emphasize to him that the benefits of maintaining body hygiene are not only felt by yourself, but also by the people you love.
- Keep the surrounding environment clean
Neighborhoods, especially homes, that are rarely cleaned can become a breeding ground for germs and pests, such as cockroaches and mice. This can make you and your family more susceptible to illness.
To prevent this from happening, take a few minutes every day to clean the house, such as wiping furniture, sweeping and mopping the floor, and cleaning the kitchen area.
Also, dispose of unnecessary equipment or objects that could potentially become a place for dust and germs to accumulate. If necessary, also use a humidifier or air conditioner so that mold does not breed easily.
- Eat healthy, nutritious food
Some studies show that people who cook their own food can get a better nutritional intake than people who often buy fast food.
This is because when you cook your own food at home, you can determine the ingredients, types of nutrients, and how to cook them according to the needs of each family member.
However, this does not mean that you and your family should not consume ready-to-eat food at all. It’s just that you need to pay attention to the nutritional content in the ready-to-eat or packaged food you are going to eat.
For example, if you and your family want to eat instant noodles, try to choose instant noodle products that do not use artificial colors and are made from natural ingredients, such as broccoli, and do not use flavor enhancers.
Those are some things that can be done to maintain family health. Although it seems easy, it takes a high commitment to carry out various ways to maintain family health consistently in everyday life in order to get the benefits in the long run.
However, if you or your family members experience certain complaints, such as fever, abdominal pain, dizziness, or other health problems, despite having implemented the various ways to maintain family health above, do not hesitate to see a doctor for appropriate treatment.
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