Men, be more proactive with your health

NAIROBI: A male patient of mine was recently diagnosed with diabetes and had come to me for some advice on proper diet.

As I started to discuss the changes he would need to make in his eating habits, the man kept muttering: “I wish my wife were here to listen to this. Her cooking is probably the cause of my sugar spikes”.

He was not the first to react in this manner.

So I ask: “Whose health is it?”. Sure, she is the one who prepares the food, but doesn’t the man have a say in what and how his food is cooked?

Life expectancy in Kenya stands at 63.1 years for females and 59.9 years for males. One of the major reasons for this is because the health-seeking behaviour of men is generally poor compared to women. So, by the time a man is diagnosed with an illness, it is often too late since the disease is in its final stages making recovery difficult.

Further, the role of family care, which is at the core of nutrition, is mostly placed on the woman. In the process, the woman gets to learn how to tackle some health issues because of the information and experience she has acquired.

In the meantime, the man is too busy and does not even have time to learn about his own health issues.

Ask a man anything about prostate cancer and he will not know what to say, despite the fact that it is the number one killer cancer in men. Or even about fibroids, breast or cervical cancer - top issues affecting their women, and their lips will be mum.

Tomorrow (Thursday) is International Men’s Day and this is a call to all men: You too have a role to play in ensuring your health statistics do not get worse.

Remember: ‘It’s your body, your health’.