High Rates of Arthritis among Female and Cardiovascular Disease among Men

GENDER, SEX, AND HEALTH
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Gender, Sex, and Health 1.    Introduction The prevalence of specific ailments in the United Kingdom relates to gender-based modalities where more women or men are affected by particular disease conditions than the other. Since each gender undertakes different jobs and duties within the employment sector, they become afflicted by diverse health concerns that differ according to their gender roles. The gender disparity in which some ailments affect more women or men than others has received much attention from the public in recent research to determine such causes (Swain et al., 2020). In various dimensions, distinct health disorders, either psychological or physical, have varied incidence rates among male and female groups in the UK. On the other hand, experts have developed some theoretical concepts to explain why such cases occur among various genders and seek to determine the causes of such health problems. The theories shed light on how the health issues remain linked to gender differences and how they arise among the general population. Thus, it is imperative to critically discuss two health issues that affect more men or women than the other gender and evaluate them through theoretical analysis. 2.    Discussion 2.1         Critical Analysis of First Health Topic 2.1.1        High Rates of Arthritis among the Female Gender Arthritis is among the most common long-term diseases, resulting in substantial physical damage to the body. It can impact several joints, exacerbating functional disability and participation limitations. The lack of a known cure has caused the global burden of arthritis to increase. Evidence indicates that it has been rising by an estimated 28% among people aged 60 and above in the UK (Abhishek et al., 2017). Moreover, knee osteoarthritis emerged as the 11^th leading cause of worldwide functional impairment and the 23^rd leading causal factor of disability-oriented late-life years in 2017 (Swain et al., 2020). Trends anticipate that this disease will become the 4^th major cause of disability-adjusted life years by 2020 because of the rising life expectancy and ageing population among the public and a considerable rise in functional body impairment from 2010 to 2019. The prevalence rate among the people in the UK is 0.5–1%, or 45 people per 100,000 people (Brennan-Olsen et al., 2017). However, the disease affects more women than men. In 2021, the total number of people diagnosed with osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis was 10,495,497, 6.8 people per 100,000 women (NHS, 2018). Among women, the rate was higher since they recorded a combined incidence of 7.9-8.3 persons per 100,000 with a ratio of 8:1, compared to males with 5.3–5.7 persons per 100,000 men (Swain et al., 2020). In terms of percentage, in 2018/2019, 49.1% of females compared to 33.6% of males aged 60–64 had arthritis, and 62.9% of females, as opposed to 41.5% of males aged 80 and above, had been diagnosed with arthritis (See Figure 1.1). The rate in females was much hig...