The article discusses addictive behavior as a global health crisis. It notes that while many people are engaged in addictive behaviors, such as gaming and gambling, they may not face any significant health consequences. Nonetheless, there is a small proportion of people who engage in addictive behaviors and end up developing disorders associated with functional impairment and/or distress. It is not surprising that this issue is a concern since video gaming and gambling are particularly prevalent with the internet making these activities more readily available. Those who engage in gaming and gambling are likely to spend a lot of time in such activities to the exclusion of other important daily activities. This compromises physical health, psychological health and social functioning (World Health Organization, 2023).
Two initiatives within the scope of nursing can help to mitigate the risk of addictive behavior. First, creating awareness of addictive behavior as a concern through identifying the problem, and exploring responses and resources to help address the problem. Creating awareness helps to motivate communities to come together for action. In addition, it can help in reaching high-risk groups like adolescent populations. Creating awareness helps in educating the audience about the topic that could be new to them and encouraging them to bring change. For instance, discussion forums can be held and adolescent populations engaged to improve their awareness of how gaming would affect them negatively thus motivating them to avoid addictive behaviors (Ervin & Kulbok, 2018). Second, involvement in policy development and advocating for changes in response. This can galvanize action away from only treatment and rehabilitation of addicts to prevention, thus shifting from expensive action (treatment) to cheaper action that can reach more people (prevention) (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2020).
Ervin, N. E., & Kulbok, P. A. (2018). Advanced Public and Community Health Nursing Practice: Population Assessment, Program Planning, and Evaluation (2nd ed.). Springer Publishing Company.
Stanhope, M., & Lancaster, J. (2020). Public Health Nursing: Population-Centered Health Care in the Community. Elsevier, Inc.
World Health Organization (2023). Addictive Behavior. https://www.who.int/health-topics/addictive-behaviour#tab=tab_1
">Visit the World Health Organization (WHO) website and locate an article that relates to research on the global health crisis. Include the link to the article and summarize the crisis the article discusses.
Article link: https://www.who.int/health-topics/addictive-behaviour#tab=tab_1
The article discusses addictive behavior as a global health crisis. It notes that while many people are engaged in addictive behaviors, such as gaming and gambling, they may not face any significant health consequences. Nonetheless, there is a small proportion of people who engage in addictive behaviors and end up developing disorders associated with functional impairment and/or distress. It is not surprising that this issue is a concern since video gaming and gambling are particularly prevalent with the internet making these activities more readily available. Those who engage in gaming and gambling are likely to spend a lot of time in such activities to the exclusion of other important daily activities. This compromises physical health, psychological health and social functioning (World Health Organization, 2023).
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