Chronic diseases refer to a kind of chronic non-communicable diseases, such as cancer, hypertension, diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, etc. With the improvement of living standard, people’s lifestyles have changed significantly, leading to maladjustment of thes human body. So, the chronic diseases are also called lifestyle diseases. The main acquired factors of chronic diseases include smoking, drinking, unhealthy diet and habits, lack of exercises. With the development of economy, living standard and the change of lifestyle, the morbidity of chronic diseases increases at an alarming rate. For example, in 1980, the morbidity of hypertension is 7.73% in china, while in 1999, the morbidity of hypertension is 16% among the 100,000 people surveyed in Shanghai Yanji community, and this number closed to that of the western countries, the rate has doubled in 20 years.
The survey shows that the morbidity of diabetes increases from 1.01% among 100,000 people in 1978 to 5% in 1999 in Shanghai, indicating that the rate has quintupled. Meanwhile, the chronic diseases can cause a variety of complications, such as angina pectoris, myocardial infarction, cerebral thrombosis, acute infection, atherosclerosis, pathological changes of kidney and retinal capillaries, etc. Chronic diseases have become the leading cause of endangering people’s health and lives. Through the investigation and researcher of the chronic diseases, some risk factors causing chronic disease has been found, such as heredity, lifestyle, environment, past medical history, occupation and so on. Continue to learn Diabetes in TCM.
