Goals of the Sendai Cluster
Wellbeing for the Whole Person
The goal of the overall Greater Sendai Region is "In order to create a society where all citizens can live happy, healthy, and vigorous lives, we will reduce the number of deaths in late middle age and persons who require care, extend their healthy lifespan, and create a regional community to improve their quality of life (QoL) as it relates to health." Or, to state these goals in a way that is easier to understand, we will move "from a narrow definition of healthcare to a whole-person wellbeing." To achieve this wellbeing, it is important to improve resistance to the various factors that affect health. This includes the "prevention of lifestyle illnesses" as a physical factor and "creation of health for the mind" as a mental element.
Wellbeing and Life Stages
The prevention of lifestyle illnesses, or what in Japan is referred to as "metabolic syndrome," is being given a lot of attention lately. This also includes the prevention of cardiovascular and other diseases brought on by such things as lung cancer (caused by smoking) or high blood pressure and hyperlipidemia (caused by irregular and intemperate lifestyles). In other words, the illnesses related to lifestyle are not just metabolic syndrome, but include ones that can strike at any time, from school age to old age, in middle age or in pregnancy, and without regard to age or sex. Thus it is clear that there is a possibility of significant social and economic loss at all age levels. Therefore we can conclude that the creation of health for all life stages is important.
When we consider what health creation is needed for these life stages, it is important to not just deal with them simply in the different aspects of physical or mental, but to see them as a collection of issues that overlap in complex ways and require an overall solution. Creating a healthy mind is all about dealing with the increasing severity of the various stressors of modern life: the recent changes in the environment in employment, in education, and in the household. The suicide rate, which is still as high as ever, and the great loss not only to the suicide victim but to their families and friends can be offered as a background to this. However, since it is difficult to completely remove all stress in an actual society, realistically what we need is "a way to control unavoidable stress."