Families and Health - Paperback

by Janet R. Grochowski (Author)

This interdisciplinary text examines five different components of family health--biology, behavior, social-cultural circumstances, the environment, and health care--and the ways they affect the abilities of family members to perform well in their homes, workplaces, and communities. Special awareness is paid to health disparities among individuals, families, groups, regions, and nations. The author discusses how health of individual families influences our local, national, and global communities. Families and Health argues that family health is not a privilege for the few, but a personal, national, and global right and responsibility.

Back Jacket

Family health and well-being is vital to the national interest of any society; it is fundamental to its citizens being able to perform well in their homes, workplaces, and communities." Families and Health" offers a unique approach to the subject that builds on an interdisciplinary paradigm, the Family Health Determinant Model. In separate chapters, the author explores each of five major components of family health: biology and genetics, behavior patterns, social-cultural circumstances, environmental exposures, and the health care system. Each chapter contains several case studies, to add the lived experiences of real families to the discussion. Janet R. Grochowski is the Endowed Professor of Education and Department Chair at the College of St. Benedict-St. John's University, Professor Emerita of Health Studies at the University of St. Thomas, and former Chair of Health and Human Development and Director of Family Studies at University of St. Thomas. Her professional interest in family health springs from a long career devoted to interdisciplinary study of complex communities, such as families, and the interactive impacts of complex health determinants on individuals and their families. She has taught numerous courses on health and well-being from a variety of perspectives--personal, family, consumer, environmental, national, and global-and is the co-author (with Meg Wilkes Karraker) of "Families with Futures: A Survey of Family Studies for the Twenty-First Century" (Routledge).

Author Biography

Janet Grochowski is the Marie and Robert Jackson Professor of Education at Saint Benedict College & St. John′s University in Minnesota.