Preventive Care Services in Jamestown, and Fargo, ND

Preventative care visits can be viewed like maintenance that is done to your car or your home, in the case of your health, you are looking to manage things before they spiral into less-than-ideal situations. Preventative care can include things like STD checks, physicals, and for some patient’s regular blood tests. Other things that can fall into preventative care for women is receiving annual OBGYN appointments for pap smears or mammograms. For men, preventative care includes things like having prostate exams done as well.

If you have a family history of conditions like myocardial infarctions (heart attacks), hypertension, or cancer, your preventative screenings may involve specific testing to look for indications of these conditions or any signs of them potentially forming. When it comes to preventative care it is equally important, if not more important, than seeking care after these conditions begin to develop, as having preventative care appointments increases the likelihood of catching the development early enough that you may only need medicine-based interventions. Whereas when left to long you may have to undergo invasive medical interventions like surgery to deal with them. Since most health care plans and insurance companies cover preventative health care appointments and the associated testing that can be done, patients can expect to not have to pay for these appointments making them that much more accessible and important to their overall well-being.

When it comes to preventative care visits there are no “set” tests patients should expect to undergo as these tests will be based on their current health, any conditions they have, or their family history of health-related conditions. There are common tests that your preventive health doctor will recommend, such as a measuring your height and weight, and depending on when the last preventative care appointment was, you may have a blood test done. You can also expect that at some point during your appointment the physician will go over your current diet, exercise, and lifestyle to see if there is anything that can be improved, or if there is anything you are doing that could potentially increase the risk of long-term health concerns. Preventative care visits are also extremely important for patients who are 65 years old or older, as this is when the risk of health conditions forming is at its highest, and undergoing regular preventative care check-ups and testing can mean catching their development early enough that they will not affect your quality of life long-term and increase the ability to enjoy your daily activities.

Yes, annual physicals are a part of preventative care, as the doctor will be going through your current health levels, examining reaction levels, and examining things like the gut health of patients as well. Annual physical exams improve the likelihood of catching the development of health conditions early, as they will be able to compare your current tests to the previous ones done, which can lead to an increased chance of health concerns like pre-diabetes or cancer being caught early.

The biggest benefit for patients when it comes to preventative care is the increased chance of catching health conditions or diseases in the early stages, which means a higher likelihood of these conditions or diseases being managed quickly or mitigated completely. This translates to a lower chance of conditions being life-threatening, less chance of leading to disabilities and reducing the overall risk of diseases forming. Since diseases that are caught earlier are a lot easier to manage and treat than diseases or conditions that have gone untreated for a long time as this gives the disease or condition more time to develop into a potentially dangerous situation.

Given the benefits of having preventative care appointments, it can be shocking for most to realize that most people in the United States are not undergoing these appointments, which can potentially be why there is such a high mortality rate for heart-related disease. For more information please contact us or see our business hours online. We serve patients from Jamestown ND, Valley City ND, Devils Lake ND, Fargo ND, West Fargo ND, Moorhead MN, Mapleton ND, Horace ND, and surrounding areas.