DFW Oncology Navigators

Self-care month begins on June 24, 2024

Posted over 2 years ago

“Self-care is your fuel...Whatever the road ahead or the path you’ve taken, self-care is what keeps your motor running and your wheels turning.” ~ Melissa Steginus,

24th June marks the start of Self-Care Month, which ends on Self-Care Day on 24th July. This symbolic day was chosen because self-care can be practiced “24 hours a day/7 days a week”.

During the month, people around the world will be celebrating self-care and how it can make a difference to everyone’s lives. 

What is self-care? 

WHO defines self-care as individuals, families and communities’ promoting and maintaining their own health, preventing disease, and coping with illness and disability, with or without the support of a health worker. 

Why is self-care so important? 

Self-care is about empowering people to be active agents in their own healthcare. As well as being the right thing to do, with more and more pressure on health systems there is a great need. Those pressures include:

  • 4.3 billion people have inadequate access to essential facility-based health services 
  • An estimated global shortage of health workers to achieve and sustain Universal Health Care (UHC) is expected to grow to 18 million health workers by 2030
  • 1 in 5 of the world’s population now living in humanitarian crises, in which health systems are challenged to deliver essential services 
  • Pandemics, like Covid-19, armed conflicts and climate change have also disrupted and stretched health services worldwide 

Self-care and self-care interventions are the future of healthcare. They won’t replace health systems, but rather enhance them. 

- From the World Health Information. Get more information at  https://www.who.int/news-room/events/detail/2023/06/24/default-calendar/self-care-month and see our self-care post from last year at https://dfwnavigators.nursingnetwork.com/nursing-news/186898-self-care

Have a great self-care month and take time out for YOU!