Chronic illness is having a disease which often does not improve and is difficult to cure completely. ‘Approximately one in four British Columbians have been diagnosed with one or more chronic diseases’. According to Al Gore’s movie many new illnesses have been found and many more which we thought were forever gone have re-emerged.

Chronic illness can create difficulties in the physical and emotional well being of individuals, often making it difficult to manage all aspects of life. In most cases deterioration in health can be minimized by the individuals daily choices related to the management of their particular circumstances.

Some examples of chronic illness in alphabetical order:

Asthma
Auto-Immune Diseases
Cancer
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/ME/Yuppie Flu
Chronic Stress
Diabetes
Depression
Epilepsy
Endometriosis
Fibromyalgia
High blood pressure
HIV/AIDS
Heart attack and other heart related problems
Illnesses which could be related to environmental change – New and emerging diseases such as (MRSA – found in many hospitals, SARS etc)
Lupus
Migraine
Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
Recurring Malaria, Rickettsia, Bilharzia
Rheumatoid and osteoarthritis
Stroke
Tropical illnesses
Viruses such as Epstein Barr, Coxsackie