Why Your Annual Physical Should Be More Than a Checkup
Your annual health checkup is more than just a routine examination—it's an opportunity to understand changes in your body and learn how to take better care of yourself.
Some people avoid these checks because they fear the emotional burden that might come if something is found to be wrong.
Others schedule their appointments every year, complete all the tests, and once they receive their reports with no major issues, simply set them aside.
I've been getting annual checkups for nearly ten years.
Each year, after receiving my results, I'd glance at them briefly and then leave them untouched.
If doctors pointed out any abnormal readings or advised me to pay attention to certain aspects, but didn't explicitly say anything serious was wrong, I assumed everything was fine.
And so life went on as usual.
Recently, I came across a short video about health check indicators, highlighting four key metrics to watch:
- total cholesterol,
- triglycerides,
- low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol,
- fasting blood glucose.
That piqued my interest. I dug out last year’s report, located those specific numbers, and finally started reading them carefully.
The report clearly indicated: which indicators exceeded the standard values and what precautions needed to be taken.
Only then did I realize that we should pay attention to these indicators and study them, although I am not very good at learning these medical knowledge and find them extremely confusing like a mystery book.
We Learn How to Manage Money. But Who Teaches Us How to Understand Our Bodies?
Modern people are increasingly emphasizing "financial intelligence".
We learn how to earn money, save, invest, and how to check bank accounts, balance sheets, and investment returns.
Because we know:
If we don't understand our money, it's difficult to manage our wealth.
But we rarely receive the same systematic health education.
Every time I accompany my family members to the hospital for medical treatment, facing those professional terms, many times I even feel it's more difficult than learning a foreign language.
In fact, schools rarely teach us how to earn money and rarely systematically teach us how to manage wealth.
Later, we gradually realized that financial intelligence is an ability that requires active learning.
So, more and more people began to learn about investment, insurance, taxation, and personal finance management.
However, in terms of health, we seem not to have formed the same awareness.
Of course, we don't need to cultivate ourselves into doctors and can't master complete medical knowledge.
But as ordinary people, we at least should know some basic knowledge related to our own bodies and how to understand health information.
We were taught since childhood to wash hands frequently, eat less sugar, and pay attention to hygiene, but very few people systematically taught us:
- How to interpret a physical examination report?
- What do blood sugar, blood lipids, and blood pressure mean respectively?
- Which indicators are worth long-term tracking?
- Why is this year's normal not necessarily the same as next year's?
- Why should the physical examination items change as we age?
- What makes an abnormal number worthy of attention?
- What makes it unnecessary to be anxious about a number?
We seem to take it for granted:
As long as we go for a physical examination every year, we are already managing our health.
But in fact, physical examination and understanding one's own health are two different things.
A Physical Is Not the Same as Understanding Your Health
When reading the physical examination report, always start by focusing on the numbers marked in red.
- Normal - Relax.
- Abnormal - Nervous.
A single number exceeding the reference range does not necessarily indicate a disease;
a single number within the normal range does not mean everything is fine.
What is truly valuable is understanding:
What is this number? Why has it changed? What changes have occurred compared to the past?
More importantly, these numbers should be understood in conjunction with your age, family history, lifestyle, medication status, and other health information.
Many people tend to have a misunderstanding that the more inspection items there are, the safer it will be.
As a result, they purchased a very expensive package for a series of tests that might not be very useful, while neglecting the truly important aspects.
The value of a single test depends on the specific context.
In fact, for different age groups and different health conditions, the key points to focus on are not exactly the same.
When you are young, some tests may not be the focus;
as you age, certain risks gradually increase, and accordingly, screening and monitoring should also be adjusted.
Therefore, a good health management approach should not be:
To mechanically repeat exactly the same tests every year.
Instead, it should be:
Gradually adjust the items you truly need to focus on as your age, physical condition, and risk factors change.
This is why, compared to "how many tests were done", the more important question is:
What do these tests mean to me?
Your Health Checkup Should Evolve With You
The human body is constantly changing.
At the age of 20, 40, and 60, the problems faced by the body are not the same.
Therefore, our health examinations should not always remain in the same template.
When young, we may pay more attention to basic health conditions, such as metabolic issues, infection prevention, etc.
After entering middle age, the risk of some chronic diseases begins to gradually increase, and the importance of indicators such as blood pressure, blood sugar, blood lipids, and weight will also change.
Later on, bone health, cardiovascular risks, cancer screening, and other age-related issues may require more attention.
This does not mean:
The older you are, the more examinations you should have.
Rather, it is:
The older one gets, the more one should know which examinations are more meaningful for oneself.
What I Discovered When I Finally Read My Own Report
I gradually came to realize that when receiving the health examination report, one should take it seriously and not ignore it.
One should not panic just because of a single abnormal figure.
For example，my lipid panel.
A single number alone may not tell you the whole story, but if you keep track of it over several years, you can observe the trend of your own changes.
Which indicators have remained stable,
Which are slowly increasing.
Are there any issues that were not particularly significant in the past few years but have started to change recently.
These changes themselves are information worth discussing with your doctor.
| Year | Blood Pressure | Fasting Glucose | LDL-C | HDL-C | Triglycerides | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| 2025 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| 2026 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
The physical examination report is actually a long-term health record of your own.
And if you keep and compare the reports over many years, you will have the opportunity to see your own change trajectory.
Only after the physical examination report is understood can it truly begin to have value.
Perhaps we need to establish our own "health education system".
Our body is our most fundamental asset. Without health, even the most abundant wealth may lose its meaning.
We spend years in school learning mathematics, history, science, languages, and many other subjects.
We learn basic hygiene.
We are told to eat properly and exercise.
But very few of us receive a practical education in how to understand our own health information .
We are rarely taught:
- how to read a basic blood test;
- which health numbers are worth tracking;
- how screening recommendations change with age;
- how to compare annual physicals;
- how to distinguish screening from diagnosis;
- how to prepare questions for a doctor;
- or how to think about health information without either ignoring it or becoming unnecessarily anxious.
When it comes to our own bodies, we often remain at the stage of:
"Just go to the hospital whenever you feel unwell."
But health isn't a subject that becomes relevant only when we get sick.
It is relevant every single day.
Mobile phones are not enemies. I increasingly realize the immediacy of the information they provide.
We often hear such advice:
Use your phone less, watch fewer short videos, and read less information.
Because unconsciously swiping the screen can indeed easily consume a lot of time and may expose us to too much information, even increasing anxiety.
But I think the key issue lies in whether we have the ability to filter information and whether we are clear about what we really need.
Because have you noticed?
Sometimes, valuable information can also reach us very quickly.
- If you want to learn English, now there are much more learning resources than in the past;
- If you want to understand technological development, the latest information can appear before us very quickly;
- If you want to obtain information in the field of investment, relevant content will also be constantly pushed to us.
The phone is not an enemy. Learn to be its companion and let it serve you to the greatest extent possible.
In the past, we might need to actively seek a book, a newspaper, or a professional channel; now, a large amount of information has come to us on its own.
This can be either an interference or a huge convenience.
The difference lies in:
Do you have the ability to judge what is worth watching and what you really need?
A valuable piece of information can also be a very good reminder.
A short video made me reopen my health check report.
It didn't make a judgment for me.
But it made me start to ask questions.
I think this might be a better way for us to obtain health information from the Internet:
Not letting the Internet make decisions for us, but letting it help us ask better questions.
Ultimately, the judgment related to personal health should still be discussed with qualified medical professionals.
Health literacy ultimately aims to enable individuals to make choices that suit them.
The purpose of health literacy is not to make us know all the health knowledge, but to enable us to have a sufficient understanding of our own bodies, thereby allowing us to make more appropriate choices for ourselves.
We don't need to become doctors, nor do we need to memorize all medical knowledge.
What we really need to do is to gradually understand the state of our bodies, where they are healthy, where more attention is needed, what changes are occurring, and what changes have happened to our bodies as we age.
Only by understanding ourselves can we be more likely to know what we need.
- Why do some people feel good after taking a certain supplement, while others do not show significant changes?
- Why do some people suit high-intensity exercise, while others are better suited to gradual and mild exercise?
- Why does the same diet approach produce different results for different people?
Because everyone's body is not exactly the same.
Therefore, health management should not merely be constantly seeking "the best food", "the best exercise", or "the best supplement", and then following what others do.
What is more important is to first ask ourselves:
Is this suitable for my body?
- The physical examination gives us a set of data about our bodies;
- health literacy helps us gradually learn to understand these data and connect them with our own lives.
As we become increasingly familiar with our bodies, we will start to know when to persist, when to adjust, and when to seek professional help.
Not blindly pursuing health, but understanding our bodies better.
This might be the true meaning of health literacy:
Understanding ourselves, paying attention to changes, making choices that suit us, and taking care of our bodies as early as possible.
After all, we only have this one body.
Rather than starting to learn how to take care of it after it has problems, it is better to start now and spend some time getting to know it.