Evidence on why wellbeing matters

The Department of Health has published evidence on why wellbeing matters to health throughout someone’s life, and what policy makers can do about it.

The documents of published evidence can be downloaded below:

• Wellbeing and why it matters to health
• A summary of key points
• Starting well (pregnancy to 5 years)
• Developing well: 6 to 11 years
• Developing well: 11 to 19 years
• Living well
• Working well
• Aging well
• The relationship between wellbeing and health
• Health behaviours and wellbeing
• Wellbeing and longevity
• Staff wellbeing, service delivery and health outcomes
• What works to improve wellbeing?
• International comparisons - where does the UK stand?
• Evidence gaps and current/on-going research

The documents aim to give a flavour of some of the important issues and relationships between wellbeing and health throughout someone’s life.

For health professionals, understanding the different parts of personal wellbeing may offer insights into how their own work fits into a wider context and how what they do can influence wellbeing.

Important findings from the evidence include that wellbeing:

• Adds years to life and improves recovery from illness;
• Is associated with positive health behaviours in adults and children;
• Is associated with broader positive results;
• Influences the wellbeing and mental health of those close to us;
• Affects how staff and health care providers work with implications for decisions for patient care practises and services, and treatment decisions and costs
• affects decisions about local services; and
• May ultimately reduce the healthcare burden.

The evidence is largely from published, peer reviewed documents and each factsheet provides references for readers wishing to follow up the literature in more detail. The documents have all been peer reviewed by independent experts.