The Pleasure to Smile: A Review Article

Yulia Bogdanova Peeva^*
Associate Professor at the Department of Social Medicine and Public Health, Faculty of Public Health, Medical University, Plovdiv, Bulgaria.

Correspondence to: Yulia Bogdanova Peeva, Associate Professor at the Department of Social Medicine and Public Health, Faculty of Public Health, Medical University, Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
Received date: February 14, 2023; Accepted date: February 25, 2023; Published date: March 04, 2023
Citation: Peeva YB. The Pleasure to Smile: A Review Article. J Med Res Surg. 2023;4(1):8-11. doi: 10.52916/jmrs234098
Copyright: ©2023 Peeva YB. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

"Nine-tenths of our happiness depends on our health alone."
Arthur Schopenhauer

Abstract

Most people find happiness by making money, eating good food, or spending time with friends. Epicurean philosophy provides an explanation of what makes people happy and how to experience joy and pleasure in life. Gossipiboma is a rare complication that can occur due to human negligence. Gossipiboma’s form as a complication of inflammatory reaction to a surgical sponge or a laparotomy pad left mistakenly in the body of the patient after a surgical procedure. The term Gossipiboma is a combination of two words from two different languages; Gossypium a Latin word which mean cotton and boma a Kiswahili word which means plan of concealment. Their incidence is reported to be 1 in 1000 to 1500 surgery. We present here a case of a 67-year-old male who had a history of right-sided Percutaneous Nephrolithotomy (PCNL) five years back. No immediate post procedure complications occurred however the patient presented to the Outpatient Department (OPD) with left flank pain and his Computed Tomography (CT) scan was done which showed an organized Gossipiboma.Most people find happiness by making money, eating good food, or spending time with friends. Epicurean philosophy provides an explanation of what makes people happy and how to experience joy and pleasure in life. It focuses on the absence of pain as the path to happiness and advocates leading a simple lifestyle. There are people in the world who are happy just because they live and they live much longer without cancer, cardiovascular or other social important diseases. The material measurability of the timelessness in which we live does not exist, and the virtues have preserved them above all as human beings. They have the ability to enjoy the simple things in life, which in most cases are not financially commensurate. The connection between the beauty of the smile, positive health and longevity has been consciously sought. All aspects of the life of the Bulgarian population are outlined, which are positive and could lead them out of the black rankings for morbidity and mortality in Europe and the world. Questions are raised related to the health and activity of long-lived and centenarians and what in the modern way of life turn this trend into a negative one.

Keywords:

Epicurean philosophy, Pain, Cancer, Cardiovascular, Diseases

Introduction

Dalai Lama points to empathy as part of happiness: “If you want others to be happy, practice competition. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” These words can be added to the Hippocratic Oath that new doctors take on the day of their graduation. They give their pledge of empathy, compassion and justice in the name of health.
Specific educational objective-To summarize the role of the dentist in the socialization and well-being of the individual. Desirable, hypothetical, ideal educational objective-More people to smile to be long years in a good health.
According to the Bulgarian interpretive dictionary, "Happiness is a state, a feeling of mental satisfaction, complete satisfaction with success, luck in life, honour, goodness, well-being”. The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche defined true happiness as “inseparable from instincts, as long as life is on the rise. When happy, a person often laughs.”
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness' are considered inalienable rights in the US Declaration of Independence. According to a number of studies, happiness is a product of positive evaluations of life situations and favourable comparisons with those of others and in the past. An individual's various personality characteristics and the resources under his control, such as gender, age, and income, influence happiness primarily through their impact on the two psychological processes of evaluation and comparison [1,2].
While Thomas Jefferson spoke of the right to pursue your happiness, Sarkozy spoke of politics to ensure that happiness. Those who wrote the oldest still-current constitution in the world spoke of the right or freedom to happiness (as a possibility), while modern politicians speak of happiness itself (as an outcome)–some refer to the personal pursuit of happiness, while others speak for the happiness of society. All these contradictions are rooted in the understanding of freedom-whether a person pursues his personal happiness or sacrifices himself for the good of society [3].

Historical, Philosophical, and Ethical Doctrines of the Relationship between Happiness, Quality of Life and Health

Born into a wealthy royal family, Buddha grew up in luxury. His father tries to protect him from the ugliness of life, but one day he goes beyond the castle walls and encounters three aspects of life: the old, the sick, and the dead. Each of these experiences worries him too much, and he begins to feel the meaning and transience of life and its pleasures.
At that time he met an ascetic who had renounced the pleasures of life. Even then his eyes shone with satisfaction. These shocking experiences lead the Buddha to abandon peace and luxurious search for greater meaning. At a time when extreme forms of self-denial were practiced, the Buddha discovered the "Middle Way" of moderation, an idea very similar to Aristotle's "Golden Mean."
Confucius, focuses on social relationships and the greatest virtue "humanity" and how to realize it in our lives. Confucius detested the "right peasant" who invariably did the right thing. The problem is that the proper peasant does it for the sake of social approval, not for self-improvement. Instead of "rejoicing in virtue," the "proper peasant" steals virtue and uses it as a cloak. Confucius is perhaps the earliest figure to argue that we have the power to transform ourselves. For Confucius, it doesn't matter who your parents are. If we do not cultivate our humanity, we are not worthy of the title "Noble Man" according to him.
The concept of "quality of life" in the philosophical theories of happiness and their reflection in the field of medicine and public health are sought and defined. And how does happiness relate to medicine and the individual, subjective sense of well being? The answer is, through health! Medicine as a system of scientific disciplines that aim to overcome difficulties on a personal, but also social level, related to the disease is called to find contemporary trends that reflect the positive aspects of health. And in health care - as an organizational system for the application of medical knowledge, at some point in the life of each person, these questions become existential. From this point of view, every information and knowledge that the individual acquires is important and significant for him, because they form and develop his health culture. Moreover, they are also significant for social groups, categories and communities, for the whole society.

Ben Bernanke's concept of "Happiness Economics" is based on:
• More time with family and friends; emphasis on social interactions
• The concept of "flow"-loss of a real idea of time
• Control over life–both challenging and achievable goals
• "Gratitude diary" [3]

An interesting practical suggestion is a "gratitude diary" in which experiences and circumstances are regularly listed. According to Ben Bernanke, Mihai Csikszentmihai, Raj Raghunathan of the University of Austin, Texas, gratitude journals help people stay aware of the happy aspects of their lives, offsetting the natural human tendency to take these things for granted after a while. Happiness is only one component of a broader, long-term concept of life satisfaction, and only one indicator of how the fabric of life is shaped by choices and circumstances [4,5].

Protective Determinants of Happiness for Health

The concept of measuring health by a single indicator that is based on mortality information but also reflects the health characteristics of life was first proposed by Sanders in 1964 and further developed in the search for an appropriate measure by D. Sullivan , who in 1971 also proposed a specific method for estimating life expectancy as a function of different states of physical capacity:
• Sanders, 1964-(health characteristics of life)
• W. Fry, 1965-(Gelotology)
• Sullivan, 1971-(method of evaluation of life expectancy as a function of the physical legal capacity)
• Dahlgren and Whitehead-(rainbow pattern of the determinants of health)
• Mikulić B, 2009-"Quality of life in Bulgaria. Subjective indicators"

"The chances of life" and "life outcomes" together imply four qualities of life according to Ruut Veenhoven’s study:
• Suitability for living in the environment
• Viability of the individual
• External utility of life and
• Internal evaluation of life

This four-fold matrix is applied in three ways: first to contrast related concepts and alternative classifications, second to explore substantive meanings in different quality of life measures, and third to understand whether quality of life can be measured holistically.
Capabilities and outcomes are related, but certainly not the same. The chance may fail and not materialize, due to stupidity or bad luck. Conversely, people sometimes achieve a great deal in their lifetime despite poor opportunities [6-11].

Timeline of the Happiness-Longevity Relationship

According to Easterlin's Paradox, after a certain level of development, economic growth no longer brings happiness by itself.
In one way or another, these observations of Easterlin set the framework for this current, they shape the position of both Bernanke and Sarkozy – namely that policies should be aimed not only at economic growth, but also at more happiness. Historically, there is a connection in the upgrading of the concept of happiness through health and quality of life to longevity. The temporal aspects in this connection are presented in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Chronology of the happiness-longevity relationship.

Figure 2: After a certain point, accumulating more wealth does not make people happier.

The development of the concepts of what happiness is, how it is related to the quality of life is visible; life fulfilment and satisfaction in correlation with smiling and its impact on quality of life. Happiness is one of the main categories of ethics. As an ethical category, it was developed already in ancient philosophy. Aristotle, who introduced the very concept of ethics, calls happiness the highest good, because all human behaviour is ultimately motivated by the pursuit of happiness [12,13].
At the end of this journey through the ages, human civilization, although torn from its material existence as part of the natural team, shows an interest in upholding humanism, empathy and self-denial for the sake of the good of man.

Role of the Dentist for Socialization and Well-Being of the Individual

Algorithm for longevity by smile and laugh: Laughter is a part of everyday life that is taken for granted. But this natural human reaction has a history in the endless millennia of human evolution. Today, people smile widely through social media to show not only their pretty smiles and properly aligned teeth, but also their standard, well-being and orderly life. A smile is a solution to the equation for a happy and successful life through social interaction [14-15]. The science but art differ following types:
• Real-Duchenne's
• False
• Experimentally manipulated
• Disturbing
• Seductive
• Sarcastic
• A smile of happiness
• Smile for health
• Mona Lisa, sphinx harmony, positivity, contact
• Theories-Aristotle, Benjamin d'Boulon, Darwin, Ekman [17- 22]

Healthy Years and Life Expectancy and Longevity as Predictors for Positive Health

Longevity is a socio-biological phenomenon, the survival of a person to high age limits. But in some countries such as Japan, America, France, Italy, Greece, Azerbaijan, Vietnam, Palestine, Altai, Caucasus...the people live more than the others. What are the reasons?
Some factors for Longevity are presented:

1. Uniform food.
2. Living in one place and in a uniform society.
3. Relatively high life safety.
4. Drinking (moderate) wine.
5. High motor activity.
6. Lack of tension in the intellectual life.
7. Sleep pattern, often an afternoon nap.
8. Cold - addiction to cold.
9. Preservation of the psyche - isolation from the world.
10. Overstability of the family.
11. No fear of death.
12. Genetic factor.
13. Moderation in everything. In the manifestation of feelings, in food, in work, even in cleanliness or the accumulation of material values.

Conclusion

The pleasure to smile is a need. Happiness is individual and group, social. A smile is the spiritual light on the face, coming from the heart. A smile is part of our health culture. A patient's smile is a doctor's best advertisement. The dentist creates a positive, sustainable emotion with his active role in building a harmonious smile and thereby contributes to general health, not just oral. Happiness is being a doctor. It is a conscious and shared joy in the name of people's health.

Conflict of Interest

The author declare no competing financial interest.

Consent

The consent was taken from the patient.

Funding

No.

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