Why and how do gender or age matter when we consider issues of health and illness? How can understanding gender or age help clinicians plan health education? Throughout this essay I will answer the question above, but I will focus on the topic of gender. The topics I will cover involve defining gender, describing the health differences faced by people of different sexes, so I will focus on health education issues related to gender. Gender and sex have been defined by sociologists as two different things. Sociologists have defined the term “sex” as relating to the biological differences between men and women based on their anatomy, while the term “gender” refers to the social and cultural differences that men and women display (Bruce and Yearly 2006). Although the term gender has a biological basis, it is important to note that social and cultural factors shape how gender is defined (Connell 2009). These social and cultural factors include people's self-representation, their social representation, and how they are viewed by others from a sociological perspective (Rocha-Sanchez and Diaz-Loving 2005). These are the definitions of sex and gender that I will use throughout this essay. There are many ways in which men's and women's health can vary, but the topics I will focus on are the differences in morbidity and mortality among men. and women, diseases that affect men and women differently and finally I will conclude with information on health education. Throughout the essay I will try to explain gender-based health inequalities (Arber and Thomas 2004). Morbidity and mortality are interconnected topics... half of the article... Miles, A. (1991) ). Women, health and medicine, Open University Press. Nettleton, S. (2006). The sociology of health and illness, Polity Press. Payne, S. (2006). Men's and Women's Health, Polity.Popay, J. (1992). “My health is good, but I'm always tired” Women's experience of poor health. Women's health is important. H. Roberts, Routledge.Rocha-Sanchez, T. E., and R. Diaz-Loving (2005). “Culture and Gender: An Ideological Divide Between Males and Females.” Anales De Psicologia 21(1): 42-49.Scambler, G. (2003). Sociology applied to medicine, Saunders.Veenstra, G. (2011). “Race, gender, class, and sexual orientation: Intersecting axes of inequality and self-rated health in Canada.” International Journal for Health Equity 10(1): 3.Weitz, R. (2009). The Sociology of Health, Illness, and Healthcare, Cengage Learning.