Thanksgiving Day is not only a time to gather with friends and family to eat a sumptuous meal and count blessings. It’s also happened to be National Family Health History Day today. The idea is to take a day when everyone in your family is assembled and discuss the family health history, specifically any occurrence of colorectal cancer. Healthcare providers encourage you to use this day to share and care about this and other serious diseases.

Today is National Stress Awareness Day, a 24-hour reinforcement that you are not doing yourself a favor by stressing about situations you cannot control. Everyone feels stressed from time to time, as it is how the brain and body respond to any demand. Needless to say, stress can affect your health, hence it is important to pay attention as to how you deal with minor and major stressors to know when it is time to seek help.

National Mammography Day is a part of Breast Cancer Awareness month and is celebrated on the third Friday of October every year. Mammograms are a hugely important aspect of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, as millions of women across the globe are encouraged to attend Mammography screenings as part of the defense against developing breast cancer.

Created by the World Heart Federation, World Heart Day informs people around the globe that CVD, including heart disease and stroke, is the world’s leading cause of death claiming 18.6 million lives each year, and highlights the actions that individuals can take to prevent and control CVD.

World Alzheimer’s Day, September 21st of each year, is a day on which Alzheimer’s organizations around the world concentrate their efforts on raising awareness about Alzheimer’s and dementia. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia, a group of disorders that impairs mental functioning.

September 13 has been dubbed “National Celiac Disease Awareness Day” in honor of the doctor who identified a link between celiac disease and diet. Dr. Samuel Gee, a leader in celiac disease research, was born on Sept. 13, 1839.

International Overdose Awareness Day is held each year on August 31st to remember those who have been lost to fatal drug overdose, celebrate those who have been rescued from or assisted in rescuing someone from an overdose, and most especially help reduce the stigma of overdose and drug use.

World Hepatitis Day (WHD) is recognized every July 28th, the birth date of Dr. Baruch Blumberg, who discovered the hepatitis B virus in 1967, and developed the first vaccine in 1969. These achievements led up to Dr. Blumberg winning the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1976.

Today, the United States celebrates National Hydration Day. Proper hydration is vital to living a healthy life, but it is often overlooked. It is easy to forget to carry a water bottle on a hot day outside, but skipping out on H2O can lead to major health risks.

Every year countries around the world celebrate World Blood Donor Day (WBDD). The event serves to raise awareness of the need for safe blood and blood products and to thank voluntary, unpaid blood donors for their life-saving gifts of blood.