Topic Page for Health
Foreclosures and Health
Switchboard Miami provides crisis counseling for residents of the Miami-Dade area. Looking at who is calling Switchboard we get some sense of the mental burden of the current housing crisis.
From MiamiHearald.com:
During the fiscal year that ends this June, Switchboard has processed 9,525 complaints from people with housing problems. Some 4,600 requested emergency shelter after being evicted from their homes. About 400 needed urgent psychological assistance for depression, anxiety or drug dependency. Two were suicidal.
The foreclosure debacle has not only resulted in millions of dollars in losses and thousands of homeless residents, but it has also caused mental and emotional turmoil. Agencies such as Switchboard can't do much more than attempt to treat the symptoms with therapy and referrals to credit counseling agencies.
A lengthy USAToday article on the subject reports that suicide rates increase during times of economic turmoil:
In an article published in 2005 by Cambridge University Press, researchers compared suicide data in Australia from January 1968 through August 2002 with economic problems such as unemployment and mortgage interest rates. The study found that economic trends are closely associated with suicide risk, with men showing a heightened risk of suicide in the face of economic adversity.
And an AP story says that the burden of stress from this financial storm can have a negative affect on health:
Although most people appear to be managing their debts all right, perhaps 10 million to 16 million are "suffering terribly due to their debts, and their health is likely to be negatively impacted," says Paul Lavrakas, a research psychologist and AP consultant who analyzed the results of the survey. Those are people who reported high levels of debt stress and suffered from at least three stress-related illnesses, he says.
That finding is supported by medical research that has linked chronic stress to a wide range of ailments.
Here in Cleveland, Project Hype participants were asked to photograph things that had an affect on their hypertension control. They responded with photos of abandoned houses in their Cleveland neighborhoods.
Clearly the housing crisis is not just a Wall Street problem. It's also a my street problem.
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Posted by: David Porter on June 27, 2008
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Category: Health; Housing Crisis; foreclosure; foreclosure; hypertension; stress
Stroke risk in women
An MSNBC.com article talks about the disparity in risk of stroke between men and women.
The risk [of stroke] surges between ages 45 and 54. In those years, women are more than twice as likely as men to have strokes. And at every age, strokes are harder on women — they're more likely than men to wind up physically and mentally impaired.
On average, women get to the emergency room an hour later than men when a stroke hits, partly because stroke isn't on their mental checklist of ER-worthy dangers. And when they reach the hospital, it takes women about an hour longer to be examined by a neurologist.
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Posted by: David Porter on June 04, 2008
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Category: Health; Health Disparities; Health Inequities; Women's Health; gender disparities; stroke
Social networking and health
We recently learned that using text messaging might improve the rate in which teenagers take their medications. A new study out reports that social networks could be used to improve health.
From the Washington Post:
In a study published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine, the team found that a person's decision to kick the habit is strongly affected by whether other people in their social network quit -- even people they do not know. And, surprisingly, entire networks of smokers appear to quit virtually simultaneously.
The study can be found in the New England Journal of Medicine.
EXTRA: Over the weekend Doc Rob celebrated 100,000 visitors to his website. Congratulations.
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Posted by: David Porter on May 27, 2008
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Category: Health; social networking
Racial disparities in diabetes control
DIABETES CONTROL may be more challenging for Hispanics than for non-Hispanic whites, a meta-analysis suggests.
Researchers found that hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) levels are higher in Hispanics than non-Hispanic whites, with an overall mean HbA1c difference of 0.5%. The reasons for the disparity in HbA1c levels are not known, but plausible explanations include differences in biology, access to care, insurance status, and diabetes treatment adherence
BONUS: New York City started issuing citations to restaurants that did not have calories posted on their menus. See NYTimes.com for more info.
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Posted by: David Porter on May 07, 2008
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Category: Health; Health Disparities; racial differences
Life expectancy - It goes beyond race
From Reuters:
Smoking, obesity and high blood pressure are taking the lives of women in Appalachia, Mississippi River states and parts of Texas, a team at Harvard School of Public Health reported.
"There has been increasing disparity in health in the U.S. population for two decades," said Majid Ezzati of the school's department of population and international health, who led the study.
Overall U.S. life expectancy increased mostly because of fewer deaths from heart disease, the No. 1 cause of death, and stroke. But by the 1980s, death rates started to head back up in many counties.
"The majority of these counties were in the Deep South, along the Mississippi River, and in Appalachia, extending into the southern portion of the Midwest and into Texas," Ezzati's team wrote.
While many of the worst-affected counties had a high black population, Ezzati found that white populations in poorer counties fared worse that whites elsewhere, too.
"It exists above and beyond race," he said.
The study can be found free and online at PLoS Medicine.
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Posted by: David Porter on April 22, 2008
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Category: Health; Health Disparities; Longevity; racial differences
The bleak effects of poverty
From SFGate.com:
Illustrating the profound societal impact of chronic poverty, a new report released Thursday by the Alameda County Public Health Department documents health disparities by neighborhood, income and race. It highlights a widening social, economic and health gap in the county - as poverty goes up, life expectancy goes down.
"The data are overwhelming," said Dr. Tony Iton, the county's public health director. "It is shocking. It is not unique to West Oakland. You see it in Bayview-Hunters Point, in Richmond, in Cleveland and Detroit."
You can read the executive summary of the report at acphd.org.
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Posted by: David Porter on April 21, 2008
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Category: Health; Health Disparities; poverty
Being A Black Man
The Washington Post has an excellent series titled, 'Being A Black Man.'
The most recent article in the series, 'His Last, Best Cause', chronicles an activist who neglected his own health.
In his final days, as he underwent grueling chemotherapy, Smith said he was fighting for Asha -- "I've got to see the man she marries," he cried. But in the end, he was no match for colorectal cancer -- or his own failure to seek medical treatment.
Smith, 54, like many other black men, died before his time. Black men have a life expectancy of 69 years, six years less than white men and far shorter than men of other ethnic group. They are more than twice as likely to die from cancer as white men, according to the National Cancer Institute, and nine times as likely as white men to die of AIDS. They suffer from lung disease, heart disease, hypertension, stroke, diabetes and other chronic illnesses in disproportionate numbers that alarm health-care professionals.
The entire series is worth the read. Additionally, there is a good discussion thread about health care education and awareness here.
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Posted by: David Porter on October 10, 2006
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Category: Health; Health Inequities; racial differences
Case Comprehensive Cancer Center
The Center for Reducing Health Disparities is glad to announce that Senior Instructor of Medicine, Maghboeba Mosavel PhD, will be presenting, 'Utilizing the Mother-Daughter Relationship to Address Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Cervical Cancer.'
The presentation will be held in Wearn 137 from 12pm - 130pm.
You can view the flyer by clicking here.
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Posted by: David Porter on August 04, 2006
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Category: Health
Health Disparities in the Mississippi Delta
Earlier we posted a story about health disparities in Milwaukee. This story focuses on health disparities in the Mississippi Delta region.
Here is an excerpt of that report.
The Mississippi Delta, the poorest region of the poorest state, has extremely high measures of health disparities, obesity, diabetes and the complications from diabetes," Bouldin said.
Bouldin, a Clarksdale native and one of four sons of acclaimed artist Marshall Bouldin Sr., said the obesity and diabetes have a direct correlation.
"A third of our school children in Mississippi are obese," Bouldin said. "We're talking about being 30-40 percent overweight."
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Posted by: David Porter on July 03, 2006
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Category: Health; Health Disparities; Health Inequities