While we originally planned on placing our This Is Public Health sticker on a hand sanitizer dispenser, we ultimately placed it on a blood pressure machine at the Wal-Mart across the street from USF. We chose this location because, quite frankly, Wal-Mart was in the general vicinity and has almost everything (almost being the keyword as this particular store didn’t have hand sanitizer dispensers). Heart disease is the leading cause of death in this country and one of many conditions that claim millions of lives across the world each year. With Wal-Mart having such a strong foothold in this country’s economy, it’s good that they provide free blood pressure measurements in the Pharmacy section of their stores across the country. One of the key factors in determining if someone has heart disease is measuring their pressure and seeing if it’s above normal, known as hypertension, or below normal, known as hypotension. After assessing these measurements, a doctor will generally either give you a clean bill of health or order more tests depending on the results.
Removing all bias considering we chose this particular topic, it can be easily argued that heart disease is the biggest public health issue our country is facing at the moment since it has the highest mortality rate. Even though lifestyle changes can alter and even diminish heart disease within an individual, the death rates have consistently risen year after year. One of the leading reasons for this is due to people leading sedentary lives and eating a lot of fast food, high in saturated fats, sugars and cholesterol, which negatively affect heart health.
It’s important to note that while some people are predisposed to heart disease, proactive steps can be taken to ensure a healthy life by means of exercise and diet, amongst other things. Feel free to visit the site below to assess your risk of having a heart attack. Note that this calculator shouldn’t be construed as a sound answer to whether you are at risk or not. Measure your blood pressure at Wal-Mart and other locations that offer the service free of charge and seek advice from your doctor.
http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Conditions/HeartAttack/HeartAttackToolsResources/Heart-Attack-Risk-Assessment_UCM_303944_Article.jsp
Participants: Ashlie Walker (photographer), Christopher Oural, and somewhere underneath the pound of facial hair is George Daniel :)
This post caught my attention because I used to teach an Adult Nutrition health class at homeless shelters in Jacksonville, and something that always came up in the salt and sodium section was getting your blood pressure checked. When the participants were asked if they knew their (relatively recent) blood pressure, it was rare to get more than one or two responses, in part due to the lack of access to medical care including regular physical exams. But this post highlights that there are alternative ways to measure your bp, since besides Wal-Mart described here, free blood pressure machines are increasingly available at certain Winn-Dixie, CVS, Walgreens, etc. locations in the community.
ReplyDeleteChecking for hypertension can be a significant part of assessing your risk for more severe issues such as stroke and heart failure, and due to race and lifestyle correlations to socioeconomic status, many of the risk factors for high blood pressure are often present in the populations who are not attending yearly physicals or other doctor visits. This is a good example of addressing a public health need, as these blood pressure stations increase accessibility for the majority of people, since they are free and public transportation can be utilized (even if not ideal) to reach a location.
This post does really depicts a simple machine that we see in almost every grocery store and take for granted for its common use. Before this machine was put into every corner store, people would have to go to there primary physician just to check on their blood pressure. The invention of this machine simplified taking ones blood pressure and gives a reading within minutes. We as American see this a normal average machine, but to public health this machine can be a preventive to future blood pressure issues that can be seen without paying a co pay to see a doctor. This common device is taken for granted due to how long we've had this device. This group did a good job in pointing out a device that usual we wouldn't see that was special but when thought about extensively it has changed public health in a good way.
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