Health Educators : An Important Part Of Society

For second part of reading response, I choose to report on Promoting public understanding of public health article by our professor Stephen Bezruchka. I really enjoyed reading the article he wrote about how people in the America are being less healthy than those people in other rich nations. Promoting public awareness about this topic should be high priority for all Public Health majors. Health is the most important part of human life and it surprising to me that people in America are not really doing anything to change it. Solving this problem need individual supports and public supports.

I interviewed Dr. Kwa Sey who is an epidemiologist with the Los Angeles County department of Public Health and the Director of the International Health Program at Charles R. Drew University (CDREWU). Dr. Sey earned his M.A. in epidemiology and a PhD in Public Health from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) school of Public Health. He has over 16 years of experience working in Public Health. He currently directs CDREWU funded HIV Behavioral Surveillance in Los Angeles and DHAPP funded HIV prevention programs internationally.

Education for the providers and patients both need to be more accessible. Providers education for screening, and implementation of a policy to set better guidelines for screening, needs to be created so that patients at risk can be educated soon rather than later on lifestyle changes. The education for patients needs to be more extensive in the office and also in the community where individuals are more likely to ask questions and be in an environment where they are more comfortable.

The prevalence of HIV in the African American community is unmatched by any other population. African Americans accounted for 49% of all HIV related deaths in 2010 (CDC, 2014). In my specialty area of family practice, I have encountered only one non-minority patient with HIV; all others have been African-American. This population needs to be of high consideration for disease education. African Americans are typically unaware of resources available to prevent the transmission of this disease, as well as testing available to them in their communities. African American children, especially, are at greater risk for HIV due to lack of knowledge and earlier age of engaging in sexual intercourse. They are typically unaware that their behavior can yield such a negative outcome (CDC, 2012). Many urban schools lack proper funding to accommodate a sexual education curriculum. It is of increased importance to raise awareness, educate and provide a plan of care for the African American teenage and adult population, as the incidence of this disease rises daily.

The Advances in public health have been possible due to the contributions of people with ideals of change who decided to make a difference in their communities through the creation of innovative ideas capable of changing the lifestyle of a community. Public health is about helping people to stay healthy, and protecting them from that psychosocial factor that may affect their life and that is why the public health worker must have a passion for a change and for a better quality of life for their community. In the beginnings of public health there were two people who acted as agents of social change and they were Sara Josephine Baker and Clara Barton.

The National Institute of Health's article states that the commencement of the 21st century helped with the provision of a preview of the numerous challenges that the US would face in the coming decades. The article's areas of focus that would help change the health of America's population include the adoption of a population health approach that gives consideration to health determinants, the strengthening of the public health infrastructure of the government, the development of accountability systems to enable the assurance of the quality and availability of public health services, and others (Curry, 2005). Furthermore, the report suggests several findings that would help enhance America's public health. For instance, the article suggests that appropriate education and training should be provided to the public health workforce if America's public health is to undergo a significant evolution. Despite NIH article's findings and commitment to change America's public health, no significant efforts have been channeled towards the elimination of the health challenges faced by a huge percentage of America's population. Essentially, America is yet to realize its goals of eliminating incessant health challenges. Today, in the US, the obesity rate has soared from 27.6% to

The health care policy for many years has posed significant challenges for administrators within the federal system, which also span in the public, nonprofit and business arena. One of the administrative agency’s primary area of focus is to educate individual through preventive

In our first week of class, we have looked at the first three chapters in, Health Care Delivery in the United States. The first chapter talks about how the health care system has moved from a mindset of restoring a person’s health, into the phase of preventative medicine, which we see now. This has resulted from measurement of how the health care system is working, and with research looking at patients throughout the years. We now know, that any problem, disease, or condition, should be treated early or prevented if possible. The health care system has been working with public education to make citizens aware of what tests and preventative programs will be of assistance to them. (Knickman & Kovner, A., 2015).

Greenberg, R. (2010) the authors talk about the need for changes in the health education system.

Over the past 8 years, healthcare has been a major topic of debate. President and governmental elections, school systems and districts, local communities, and even cartoons have centered their focus on what seems to be one of the US’s major dilemmas: Healthcare. While our country has vast resources and often leads the world in advanced technology, healthcare and its access remains something we have yet mastered (Collaboration Health Care, 2015). As defined by WHO, the World Health Organization (2015), healthcare promotion is the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve their health. It moves beyond a focus on individual behavior towards a wide range of social and environmental interventions. While the concept of health promotion, its accessibility, and its maintenance are easy to understand, sometimes things easily understood aren’t as easily implemented into the general populations and their lifestyles. Unfortunately, there are many obstacles standing between the general population and complete access to healthcare. Some of the major hurdles include:

From the time I started middle school, I have had a health and wellness education class each year throughout school. My first health class started in seventh grade and that is around the time I started to learn about the importance of health and wellness. As a kid, my diet was not what I would consider healthy. There were few fruits and vegetables outside of school lunches. I played three sports all of my life so I was an active person getting the important benefits of exercise. However, fast food was often a quick solution to eating after sport practice. Once I started to learn about healthy options in health class I was able to make conscious decisions on eating healthy. Health and physical education classes in high school started to explain why nutrition and exercise were important. Furthermore, I attended a private school that offered religion classes and I attended church weekly. Both of these influenced my spiritual wellness positively. After high school, I decided I wanted to study kinesiology and health promotion in college to learn more.

Health literacy is defined as "The degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions" (Michael K. Paasche-Orlow, 2010), the word Health literacy first appeared in 1974 in a paper which calls for “education standards for all grade school levels in USA” (Carolyn Speros, 2004) . Some recent works suggest that there is a relation between literacy, low health and premature deaths (Christina Zarcadoolas et al, 2005).

Is there a solution to this costly societal problem? The long-term solution rests in the hands of health education beginning in kindergarten and continuing throughout college. We need more community involvement with this issue. It not only affects the health illiterate but those that are very health literate. It raises the costs of health care enormously. Despite massive technological advances and that we spend twice as much per capita on healthcare in the United States, we remain one of the unhealthiest nations in the world. Low health literacy contributes to our grim future. We have high rates of infant mortality; increased mortality related to chronic, preventable disease processes; and cancer mortality could be greatly reduced by early detection.

I was drawn to the idea of not only focusing on one-on-one patient care that doctors provide, but also solving problems that affect the health of entire populations. The study of disease and health within populations; for instance, preventing disease, promoting health, and reducing health problems between groups are the main reasons I want to pursue an M.P.H focusing on epidemiology. These are my strongest interests because I believe they are important in improving our world’s health.

Even though there is no direct outcome between education and health, but a higher education leads to a better understanding of health priorities and medical care needs. Skills such as cognitive ability and health literacy can help to improve health outcomes because of a better ability to comprehend complex treatment regimen and disease self-management. Educators tend to make superior choices in terms of their lifestyle and personal health behaviors. Adults with a higher education have the advantages to be employed and have desirable jobs. By having satisfied jobs not only offer higher salaries but also health related benefits such as health insurance coverage.