NIH Health Disparities Conference Focuses on Success in Addressing Gaps

The National Institute of Health in a fact sheet on health disparities frames the issue in this way: "Americans enjoyed improved health and longer lives during the latter part of the 20th century. However, African Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, and Asian/Pacific Islanders, who represented 25 percent of the U.S. population, continued to experience striking health disparities, including shorter life expectancy and higher rates of diabetes, cancer, heart disease, stroke, substance abuse, and infant mortality and low birth weight. Scientists believed these health disparities resulted from the complex interaction among several factors such as biology, the environment, and specific behaviours that were significantly impacted by a shortage of racial and ethnic minority health professionals, discrimination, and inequities in income, education, and access to health care."

In Kentucky, Appalachia also is impacted by high poverty levels, a shortage of health professionals, inequities in education and access to health care. HEEL was funded to address the rural health disparities in health literacy. One such project is Team UP! which successfully leveraged a state and local partnership to improve screening rates of never or rarely screened women in 9 east Kentucky counties. This project is being presented at a poster session at the NIH Summit on the Science of Health Disparities this week in National Harbor, MD.

KY Children not as Healthy as they could be : A Snapshot of Kentucky

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has published a report ranking the states on surrounding social, economic and physical environment factors that affect our health. According to RWJ "the levels of health for most Kentucky children fall short of levels for children in the most advantaged subgroups in the state and across the country."

The reports states:
"Kentucky ranks 30th among states based on the size of the gap in infant mortality by mother’s education, when comparing the current overall state rate of 6.2 deaths per 1,000 live births with the lower rate—3.9 deaths per 1,000 live births—seen among infants born to the state’s most educated mothers.

Kentucky ranks 29th among states based on the size of the gap in children’s general health status by family income, when comparing the current overall rate of 13.1 percent of children in less than optimal health with the lower rate—5.3 percent—seen among children in higher-income families."

See the complete report at RWJF website.

Study Reveals Problems in Costs and Quality of American Health Care System

A study from the Commonwealth Fund reported on the website Cover the Uninsured, a project of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation shows that "chronically ill Americans are more likely to forgo medical care because of high costs or experience medical errors than patients in other affluent countries," reports Reuters. "Fifty-four percent of Americans surveyed said high costs prevented them at some point from getting recommended medical care, filling prescriptions or seeing a doctor when ill." Read more of the Reuters' article. Submitted by Dr. Bob Flashman.

Giving Children Cough Medicine

The new FDA recommendations are to NOT give children under 4 cough medicine. One year ago, the FDA began looking into the hazards of using over the counter cold medicines in children and last month, the FDA and manufacturer's of cough-cold medicines announced that products will have new labels warning against their use with children under 4.

Will parents who grew up being given these medications, pay attention to the labels? As a mother who kept children's cough medicines on hand, I understand the prevalent use of such medications. That is why the FDA according to their press release dated October 9, 2008 made the decision to not ban these medications. The fear being that parents would give adult cough medicines to children.

Osteoporosis Tool Kit Available on Line

The Cabinet for Health and Family Services' Kentucky Osteoporosis program has made available on-line a tool kit for Extension Agents, Health Department educators and others wanting reliable information for teaching community members about the importance of Bone Health for adults and children. HEEL staff members serve on the state advisory committee and contributed to the development of this tool kit. Access the tool kit at: http://www.chfs.ky.gov/dph/ach/cd/osteotoolkit.htm

Health Confidence Survey

More than half of Americans with health insurance coverage experienced an increase in health care costs in the past year, according to the 2008 Health Confidence Survey released by the Employee Benefit Research Institute. Most who experienced cost increases also reported that these increases had a negative effect on their household finances. In particular, increased health care costs resulted in decreased contributions to retirement and other savings and difficulty in paying for necessities and other bills.
Source: Family Economics News -- Nov. 2008

Bob Flashman

What Does It Cost to Eat a Healthy Diet?

The New York Times reports that he average American spends $7.00 a day on food cost. The World Bank says nearly a billion people around the world live on a dollar a day, or even less. It is difficult to determine the costs to eat healthy. According to the New York Times "many people don’t know how to prepare foods from scratch, or lack the time." Sounds like a good opportunity for the Cooperative Extension Service.