Talking About Health; Why Health Communication Matters

How does Anderson Cooper’s statement, ‘hope is not a plan’ fit today’s events?

August 8, 2011

I saw an ad for Anderson Cooper’s new talk show coming in September. The ad shows Anderson sitting with Oprah–an excerpt from an interview some years ago. She compliments him on his coverage of Hurricane Katrina. She remarks that he got it right when he said, “Hope is not a plan.”

I thought that it was a bit ironic in the light of the day… after our nation’s credit rating has been downgraded and the U.S. stock market lost 634 points… and the news is covering it round the clock–a reminder that “the audacity of hope” is …hope without a plan…

And what can we do about it? Stop listening? Stop talking about it?

We have talked about in this forum before, news coverage has been found to lead to compassion fatigue. As Susan Moeller wrote in her book about compassion fatigue more than a decade ago in 1999 [http://www.amazon.com/Compassion-Fatigue-Media-Disease-Famine/dp/0415920981], the effects of nonstop alarming news and no messages about concrete actions to represent effective responses: fatigue, exhaustion, and an inability to even feel anything about anything…

Here is the concrete action I seek: no matter how hard it is,

….stop responding by placing the blame on someone else.

Stop doing the same thing over again and expecting different results…

Do we have a responsibility for health and the environment? …and the sheet ‘experiment’…my ‘story’…

July 27, 2011

Look closely. That is a baby robin peaking its beak up above the nest line. Where? On my front door…

This is the view when I got a stool and stood up to peer inside.

There were two babies. Can you tell?

http://www.learner.org/jnorth/search/RobinNotes2.html#number%20of%20eggs This site gives a good overview about robins. You can guess their age based on the pictures there. They were probably about a week to nine days old…

I discovered them on a Saturday when I went to clean the front porch. I wanted to wash the door, so I put my hand up to lift the wreathe off the door and felt something — well, not part of my wreathe.. something really soft… I jerked back and went for the stool. You cannot really tell from the first picture, but the nest was hidden in the wreathe.

I worried once I saw what was hidden there that my touching the baby would keep the parents away… luckily not. Both parents spent all day every day for the next 10 days flying back and forth feeding the babies… And I left the door and the porch alone… except when I couldn’t help myself and had to have another peak…

We always have birds nesting around the house, on the gutters, above our lights on the deck… but never robins before. …and never on my front door. We had been hearing these sounds around the front door. They made our golden retriever bark sometimes. We would open the door… and nothing. I guess the parents were building the next.

It was the most blessed thing to watch the parents and their newborns for a week or so… I was happy to think that we have a place where the environment could nurture them. We have a lot of dragon flies this year, too… supposed to be a sign of a healthy environment.

A few days ago, I reported on Dr. Besser’s advice to put your pillow case and sheets in the freezer for two hours before going to bed… I am happy to report that for me and my granddaughter–this was just what the doctor ordered and helped us get to sleep in the heat of the record-breaking temps. For my husband, he said it made no difference… And so, Grace and I recommend it… John does not… 😉

How do we communicate about responsibility and health?

July 18, 2011

I have been basking in the summer heat… catching up on some research and and reflection, and most importantly–my family. July is the month that my granddaughter, Grace, visits… and we have been reading the American Girl book that introduces Kaya…an American Indian. And that is what made me think of today’s topic.

Chapter 2 of the book introducing Kaya, the title is ‘Switchings’, Kaya and all of the youngsters old enough to share in the responsibility for Kaya’s mistake [leaving her twin brothers when she was responsible for watching them] gets a ‘switching’ — that is, she must lay face down on the ground along with all of her peers and pull her clothing up on her legs to her knees. Then the ‘Whipwoman’–elected by the tribe to administer switchings to the youth–takes twigs from a tree and gives the children lashes. The message is that what one of them does affects all of them… So, the bad behavior of one gets all of them into trouble….

Grace is 7 years old… I asked her what she thought about everyone getting a switching because Kaya had done something wrong. She said that it was fair because Kaya went off with two boys to ride horses when she should’ve been watching her brothers. So, she said, those boys should be punished, too. What about the others, I asked What about some of the kids who were punished who were nowhere near the other three kids? It seems fair…what we do does affect everyone, and everyone should support us in doing the right thing…

Interesting. I considered that I might use this book in my health communication classes this year to capture the many meanings of responsibility and health. Personal responsibility, as illustrated here, has more meaning than just what and how our behaviors affect our own health… It affects others, including the nation’s health care costs. But it is impossible to be responsible when all around us are people and ways temptinig us to forget about what we know we should do. And when there seems to be no support on the other end–no one and no ways to achieve the right things… ‘Switchings’…it is a good metaphor for what we are doing to ourselves as a nation when it comes to health and health care…

…only 54,000 new jobs in the U.S. for May 2011… what’s wrong with this picture?

June 4, 2011

As a college professor, I get to bask in the reflected glory of graduating seniors each semester…especially every May. Until the past couple of years. Especially this year. This year, I hear the same story from students whether they were graduating with experience or not, an engineering degree or communication, and high grade point averages or just average. No jobs.

I feel their pain. I see it in their daily classroom attitudes. ‘Once upon a time’ is how they hear the refrain ‘go to college, study hard, and you’ll get a good job’… Maybe in the old days they say…

This in the same period of time as Oprah retiring and telling us all to live our best life… ‘Our best life?’ asks students whose parents sacrificed for them to go to college and may themselves be faced with unemployment or forced early retirements. How shall we define that life?

Of course, when there are no jobs, there is no health care insurance. When there are no jobs, there tends to be less healthy eating, as fresh foods cost more and fattening high calorie foods are…cheaper and often comforting in the face of disappointment. Higher rates of depression… So physical and mental health suffer.

And then last night I watched the ABC show, ‘Shark Tank’…wow! Inspirational, motivating… The person seeking money for his idea had invented a filter paper in the form of a “nose contact”–not his words exactly, but mine to help you visualize what it looked like if you don’t have time to go to the show’s online site and watch an excerpt. He did say that to insert the filter paper into your nose, you place it on your finger like putting in a contact…which seemed to be understood by all of the ‘sharks’–the panel with money to invest if they see profit potential in an idea.

At any rate, the paper is designed to filter out viruses and air pollutants. The person seeking money for his idea had a signed contract with another country for 8 million dollars and needed 500 thousand to produce enough product to fill the order. Well, to make a great story short, most of the panel wanted in… One even offered to buy the company for 4 million dollars and give the inventor a royalty. As discussion unfolded, two of the sharks teamed up with an offer, another shark made a separate offer, and then–they asked for a time-out and the contestant left the room. The latter three teamed up with a combined offer.

In the end, the contestant accepted it and did not sell his company. He now has 750 thousand in cash and three partners in his company…three partners with proven success in bringing innovations to huge distributions. This is an idea that is smart, solves a problem that is much bigger in many parts of the world than it is currently in the U.S., requires manufacturing–i.e. jobs…

Perhaps this is a path of living our best life in the 21st century…solving persistent problems with simple solutions.

I am going to keep a diary of the ‘problems’ or ‘challenges’ I face each day this coming week for which I have no solution but have experienced before. I will add to it notes about my own observation of media reports that suggest others’ problems. I will listen for insights about these matters in conversations.

Perhaps you would join me in this venture. Let me know what you come up with and let’s get a conversation going about these matters…

…cell phones and cancer…why now?

June 2, 2011

We have been hearing about the World Health organization’s conclusion that cell phones pose a health risk that is similar to lead exposure [http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-who-cell-phones-20110601-1,0,3926296.story]. A summary of the report will appear in a medical journal in July. But advance news stories indicate that as with lead exposure, more exposure increases risk. Cell phone use rarely–less risk. Cell phone use for hours at a time and/or every day–greater risk.

Why has this report come out now? Last year, the U.S. National Cancer Institute reviewed research relating to cell phone use and cancer and posted a summary of their conclusions at http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/cellphones. It is tricky to read through the findings. They sometimes suggest that the issue has been directly studied. The ‘gold standard’ for clinical trials is based on randomly assigning individuals to a condition in which the thing to be studied is ‘given’ to those participants and another condition for which the randomly assigned individuals do not have exposure to the thing being studied. Thus, when the NCI reports about studies that have compared individuals who subscribe to cell phone service with those who do not, it begins to sound like a randomized trial. I subscribe to a cell phone service and seldom use my cell phone. My daughter has a cell phone service, it is the only phone she has [no land line], and she uses the phone–talks on it–a lot. So if we were both included in the study mentioned by NCI based on being subscribers, the results might not be an accurate reflection of a relationship between cancer and cell phone use. Subscribers who seldom use their cell phones, if included in the denominator of an equation designed to inform about risk, may artificially reduce the overall risk.

For example, if there are 2 cases of cancer in people in the population that is not subscribed to cell phone service–let’s say that is 100 people–and there are 2 cases of cancer in people in the population that is subscribed to cell phone service–let’s say that is 200 people–it suddenly appears that there are fewer cases in the latter…. But what if only 50 subscribers use the cell phone everyday….not even counting how long everyday–just everyday. 2 cases among 50 people is twice the risk of the poulation of nonsubscribers… Is that accurate?

So that has been the challenge for some years now. No one is going to conduct a randomized trial of cell phone use in which they randomly assign some people to be users and some to be nonusers, and then have some users use briefly everyday, and some users use for two hours, and some more…and track cancer incidence across yearssssss of the lives of the participants. So we have to rely on the research that makes comparisons such as the one described above. The WHO’s group of scientists apparently reached the conclusion that the nearly four dozen published studies reviewed with the thousands of particpants is sufficient evidence to classify cell phones as a possible risk for cancer. In view of how cell phones work, it seems a safe bet. And the ways to reduce risk by using the cell phone with a device that keeps the phone away from my brain is an easy and effective way to reduce that risk…

What’s new under the sun?

April 20, 2011 GUEST BLOG POST by Caroline Gilson

Over the years, the desire to be tan led to use of tanning beds. Somehow, tanned skin is seen to be sexy and attractive. As many people have continuously begun to be “addicted” to tanning beds, their skin has been put in a dangerous environment.

Tanning beds have a different type of UV rays called UV-B rays. UV-B rays are more harmful to the skin than the sun’s UV rays.

The dangers of tanning beds have caused the need for educational programs to educate the public about the health concerns involving tanning beds. Research studies have been done to find out the best way to communicate about the tanning beds. One study in particular looked at the use of narratives, and statistics. (http://www.springerlink.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/content/

457nhk7324q63501/fulltext.pdf)

This particular study discovered that both statistics and narratives could be effective in educating individuals about the dangers of tanning beds. Specific stories about real life people seem to grab people’s attention. Statistics about tanning beds on top of narratives help with persuasion and education about tanning beds.

The research has been done and now it is time to effectively educate the public about the risks of tanning beds. Hopefully, through health communication, society will make better health decisions…

Do doctors get anxious about talking to patients?

April 17, 2011 GUEST BLOG POST by Autumn Ciliberto

I recently read some interesting research that addresses this question. It was conducted by Dahlin in 2007: “Burnout and Psychiatric Morbidity among Medical Students Entering Clinical Training: a Three Year Prospective Questionnaire and Interview-based Study.” This article covered the important subject matter of dealing with medical students still in their college practices, graduating with anxiety and incompetent speaking skills.

The medical students are doing 16+ hour days–doing school work and then going to practice within the hospitals. The researchers worked with first year medical students to compare their stress levels to the third year program students. They wanted to learn if trait anxiety and vulnerability was present in students before reaching the third year, and what effect this anxiety had on the medical students’ communication skills with patients.

The research revealed a high burnout rate among medical students who showed depressive symptoms and/or financial concerns in the first year. At the third year, a significant number of medical students had anxiety and/or depressive symptoms, but few were willing to seek help–perhaps worrying about the effects on their career. This may affect the communication between these future doctors and their patients. The researchers conclude that, “There is evidence that mental distress during medical school predicts later problems in physicians, which in addition to the personal suffering of the individual doctor might negatively affect patient care” (Dahlin, p.1)…

Dahlin, M.E. (2007). Burnout and Psychiatric Morbidity among Medical Students Entering Clinical Training: a Three Year Prospective Questionnaire and Interview-based Study. Biomed Central Medical Education, 7, 6.

How should we talk about tanning?

April 12, 2011 GUEST BLOG POST by Danielle Torrisi

Take a look around any college campus, and you’ll notice at least a handful of tanning salons. Pick up their college’s newspaper and you’ll find ads for tanning salons with gorgeous, tanned women pictured with the slogan “Beautiful Tan Today. Young looking skin tomorrow” and promotional discounts that is sure to catch the eye of any student. The tanning industry portrays tanning as harmless and risk-free. However, research has shown that the incidence of melanoma has continued to rapidly increase since the 1970’s.

A recent study at a southern university surveyed 492 students and results showed that a majority of the participants knew sun exposure increases the risk for skin cancer, but only 29% correctly identified behaviors that reduce this risk.

Less than 46% of the participants were able to identify signs of melanoma, and less than 10% were able to identify the primary area of the body for melanoma. Approximately half of the participants strongly believed that a tan improves one’s appearance, and only half thought that sun safe behaviors are necessary. It is very troubling to learn that they think their appearance outweighs their health.

College students need to be informed about the dangers of using tanning beds in hopes of changing attitudes and behaviors. It all starts with the media and advertisements need to show a more natural appearing skin. “As long as marketers portray being tan as healthy, attractive and sexy, young women will continue to believe that a tan is desirable, regardless of the risks” (Spradlin et al).

It needs to be understood that there is no such thing as a healthy tan. “In fact, UVA rays which are used in tanning beds can go all the way through the skin’s protective epidermis to the dermis, where blood vessels and nerves are found. Because of this, UVA rays may damage a person’s immune system, making it harder to fight off diseases and leading to illnesses like melanoma, the most serious (and deadly) type of skin cancer” (Tanning). This needs to be reinforced in student’s minds in order to see a behavior and attitude change.

To view this article go to: Citation: Spradlin, Kimberly, Martha Bass, William Hyman, and Rosanne Keathley. (2010). Skin Cancer: Knowledge, Behaviors, and Attitudes of College Students. Southern Medical Journal. 103, 999-1003.

Does peer sexual health education change the trainers’ behaviors?

April 3, 2011 GUEST BLOG POST by Kaitlyn Krauss

I get it–sex is a taboo topic. It’s something that shouldn’t be discussed in public let alone in front of people you don’t know. Yet I do this all the time. I know my dad would never tell his friends his daughter hosts “Safer Sex Parties” up at Penn State and I know my mom isn’t too happy that I demonstrate how to properly put on a condom, but it’s something I do and it’s something I love.

As a peer educator through University Health Services, I chose to become involved with the sexual health group. During my first year as a volunteer, I was elected the group leader. I believe that unsafe sex is one of the biggest problems that all college campuses face. It is important for everyone to be aware of the risks of sexual activities because STIs such as HPV, Chlamydia, Gonorrhea and Genital Herpes are common on college campuses.

The CDC reports that 1 in 4 college students have been diagnosed with an STI in their lifetime. I don’t know about you but that statistic shocks me every time I hear it. It was my love of communication, volunteering and always wanting to help others that led me to become a peer educator. Regardless that not everyone agrees with what I do, I’d like to think it’s worth it, even if I help one person or change one persons mind.

Because of my experiences as a peer educator, I review research about the benefits of peer educators in talking to people about sex. One of these articles conducted in 2007 (http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a903650971) considered the question, “Does Peer Sexual Health Education training shift trainee’s own behavior towards health promotion and safer sex behavior?” Through a series of surveys and training programs, the study found that participants improved their STD knowledge and health-promotion counseling self-efficacy. This is something that I believe all peer educators should grasp before preaching safer-sex to hard-headed college students. Whenever I give a safer sex party, it’s new facts that often motivate people to change. By learning the facts and improving one’s training skills, peer educators become more valuable.

College students believe they are invincible and many won’t stop and think twice about something until they are hit with the consequences. STIs are serious and that is why I try to convince people to prevent them instead of deal with the problem when it arises. The study found that peer educators were a successful tool in training college students. A lot of the educators also changed their ways after going through the training. All of the health promotion competencies they learned in the study are necessary components of a peer education program that enhances the health of its clients. And that’s why I do this, to enhance the health of my clients, my peers, and my friends…

Can you set the table please?

March 30, 2011 GUEST BLOG POST by Melissa VanAlstyne

“I have work to catch up on”, “I’m not hungry”, “I’m going out”, we have all heard these excuses when it comes to sitting down to a family meal and often it seems easier to just forgo it all together. However, research is proving just how big of an impact family meals do have. Not only is sitting down to a family meal a good way to keep the family connected but it also has a number of health benefits as well, one of which is promoting healthy eating habits among adolescents.

According to a journal article in the Journal of Adolescent Health [full citation below] having a family meal can help to detect early signs of disordered eating as well as help prevent disordered eating from ever beginning. Having a family meal allows adolescents to see their parents engaging in healthy eating habits and therefore model their own eating habits after them. In addition, eating together allows parents to monitor their children’s diet which allows them to detect signs of disordered eating earlier.

While simply prioritizing sitting and eating together is good in and of itself, family meals should be times that parents and children value and find enjoyable. This means keeping discussion at the meal free from conflict around food or other issues, thus making the meal something the family looks forward to each day.

While life is undoubtedly extremely stressful and busy and finding time to sit down and eat together may seem a daunting task, the benefits of making sure to prioritize this family time cannot be overstressed. Adolescents who report more frequent and enjoyable family meals have been repeatedly found to be at a decreased risk for engaging in unhealthy weight control behaviors. So find a time that works for your family, sit down, pass the chicken and enjoy!

Fulkerson, J. Neumark-Sztainer,D. Story, M. Wall, M.(2004).Are Family Meal Patterns Associated with Disordered Eating Behaviors Among Adolescents? Journal of Adolescent Health,35. 350-359