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When African American Patients Leave The Hospital |
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It is not uncommon for people who are admitted to the hospital to be totally unaware of many important factors that will contribute to poor outcome after discharge. Sometimes it is the patient’s fault and other times that of the physician or hospital staff. Here are a few observations that you should pat attention to. Patients are not at their best after discharge so some reliable person should be totally involved with the patients discharge planning. Make sure you have a dependable person who is going to get the information used to take care of you. Make sure your family member or friend has talked with the attending physician about the dos and don’ts of your medical situation, and the new medications that should be taken. Make sure you have all of the new prescriptions and get rid of the old ones. Make sure you know the physician’s name and the time of the follow up appointment. |
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Characteristic of a Good Physician |
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The other day one of my female patients played the race card and said she thought Black physicians were incompetent. Unfortunately, I am told that a lot of Black folk feel that way about African American physicians. Recently, research was done at the Mayo Clinic addressing what patients feel make a good physician black or white. Here are a few characteristics that patients say are important. A good physician is thorough. He or she must “Leave no stone unturned,” when it comes to finding out the problem. Good physicians are compassionate, personal, forthright, and respectful. Good physicians give personal attention to his or her patients. There is a new characteristic called “Clue management skills that has been ascribed to good physicians. Clue management skills involve informative physicians that provide detailed explanations about medical problems, follow up in a timely fashion with patients and other physicians, and express to patients a desire to consult with other clinicians about their medical problem when the answer to a medical condition is not clear. These physicians also use state of the art medical practices. I hope you have a good physician. |
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Diabetes is a major problem in the African American community and by all accounts this problem is growing. A common bad outcome of uncontrolled diabetes is Diabetic Nephropathy. Diabetic Nephropathy is kidney disease that has been affected by poorly controlled diabetes. The kidney is the organ that cleans the blood. People usually have two kidneys that are located in the mid back. When diabetes affect the kidneys it causes them to fail. Failure of the kidneys forces people to have dialysis which is one way to treat but not cure diabetic nephropathy. If you have diabetes that has caused mild kidney failure you may not have any symptoms but if the symptoms are severe you feet and ankles will swell. If you keep your blood pressure under good control(lower than 130/80) and your AIC below 7 percent, your weight under control, take your medications, exercise appropriately and keep your appointments with your physician you can improve you chances of not developing Diabetic nephropathy. Talk to your physician. |
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The water bottling companies are making big bucks selling us bottle water. Well as it turns out bottle water ain’t all it is crank up to be. As it turn out Dentist are seeing more dental decay primarily from snack foods, soft drinks, lack of parental supervision when it come to dental care and bottle water. Yes bottle water is playing a major role in the resurgent of tooth decay among children. As it turns out tap water has fluorine in it that prevent tooth decay. The American Dental Association says that bottle water does not have enough fluorine in it to prevent tooth decay. There are about 20 companies in the U.S. that produce fluorinated bottle water while fluorinated bottle water it is questionable for the other 80 companies according to the {bottle water association}. The CDC listed the fluorination of water as one of the 10 ten achievement of public health in the 20 century so this topic is very important. So while you may drink bottle water it is very important that your children drink tap water. Since we are talking about water make sure you get what your body needs daily. To determine your need take your weight and divide it by 2 and drink that much of water in ounces per day. |
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Education is Good For Your Health |
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If health disparities are to go away African Americans are going to have to educate themselves about health issues. You will have to read, and listen to health professionals when health problems that affect African Americans are discuss. I am sorry to report that the news media does not give minorities health information that is will understood and information that they can relate too that make a difference in healthy outcomes. Health disparities are a complicate problem that have and will continue affect you and your family. Research tells us that the more you know as patients the better your outcome is likely to be. If you have hypertension, diabetes, cancer, heart disease, asthma, find out all you can from your physician about these and other medical problems. It is not good enough to just take your medicine but you must be concern about prevention and long term outcome. Teach your children about risk factors, family history and life styles that will improve the chances of good quality and long life. Remember Dr. Martin Luther King said in his last speech that “longevity has its place”. |
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