For National Influenza Vaccination Week Dec. 4-10, 2011, the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC) is inviting Hispanics ages 6 months and older to get vaccinated against the influenza. The first and most important step to protect against flu is to get vaccinated, according to the CDC's Spanish-language flu website. The vaccine reduces one's risk of illness, hospitalization, or even death and can prevent the spread of the virus to loved ones. There is good news: More Hispanic children, 43 percent, have been vaccinated this year than black children at 36 percent or white children at 34 percent, UPI reports. Go to flu.gov in English or Spanish to learn ...
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Effective Health Care Program will host a live chat on its Spanish-language Facebook page with Scientific Review Officer Dr. Ileana Ponce-Gonzalez at 2 p.m. EST on Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2011. This Facebook live chat is part of AHRQ’s recently launched Toma las riendas campaign, a nationwide effort to encourage Hispanics to take control of their health and explore treatment options. The campaign promotes a wide variety of resources produced by the Effective Health Care Program, such as consumer-friendly publications that summarize treatment options for common health conditions and help Hispanics work with their health care teams to select the best possible treatment option. Access to reliable information is essential when ...
Editor’s Note: This post is part of an ongoing series that will highlight the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s work in Latino communities across the country. When his only child Emilio died of cancer shortly before his sixth birthday, Richard Nares found his world was shattered. As he and his wife tried to put their lives back together, Nares realized his priorities had changed. “All I wanted to do was help other families who were going through what we went through,” said Nares, who was an artist and picture framer. Putting his family’s tragedy and hard-earned knowledge to use, Nares and his wife Diane established the Emilio Nares Foundation to transport underprivileged families whose children are battling cancer to their medical visits at Rady Children’s Hospital ...
The Utah Department of Health recently released several videos, "For Me, For Us," to offer reliable health care information to racial/ethnic minorities, the Daily Herald reports. Each video tackles healthy eating, access to health care and healthy births, and other health challenges facing minorities in Utah. One of the videos targets Latinos. Watch in English or Spanish or ...
Increasing rates of obesity and diabetes may be contributing to a steep rise in liver cancer, or hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), among Latinos in the U.S., particularly in Texas. Overall U.S. HCC rates grew from 1.7 cases to 5 cases per 100,000 from 1980 to 2005, and reached 7.5 cases per 100,000 among Latinos, according to data presented at a recent American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) conference by Dr. Amelie Ramirez, director of the Institute for Health Promotion Research at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, the team behind SaludToday. Dr. Ramirez and her colleagues also found that Latinos accounted for about 33% of HCC cases in Texas and 75% of cases in South Texas, while also documenting corresponding increases in the prevalence of obesity ...
Editor's Note: This is the testimonial of a graduate of the 2011 Summer Institute of Èxito! Latino Cancer Research Leadership Training. Read more testimonials here or apply by March 1 for the 2012 Èxito! program. Marina Daldalian
Kansas City, Kan. Growing up, Marina Daldalian’s mother, the daughter of a migrant worker, and her father, a native of Lebanon, taught her the importance of education and about caring for those with few resources. As she volunteered locally and abroad for several years, a focus on health became Daldalian’s calling. In Kansas City, Kan., Daldalian is a master’s of public health degree student at the University of Kansas Medical Center, where she also serves as a research assistant in the JUNTOS center for Advancing Latino Health in the Department of ...
Editor’s Note: This post is part of an ongoing series that will highlight the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s work in Latino communities across the country. In the early days of his career—and also of the HIV/AIDS epidemic—Gabriel Rincón, DDS, spent part of his dental residency caring for AIDS patients in the final stages of their disease. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, there was not much information being circulated about HIV, particularly in New York City’s Mexican American community, for whom the topics of sex and gender roles were taboo. “I saw people in my community getting infected with HIV/AIDS, yet there was nothing in Spanish about the disease or how to prevent it,” Rincón said. So Rincón developed a culturally sensitive presentation to ...
Editor's Note: This is the testimonial of a graduate of the 2011 Summer Institute of Èxito! Latino Cancer Research Leadership Training. Read more testimonials here or apply by March 1 for the 2012 Èxito! program. Christina Munoz-Masso
Puerto Rico Christina Munoz-Masso works hard to improve the health of boricuas—Puerto Ricans—and Latinos in general. She is an epidemiologist at the University of Puerto Rico Comprehensive Cancer Center. She coordinates a study investigating DNA methylation in leukemia patients and collaborates on a population-based study on cervical cancer. After Munoz-Masso graduated from college with a bachelor’s degree in biology, she applied for a master’s degree in epidemiology because it allowed her to combine science with helping people. To add an ...
LIVESTRONG recently announced the creation of an iPad App to help people manage their cancer experience. The app, called LIVESTRONG Cancer Guide App + Tracker, lets you store and access information relevant to your treatment and survivorship electronically to your iPad. The tracker helps you track your daily symptoms, provides space for you to journal your experience, keep track of important records and contact information. The app's Cancer Guide will help you know what to expect, learn what questions to ask, and connect to resources. Read more about the app or watch a video here or ...
