Last Class

Oh so sad that this was our last class:(. I have learned a bunch of new important information that I can for surely use at my job and in the future. The other day at work I was even thinking about 663 while I was providing feedback on a parent questionnaire. I wanted to say, hey...why don't we ask our target population what they think since they are filling it out?? I really enjoyed the lecture on the different career options in health communication(s). I feel many professors leave this important portion out of their classes. I didn't really mean that 666 is evil everyone!;) Its just when people would ask me what class I had in the god awful late Friday afternoon, I would say 666 and it just sounded funny. You know how 666 is associated with evil haunting stuff. So from the beginning of the semester on I would just refer to it as my evil class. At least next semester it will not be offered on Friday afternoon. That was the hardest part of it all. Good luck on your presentations everyone! See you then!

11-26-07

Great PRESENTATIONS EVERYONE! I really enjoyed the presentation on the flu vaccine and all the good/interesting feedback they received from testing their message. I think we all had troubles trying to satisfy everyone's wants and needs, but I think we all did our best summarizing what people wanted. I think that is one of the most challenging parts of getting feedback from others is that you cannot make everyone happy. It was interesting to also hear what feedback the walking school bus received since they are working with not only the child, but the parent as well. I think its funny though that parents will think that some websites that are similar to my space are safer for their children. My sister-in-law allows her kids to get on all these other online communities, but not my space. I think all online communities can be unsafe because no matter what, you will never know for sure who is on the other side. Interesting though:). See you in class next time. Oh...I vote for appetizers! YUMMY!

Pop Cultre

Today's lecture was very fascinating! It really made me think about certain movies or shows that could possibly be used to send a health message. What immediately popped in my mind was this movie called Kids. This movie is based in a city and follows this group of skater kids around. The main character was a young teenager who decides to sleep with this skater (disgusting looking by the way) kid. It was her first time and he tricked her into thinking it was his first time too. They didn't use protection and bad thing was he slept around! Well at the end, the main character goes with her friend to get tested for HIV/AIDS. The main chick was just going to support her friend and then finds out that she is HIV positive. It was soo crazy! A great message for teens I thought. No matter how much you trust someone, you just never know. If you haven't seen it...rent it...it's an eye opener for sure. HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

PR-Media-Food-stamps

Wow...you can absolutely tell that the guest speaker was sooo into PR. How about that comment about reading the newspaper? Shhh! I always seem to hear that from different people that it is very important to read the newspaper and be updated with todays events. However, I just can't seem to squeeze this into my crazy chaotic life! This week I had to contact a media person to talk about doing a press release on the project i'm coordinating and I kept thinking...."THE MEDIA IS NOT YOUR FRIEND!!" Haha!! Its really true though. She gave us some great tips! Also, the presentation on Food-stamps was very interesting! I had always assumed that the EBT just meant some other form of a debit card that I hadn't used before, but had never once thought that it was linked to food stamps. It was nice to know too that the people that utilize the system are not the stereotypes. Good presentation:)!

Fire Blog

I'm so glad the fires have been somewhat contained. This whole past week has been very stressful, even without school! I was soo worried about the people I knew who had to be evacuated. At times like these I really wish my family was around. All of my family lives up north about 8 hours. So on Thursday morning I woke up and said I'm getting the heck out of here. I think at times like these, family is soo important. I'm glad to hear that everyone is safe and sound.

October 15th

It was great to listen to the different group presentations. I was happy to know that not only my group, but others are having the same barriers placed against them. DON'T WORRY CLASS....WE WILL GET THROUGH IT!!! On another note, I enjoyed learning about the concepts of anchoring and how prices are framed in our environment. I noticed this the other day when I was out shopping. I noticed that red tags are usually associated with sale items and i'm usually bargin shoppping. When I saw the red tag through the display window, I immediately thought..."this must be on sale!" However, when I went into the store, the item was not on sale. Good marketing strategy for that store! The red tags brought me into their store. I noticed that stores, such as Albertsons use a similar strategy. For instance, when Albertsons advertises grocery times: get 10 items for $10 bucks! People are drawn to the way that the numbers were presented. I've noticed though, that if you don't purchase all 10 items then sometimes you won't get the deal. Bummer for me because I don't need that many items. The presentation of numbers is very important when marketing a product.

October 8th

One of the topics in class was health literacy. This topic brought me back to my cultural competency days. After I finished undergrad I worked for a community health center on a project to increase cultural competency amongst physicians and staff. A large portion of patients were Hmong or Latino immigrants and there was a huge cultural/language barrier. The Hmong population were more challenging to work with because there were not many professionals/staff that spoke the language and their cultural beliefs were so different from westernized medicine. Some of the new Hmong immigrants were diagnosed with TB and were required to take medications for treatment. However, this was difficult for them to understand because in their country there is no doctor. They believe in a Shaman, which is a well respected person from the community that has spiritual powers to cross to the spiritual world. If a family member becomes sick or depressed they are sent to a shaman for help. Animals are sacrificed and the Shaman goes into a special trance state to cross to the spiritual world to ask the ancestors for advice or direction. So taking pills at certain times for a certain amount of days or months was totally unheard of. Physicians and healthcare staff really struggled to keep this population healthy because of this cultural misunderstanding. To make a long story short, physicians and the Hmong Shaman work together to treat Hmong patients. Some gaps still exist, but this project help fill a very important space.

I recognize that health literacy is a big problem in healthcare. I've come across so many patients, friends, and family members that just don't know what is going on. I find that many people don't know how to ASK...WHAT, WHEN, WHY? For example, my little sister who is in her early twenties living by herself in LA had a minor operation. My family lives about 6 hours north, so i'm the closest family member distance wise and of coarse the health expert. My mom was really worried about her so I took a day off to help her out on the day of her discharge. When I arrived at the Kaiser Hospital (oh, by the way I HATE HMO'S and KAISER...if you have this insurance I feel for you...these companies are money making heartless...bleep, bleep...you get the point!) they hadn't told my sister when to take her meds or when she needed to follow-up with a doctor. Nothing! The nurse just said...oh if you want me to call the doctor I can. Being the assertive woman I am, I said "YES get the doctor on the phone". I had my sister ask all the questions that I could think of and told her...you need to ASK. It's soooo sad! I mean, my sister is a smart, independent woman who speaks English fluently and luckly has a HEALTH EXPERT 4 A SISTER....but it made me think....what happens to people who don't speak up....who don't know English...who don't have a health expert in the family....who are illiterate???? How many new immigrants who can not speak English well and can't read are going to say to that nurse "oh yah, get the doctor on the phone, because I have a list of questions that he or she hasn't answered yet". That doesn't happen....they fall down the cracks and don't get the healthcare they need! Gosh...I could go on with this topic! Goodnight!:-).