Sadie Neves
Public
Health Community Trends Assignment
I
contacted the Park County Public Health Office in Wyoming and found out some
interesting things about the public health trends in my hometown. I was able to
talk to Kate Murphy, a registered nurse that works in the Cody, Wyoming office.
She was able to tell me exactly what the problems she was facing at that time.
It showed she was very involved in the community and aware of the challenges it
was facing at that time.
One
of the main issues that Murphy is currently trying to address is the
immunization problem. She was especially concerned with the youth and the
elderly. They are the ones that are most susceptible and suffer the most from
getting the disease, or from getting sick. So many
people either don’t realize the
importance of receiving immunizations, or they aren’t fully educated and don’t
realize the benefits of these vaccines outweigh the risks that they might believe
come with vaccines. There’s been a lot of controversy over the safety of
vaccines, and it’s her job to educate the community so they realize that it’s
an important thing they need to get done.
Childhood obesity
was another one she talked about. This is another widespread problem that I
believe concerns many public health workers. There is a push for mandatory
physical education classes in many schools to try and solve this problem. She
said a lot of it was trying to help the children understand how and why they
need to eat healthier. It’s difficult however, to change the minds of little
children to eat their greens instead of a yummy sugary piece of candy.
The next community
trend Murphy mentioned was smoking. This seems to be a lack of education issue,
however, I think more and more people do
realize how bad it is for them. There are so many people out there trying to
tell people that smoking causes so many health problems, whether it’s lung or
throat cancer that I believe it’s more of the problem of stopping a habit. At
home, there were radio commercials advertising programs that help people to
stop smoking, and this is the real problem to address now. People know it’s
harmful; they just need help getting enough gumption to quit.
Underage drinking
and reckless driving is another main concern in the Cody, Wyoming area. This is
addressed by talking to the high school students that might not understand the
devastating consequences that come with reckless driving. These students need
to become aware that bad things can happen to anybody. I personally remember
watching many presentations that show real life examples of people who have
crashed or become injured because of underage drinking and/or reckless driving.
Helping the students become aware of the danger is most important.
The last one was a
little unexpected for me. Murphy explained the increased number of impoverished
young single mothers in the area. So many of them are trying to be good
mothers, but they can’t take care of their children at home and still make
enough to provide for them financially. She didn’t say exactly how she was
going to solve this problem, but I believe with the raising rate of divorce,
this will become more and more of a problem. It’s hard in the current economy
to find a job that pays well, yet still enable the mothers to spend time caring
and nurturing their children.
It was a really
good experience to be able to talk to someone from the area where I’ve lived my
whole life. It made me realize all the different issues that public health
officials have to address, and to see all the results of their work at
educating the community. It was interesting to make the connection of many of
the things I’ve heard whether it’s radio commercials or school assemblies to
the work of public health officials.
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