Today is World Cancer Day, a day that gives the entire world the opportunity to come together to show solidarity on an issue that pretty much touches everybody – whether that be directly or indirectly through a family member, friend or colleague who has been diagnosed. The day aims to be a positive day with the focus being on empowerment, celebrating the lives of those who have been diagnosed and highlighting that everyone has a part to play in fighting cancer.

The theme for today is “We can. I can.” and is part of a three-year campaign exploring how everyone can contribute to reducing the global burden of cancer.  Organisers of World Cancer Day, the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), have developed a set of key messages that show exactly how everyone, as a collective or as  an individual, can play a role in reducing the impact of cancer. These messages are:

We Can:

• Inspire action, take action
• Prevent cancer
• Create healthy schools
• Create healthy workplaces
• Create healthy cities
• Support others to return to work
• Challenge perceptions
• Improve access to cancer care
• Shape policy
• Build a quality workforce
• Make the case for investing in cancer control
• Join forces to make a difference

I Can:

• Make healthy choices
• Understand that early detection saves lives
• Ask for support
• Return to work
• Take control of my cancer journey
• Love and be loved
• Make my voice heard

The aim of these messages is to reduce the millions of preventable cancer deaths that sadly take place throughout the world each year by giving everyone clear information and pushing governments to make cancer a priority.

World Cancer Day in St Kitts.

As you may know, we are now based in St Kitts, and for World Cancer Day we are delighted to have partnered with the Health Promotion Team at the Ministry of Health to take the key messages of World Cancer Day out in the community.

We started with a social media campaign using the wonderful resources developed by the UICC and of course the #WeCanICan theme but added #SKNCan (i.e. St Kitts and Nevis Can) to raise awareness of what residents of St Kitts and Nevis can do to reduce their cancer risk.

As part of our social media activity we took the messages (physically, on selfie cards!) to the streets of Basseterre and asked members of the public, businesses and government departments what messages resonated with them and did they feel they might consider taking forward to do their part in beating cancer. We then took pictures of people holding the selfie cards with the message that best represented what people thought would be most effective and these were used to raise awareness last week, in the run-up to World Cancer Day.

This was a great way to raise awareness in the community, it was fun and a bit light-hearted, but still got important messages across to the public whilst creating some teachable moments as people asked questions about what they could do specifically to prevent cancer.

We’re also in the process of organising a cancer awareness lunch to be held on 11^th February where we’ll be celebrating survivors, providing information on what the public can do to reduce their risk of developing cancer and promoting early detection through awareness of signs and symptoms and seeking help promptly.

You Can Get Involved

There is still time to get involved in this campaign.

You can visit the World Cancer Day’s website, download a selfie card, take a picture and post it on social media to show what you can do to help in the fight against cancer. Don’t forget to include the hashtags #WorldCancerDay, #WCD2018 and #WeCanICan. If you’re in St Kitts and Nevis, then go ahead and add #SKNCan.

For all the St Kitts residents out there, you can attend our cancer awareness lunch next Sunday. Stay tuned to our events page for all the details!

We’re so delighted to announce that our first Fibroids Twitter Chat of the year is with Laterria Patton on 21st February  at 5pm, AST (that’s 1pm PST, 4pm EST and 9pm GMT)

Laterria Patton is a Self Care Activist who writes a food blog that promotes reproductive health to black women. The blog content utilizes natural self-healing food practices to educate black women who are suffering with reproductive health problems about the hormonal process and how to keep it in balance.

She is passionate about eliminating the obstacles that contribute to the epidemic of reproductive health disorders amongst black women such as an absence of nutrition-based literature that specifically caters to their cultural needs and preferences, not having access to fresh toxic-free fruits and vegetables,  doctors who discourage  natural healing practices and a lack of understanding and support from their family unit.

Laterria is on a mission to create a world where there is a tremendous improvement in the outcomes and costs associated with breast, ovarian, uterine and vaginal ailments amongst black women because she believes that healthy eating, hormonal balance and reproductive health should be a positive, simple and stress-free experience for all women.

Join us for a chat with Laterria Patton about the common challenges that contribute to uterine disorders (like fibroids), how these challenges can be overcome and how women can achieve optimal uterine health through self-healing food practices.

We’ll be putting questions to Laterria and you can put your questions to her too. So if you have a burning question about uterine health or just want to get involved in the discussion then do join us on the day. To take part in the conversation please use the hashtag #FibroidsChat.

For more information on Laterria, please visit her blog  www.medium.com/@laterriapatton or follow her on social media

Twitter:  www.twitter.com/selfcareandfood

Facebook: www.fb.me/selfcareandfood

Instagram:  www.instagram.com/laterriapatton/

In 2016, the Black Women’s Health Imperative in the US published a really interesting report on black women’s health entitled IndexUS: What Healthy Black Women Can Teach Us About Health.

This report is the first comparative index on black women’s health based on healthy black women. It provides:

• Practical tips to help black women improve their health
• Recommendations for political and civic leaders on how to improve the health of black women
• An explanation as to why the health of black women is important.

This report was birthed out of the BWHI’s desire to change the negative narrative on black women’s health based on data from the Black Women’s Health Study which showed, yes, there are challenges when it comes to the health of black women, but actually, there is much to celebrate.

The Black Women’s Health Study is a research project based at Boston University that over the past 20 years has been exploring the health and well-being of black women and comparing this to that of white women. It is a fairly large study with 59,000 black women taking part.

 As data has been made available from the study, the results have been constantly negative with the prevailing message being that black women’s health is worse than white women’s, this may be true, but the BWHI asked researchers if there were any positive messages from their research.  Looking back at the data it was found that over 50% of participants in the Black Women’s Health Study described their health as good or excellent. Of this the BHWI said:

“That is something to celebrate! Black women exercise, we eat healthy, we’re educated and we work hard. It’s time to change the narrative. It’s time for our story to be told in a way that shows who we really are when it comes to our health. We do not see ourselves as broken—stressed, yes, but not broken. We are inherently strong, resilient and passionate about our health. We are not defined by disease, obesity or poverty.”

Armed with this information the BWHI then analysed the data from these healthy women in the Black Women’s Health Study to understand their lifestyles and what makes them healthy. Based on their analysis and findings they prepared their report ‘IndexUS: What Healthy Black Women Can Teach Us About Health.’  From this work, the BWHI was able to establish a set of factors that were predictive of good physical and mental health in black women which they summarised in the image below.

The BWHI is currently conducting a series of listening events across the US that will allow for honest conversations about black women’s health and based on these conversations they will update IndexUS. 

IndexUS is a fascinating and useful report and we encourage all black women to read it; the report can be accessed on the BWHI’s website here

We were absolutely delighted to be featured in the Secret Birds new social media campaign, 31 Days of Business Ideas. This campaign aims to inspire young entrepreneurs to start their business journey by giving them a wide range of ideas to learn from. The variety of businesses featured highlights the vast possibilities that are out there and underscores the importance of identifying a need and developing solutions to address that need.

Lake Health and Wellbeing (formerly The Lake Foundation) is featured on day 22 of this campaign providing up and coming business owners with the idea that challenges around health and well-being can be developed into business opportunities. We do stress that delving into this field should be done for the right reasons; to help society and not solely for personal gain as this is a field that significantly affects people’s lives and you need to have empathy and a genuine interest in people to be truly successful.

Secret Birds aims to help women in the prestart-up and start-up phase build their businesses through connecting, collaborating and growing multi-faceted memberships and to teach girls in disadvantaged communities entrepreneurial skills through Nestling Pop Ups.  They aim to build a global community with no limitations or boundaries and their mantra is to share your secrets and share your success; sharing is one of their key values and underpins everything they do.

We would like to say a big thank you to Secret Birds for featuring us in this campaign. To find out about the other businesses featured in this campaign visit the Secret Birds’ Twitter or Facebook pages and GrenStart’s Facebook page

You can also find out more about Secret Birds on their website here

Welcome to our first ‘Inspirational People in Healthcare’ piece of 2018.

Today we are delighted to feature Dr Busayo Mobolaji-Lawal and Dr Tunrayo Mobolaji-Lawal, sisters who are still early in their medical careers but making a huge difference to their patients and community.

Dr Busayo Araoye (Nee Mobolaji-Lawal)

Dr Busayo Araoye obtained a BSc in Biological Science from the University of Ghana, studied medicine at the University of Ghana School of Medicine and Dentistry and is currently an Internal Medicine Resident at St Vincent’s Medical Centre in Connecticut.

While studying Busayo gained valuable experience as an Internal Medicine Exchange Student at Hospital Clinico Universitario Lozano Blesa in Spain and as a post-graduate intern in Internal Medicine at the St Nicholas Hospital in Nigeria.

Her desire to become an Internal Medicine doctor who serves not just her patients but her community as a whole was shaped during her clerkship. Of that experience she says:

“I encountered the most medically and socially complex patients. I gained exposure to patients from diverse cultural and financial backgrounds which helped me develop a sense of compassion, empathy and humility. It also broadened my perspective of health care accessibility and it awoke in me the urge to advocate for my patients and my community.”

She also has research experience having been an integral part of teams exploring: the quality of life of caregivers at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Ghana; the different types of cervical cancer diagnosed at the University College Hospital in Ibadan, Nigeria; stroke and cocaine use; and antibiotic resistance.

Her case presentation on antibiotic resistance was recognised at the American College of Physician’s regional conference in 2017 where she was a semi-finalist in their abstract presentation competition in Connecticut.

Through a range of voluntary work Dr Araoye has counselled communities on healthy lifestyle practices, engaged in free health screening and played an instrumental role during a cholera outbreak in Ghana. She was also an Electoral Member of the University of Ghana International Medical Students’ Association and a mentor to many being an inspirational and effective role model to young students with an interest in medicine.

We applaud Dr Araoye for the difference she has already made and look forward to seeing her continued success and future achievements as she progresses in her career.

Dr Tunrayo Mobolaji-Lawal

Dr Tunrayo Mobolaji-Lawal graduated Summa Cum Laude (with highest distinction) from the State University of New York at Stony Brook with a BSc. in Biochemistry in 2011. She then studied medicine at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine graduating in May 2017 and is currently an Emergency Medicine Resident at Yale New Haven Health.

In preparation for pursuing a career in Emergency Medicine Dr Mobolaji-Lawal held a number of shadowing and voluntary positions. As a sophomore in college she gained experience in the Emergency Department of Stony Brook University Medical Centre. This experience shaped her view of medicine and the type of doctor that she wanted to be, one who puts her patient’s first. Her third year clerkship was at the Cleveland Clinic Emergency Department, of that she said:

“Every hour brought in something new to the ED. The diversity of clinical encounters – unique patients with varying disease processes, range of illness severity and assortment of procedures – further attracted me to Emergency Medicine.”

Whilst performing chest compressions on a seriously ill patient as an Acting Intern at The Metro Health System Emergency Department  she realised that she was exactly where she wanted to be (involved in patient care and making a difference)and this solidified her passion for Emergency Medicine.

Dr Mobolaji-Lawal is also passionate about addressing health inequalities and ensuring that medically under-served communities are able to access healthcare services. To that end, through her voluntary work she has provided healthcare and screening services to deprived communities.

Throughout her academic life she excelled being awarded the SUNY’s Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence, which recognises the integration of academic excellence with accomplishments in the areas of leadership, athletics, community service, creative and performing arts, campus involvement or career achievement. She was also awarded the Provost’s Award for Academic Excellence, an award given annually to a very select number of students who have shown true academic excellence, not just in the classroom but in research, creative activities or in building an academic community. Additionally she was awarded the Andrea Roher Scholarship which is awarded to an undergraduate student dedicated to the field of Health and Wellness. Finally Dr Mobolaji-Lawal was the recipient of the Bernadine P. Healy and Floyd D. Loops Scholarship and the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine Full Tuition Scholarship.

Additionally, Dr Mobolaji-Lawal was the president of the Minority Health Interest Group at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College, held a number of positions representing her Medical School and was involved in teaching and tutoring students.

We look forward to seeing Dr Mobolaji-Lawal excel as an Emergency Doctor and wish her every success with her career.

The Cancer Centre Eastern Caribbean was launched in July 2015 as part of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States’ mandate for its residents.  The centre is based in Antigua, is the first of its kind in the Caribbean and aims to provide the highest quality of care to its patients.  It is equipped with state-of-the-art technology and facilities and the care delivered is based on the Partnered Care Model where the delivery of healthcare involves the private sector, public sector and the general public, making treatment affordable to patients.

Their Services

The centre offers its patients the following services:

Medical Concierge Service – patients will be arriving from a number of Eastern Caribbean countries and having to travel for treatment can be a daunting and draining experience for patients. To ease the burden of travel the centre has set up a medical concierge service. Upon arrival in Antigua patients will be met by a member of the centre’s concierge team. They will be assisted with their luggage and transported to their guest house and transportation can be arranged to take patients to  and from their appointments at the centre.

Treatment Consultations –  all patients will have a professional and comprehensive consultation with an oncologist. At this appointment the patient’s test results and medical records will be reviewed and a treatment plan developed,  any additional tests that are required will be done in-house at the centre.

Chemotherapy –  a wide range of chemotherapy is available and the highest standards of delivery can be expected from the centre.

Radiotherapy –  External beam radiation therapy is also available using state-of-the-art equipment.

Who can access the centre?

The cancer centre serves all residents of the OECS member states as well as patients from outside the OECS. They see insured patients, private patients and government sponsored patients.

More Information

For more information about the centre please contact them using the details below:

The Cancer Centre Easter Caribbean
The Medical Pavilion Antigua
Michael’s Mount
Queen Elizabeth Highway
P.O. Box W599
St John’s, Antigua, W.I.

Tel: 1-268-460-6000
Fax: 1-268-460-6000
Email: info@TMP-Antigua.com
Website: http://www.thecancercentreeasterncaribbean.com

Today’s blog is the second in our gardening and health blog series. We hear from Abi Begho who discusses what motivated her to set up her backyard vegetable garden and how she got started.

I’ve never been a huge fan of gardening, in fact gardening never really entered into my thoughts until recently. There has been a lot of change in my life with my husband and I moving from the UK to the Caribbean. We moved for many reasons with the main reasons being to improve our quality of life, escape the city where everything is so fast-paced and to get back to what is really important  – fulfilling our purpose in life and having a positive impact on the world around us.

As we planned our move the idea of being sustainable and self-sufficient appealed to us – we’re going to have the space so why not try growing all our fruits and vegetables? I liked the idea of it, but in my mind I thought: this is going to be a chore and a lot of work, and I really don’t know where to start.

Getting Started

Once we moved I turned to my trusty friend, YouTube, and started exploring how to start a vegetable garden and there was so much useful advice.

I focused on fruits and vegetables that we eat already  (tomatoes, okras, peppers, onions, broccoli etc.) and read up on how to grow these from seeds, but also consulted with my brother-in-law who is working on his PhD in agricultural economics.

My research was really eye-opening and highlighted just how much I didn’t know about the food we eat and where it comes from – who knew that okra actually starts its life as a beautiful flower and this flower turns into an okra pod ? Amazing!

Armed with videos, information and lots of advice, I began. My first project was tomatoes. I literally just sliced up a tomato, making sure each of the slices had seeds in them and buried the slices in soil – a very simple tip I picked up from YouTube. I have to admit I was extremely skeptical – can I really grow tomato plants from these slices buried in a bit of soil? Well, to my surprise, less than a week later the seeds in the slices had germinated and I had the cutest little tomato seedlings growing happily in my container. That was towards the end of October and as I type I have nine tomato plants that are over a foot tall with 23 little green tomatoes  developing and two huge green tomatoes which look  like they’re ready to turn red any day now –  great results! I am so proud and feel a huge sense of accomplishment that I have made such significant progress in growing my tomato plants from seeds.

So far, I have to say, I absolutely LOVE gardening. I have found it to be extremely relaxing, I wake up early every morning and spend some quiet time in the garden with my vegetables (that sounds a bit creepy, I know!).  My surroundings are beautiful, the weather is great and the plants look like they develop a bit more every day, which I find really fascinating. It’s nice starting the day with the peace and tranquillity of engaging with nature and I now truly appreciate the beauty of God’s creation.

Oh, and let’s not  forget that gardening is actually hard work so I do get some serious exercise, particularly when I am creating the vegetable beds –  I have to do a lot of digging, weeding and  raking . You won’t believe how much weight I’ve lost since I started gardening, I can hardly believe it myself.

In my next blog…

My gardening journey has just started and in my next few blog posts I’ll share my experience until I hopefully get some produce (how exciting!). I’ll also share the health benefits of what I am growing, what I have learnt and the dishes I make from the vegetables I have grown – it may just inspire you to grow your own fruits and vegetables too.

Next time I’ll be discussing my lovely tomatoes and giving you an update on their growth.

See you in the next blog and happy gardening!

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If you missed the first blog post in this series, you can read it here to find out more about the health benefits of gardening – there are many!

The Body Mass Index (BMI) is a method used throughout the world to determine whether a person is at a healthy weight for their height. It is calculated by dividing a person’s weight by the square of their height giving a value that is expressed in kg/m². It tends to be used as a measure of a person’s total body fat.

People are assigned to one of four BMI categories (shown below) which helps to identify whether they are overweight or obese.

• Underweight – less than 18.5
• Normal weight – 18.5 to 24.9
• Overweight – 25 to 30
• Obese – 30  and over

It has been a useful, easy method of exploring weight and body fat, but its limitations are well known. Criticisms of it include:

• It doesn’t take into account factors such as age, sex and ethnicity
• It doesn’t look at the type of fat a person has
• It doesn’t differentiate between excess fat, muscle mass or bone mass

This means that the BMI may overestimate the amount of body fat athletes and body builders possess and underestimate harmful body fat in people who have a normal BMI.

Children and BMI

When looking at children, a different scale is used that takes into account the fact that children are constantly growing, and that boys and girls develop differently, so the BMI scale for children takes into account age and sex.

Researchers in the UK have found that the scale for children doesn’t accurately reflect the obesity levels in black and Asian children living in the UK. This is a problem as we can’t accurately identify children who will be at higher risk of health conditions such as diabetes and heart disease later in life.

Research into Children, BMI and Ethnicity

Researchers in St Georges and University College London, funded by the British Heart Foundation started work in this area a few years ago and published their work in March 2017.

Having identified that BMI may not be providing accurate measurements for ethnic minority children they sought to develop a method to adjust BMI values based on ethnicity.

In order to create the BMI adjustments they had to go back to basics and look at the actual body fat measurements of children. They identified 1,728 children aged 4 to 12 years old. They then explored the relationship between  BMI and body fat in each ethnic group (White European, Black African and South Asian). Using this data they were able to calculate the BMI adjustment needed for each ethnic group.

From their work they were able to confirm that BMI underestimated body fat levels in South Asians and overestimated body fat levels in Black Africans.

Based on their findings the research team developed a BMI calculator for children with an adjustment for ethnicity. Parents, teachers and healthcare professionals can use this simple tool to obtain accurate BMI readings for black and Asian children.

The research team followed up this work with research that they published in November 2017. This was a larger piece of work to explore the extent of the problem of using BMI in assessing the body fat of children.

They used data from the National Institute of Health Research’s National Child Measurement Programme.  Every year this programme assesses the weight of children in the UK who are aged 4-5 years old and 10-11, and attend a state-funded primary school.

The research team applied their new BMI adjustment to the weight measurements for children weighed between 2012 and 2013. This included 583,899 children aged 4-5 years old and 485,362 children aged 10-11. Their findings are summarised in the tables below.

Percentage of boys who were overweight or obese

Ethnicity	% Overweight and Obese
	Without Ethnicity Adjustment		With Ethnicity Adjustment
	4-5 years old	10-11 years old	4-5  years old	10-11 years old
Black African	31%	42%	11%	32%
South Asian	19%	42%	39%	52%
White European	23%	33%	–	–

Percentage of girls who were overweight or obese

Ethnicity	% Overweight and Obese
	Without Ethnicity Adjustment		With Ethnicity Adjustment
	4-5 years old	10-11 years old	4-5  years old	10-11 years old
Black African	29%	45%	12%	35%
South Asian	19%	34%	35%	44%
White European	21%	30%	–	–

Their results showed that the BMI overestimated the percentage of black children who were overweight or obese by 10-20% (depending on age and sex) so a significant number of black children are being misclassified in the government’s national weight assessment programme.

They concluded that BMI does not accurately reflect body fat in ethnic minorities and by using adjustments a more accurate measurement of the body fat can be determined.

Our Thoughts

This body of work highlighted the gaps that exist in medical research and the problem of using one ethnic group as a standard for health. This work clearly shows the need to explore ethnicity and health, it demonstrates that by not taking race and ethnicity into account key differences are being masked and we therefore don’t have a true picture of the health of our community.

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Sources

1. Body mass index adjustments to increase the validity of body fatness assessment in UK Black African and South Asian children (22^nd March 2017)
2. Patterns of childhood body mass index (BMI), overweight and obesity in South Asian and black participants in the English National child measurement programme: Effect of applying BMI adjustments standardizing for ethnic differences in BMI-body fatness associations (2^nd November 2017)
3. New BMI readings for children of different ethnicities (March 2017)
4. BMI Adjust (March 2017)
5. Body Mass Index Considerations for Practitioners
6. Body Mass Index Advantages and Disadvantages (July 2017)
7. BMI failing to reflect childhood obesity levels in ethnic minorities (Nov 2017)
8. Children from ethnic minorities may have been wrongly labelled obese, according to new research (Nov 2017)

The black community has a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes and this increased risk was thought to be due to a combination of factors with genetics playing a significant role.

 In a study recently published in JAMA it has been shown that there is no genetic reason linking black people to an increased risk of diabetes. The increase in risk is due to lifestyle factors like obesity.

This study looked at 4,251 black and white men and women, aged 18 to 30 without diabetes.  Forty-nine per cent were black (2,066 participants) and 54% were women (2,304 participants). Participants were followed for an average of 25 years and over time 504 cases of diabetes were identified – 189 white participants and 315 black partcipants developed type 2 diabetes.

The study found that overall black men and women were more likely to develop diabetes but when they took into account factors like biology, neighbourhood, psycho-social, socioeconomic and behavioural, both black and white people had the same risk of developing type 2 diabetes.  If there was an underlying genetic reason then when all those factors were taken into account then there would have still been an increased risk seen in black men and women.

When exploring what specific factors increased black people’s risk of type 2 diabetes they found that factors that were modifiable were the main culprits – body weight, waist size, blood sugar level, blood pressure and others.

Researcher Prof Mercedes Carnethon said:

“Obesity is driving these differences. The findings surprised us, because for the past 20 years there was a narrative that there must be something we haven’t found that was causing this higher rate. Blacks gained more weight over time. It was the accumulation of this and other risk factors that eliminated the so-called mysterious cause of the disparity.”

The findings for this study are empowering, in a way, as it means that clear steps can be taken to reduce the high risk seen in the black community by promoting a healthy lifestyle with lead study author Michael Bancks stating:

“To eliminate the higher rate of diabetes, everybody needs to have access to healthy foods, safe spaces for physical activity and equal economic opportunity to have enough money to afford these things and live in communities that offer this.”

The focus now has to be on ensuring that more black people live a healthy lifestyle so that health inequalities like this can be addressed. This means delving into the social and economic inequalities which may act as barriers to living a healthy lifestyle.