HealthyConcerns.com

Who are your Women's Health Heroes?

The folks behind Our Bodies, Ourselves  want to know:

When you hear the words “Women’s Health Hero,” who comes to mind? Your 9th grade health teacher who taught you about sexually transmitted infections? The midwife who sat with you through 15 hours of labor? The young Nigerian activist you read about who’s working to end gender discrimination in her country? Or maybe the neighbor who counter-protests at the abortion clinic every Saturday morning?

Whoever your heroes are, we want to know about them! We’ve created the Our Bodies Ourselves Women’s Health Heroes awards to honor those who make significant contributions to the health and well-being of women. It’s a great way to publicly recognize people who make a difference in your life or the lives of others.

The answers to all your questions can be found here.

The deadline is May 1st, 2009.

I will need to think about this some, but I think whoever is out there advocating to choice and health access in America is a hero. Whoever is out there trying to stop female circumcision is a hero. Whoever is out there trying to stop the spread of AIDS in Africa, where an entire generation of young women is being wiped out, is a hero.

Who is your idea of a Women's Health Hero?

Hat tip: Women's Bioethics Project

Watch out for "Wrap Rage" this holiday season

Now that I have nieces and nephews I have observed the hassle their parents, grandparents and the rest of us go through trying to extract the kids' gifts from their frustrating packaging. And quickly too (as the kids stand by anxiously ...and not too quietly...waiting).

Turns out that we're not the only family experiencing that...it's a phenomenon known as "wrap rage", and it sends people to the emergency room every year.

Not only do people have mishaps with the sharp implements they use to try to cut through the packaging...but the cut or torn hard plastic itself can cause lacerations!

Some vendors are trying to come up with "frustration-free" packaging, but it can't come soon enough. Not only for the children, but for their frazzled parents.

Hat tip: Kevin MD

If you've got Diabetes, I have the contest for you!

My BlogBuddy Amy from Diabetes Mine is hosting:

The 2008 DiabetesMine™ Holiday Survival Sweepstakes – Prizes, Prizes, Prizes!

It's all about sharing survival tactics for getting through the simple-carb-laden holiday season without doing yourself in. There are fun prizes, and even better: You can share your wisdom and knowledge with other folks in the same boat as you. (We all know that's what bloggers actually like best, even better than prizes!)

To give you an example of the kind of fun to be had, Week 2's question was:

What is your best comeback for any "diabetes" police who bug you during a holiday meal?

You can find the winning responses here. Fun.

So, I'm sure if you have diabetes you may already know about Amy's site, the number one blog about diabetes that there is.

But just in case: Happy to point you to:

Today is World Vegetarian Day...and a vegan diet turns out to be good for Type 2 Diabetes

Today happened to be World Vegetarian Day. Which, as you may know, is something I basically celebrate every day as a practicing vegan! In fact all of October is Vegetarian Awareness Month (according to the North American Vegetarian Society).

Now, i could encourage you all to give veganism a try by pointing you also to VeganMoFo, spearheaded by noted vegan chef, cookbook writer and cupcake aficianado Isa Moskowitz. That's short for the Vegan Month of Food, and is a project where scores of bloggers commit to blog as much wonderful stuff about food...recipes, reviews etc...as they can for the entire month of October.

But this is a health blog, so I will point you to the latest medical study indicating a vegan diet is effective for staving off, in this case, cardiovascular disease, particularly in patients with Type 2 diabetes. Honestly, I thought we already knew that, but i think the differentiator about this study was that it was specifically looking at Type 2 diabetes patients because heart attacks or strokes kill two-thirds of those patients! Which is pretty shocking.

So take advantage of VeganMoFo and Vegetarian Awareness month and give peace (and peas) a chance in October. Let me know how it goes, m'kay?

I'm Too Young For This-Stupid Cancer

I frequently give a presentation about the Transformative Power of Blogging, and one of the things I talk about is how blogging changes the way we get through life changes and stages, including illness and loss. one of my examples if of a blog by a woman who was widowed in her 20s. She found little out there that was targeted to or felt relatable to her as such a young widow, and blogging helped her actually build such a community of people going through the same loss so unexpectedly young. I also tell the stories of a couple of bloggers who are blogging their own illnesses, including cancer.

Hat tip to The Health Care Blog for pointing me to Matthew Zachary, the founder of I'm Too Young For This!, a site for and about young cancer survivors.

In Zacahary's words:

"There are currently no clinical trials or cancer research projects focused on young adults. Why? We're too small of a population. The young adult cancer problem is only going to be solved by and within the young adult community; from the demographic that brought us MySpace, FaceBook, YouTube. It is my personal mission not only to mobilize and activate GenX but develop our own "me generation" philanthropy model to solve our own problems with the same fervor we had for Sanjaya."

I'm Too Young For This is hosting their second annual fundraising event, entitled the Stupid Cancer Gala.

It's in a couple of weeks in NYC, and it's very affordable as galas go (double digit tickets, not triple and quadruple!) So if you're in the NYC area and are or know someone who is way too young to be dealing with cancer, go check them out.

Matthew Zachary took the power of the web and used it for good. It's easy to focus on the flamers, and the spammers and the pornographers...but take a moment to be thankful that this technological tool can also be used for such a wonderful and necessary purpose.

Where politics, health and Mother's Day intersect

This Mother's Day two bloggers are organizing a BlogSwarm that I would like to bring to your attention. Bridget Magnus (aka ShortWoman) and The Arch Crone are sponsoring a Mother's Day event to bring attention to the women who are victims of not being able to get an abortion. You can read more
about it here.

If you read ShortWoman's post you'll see that this BlogSwarm is in response to a pro-life publicity stunt, a "funeral procession" in honor of aborted fetuses.

See, there's a lot of talk about those fetuses, and there's a lot of talk about maternal health...BlogHers Act particularly focuses on it, as one example.

But ShortWoman and ArchCrone wanted to draw attention to maternal death. (Which is still shockingly prevalent I might add.)

If you want to learn more about what they're planning, visit this post.

Me? I'm happy to see people focus on the persons who are already actual persons.

Today is Blog Day for The MOTHERS Act

Yes, the first blog action event of the BlogHers Act initiative is happening today: Blog Day for The MOTHERS Act, which we are co-sponsoring along with Postpartum Progress and Postpartum Support International.

What does it entail?

Call your senators today!!

Blog it!!

Add your link to the growing list at BlogHer.

What is all this about?

Up to 800,000 women in the U.S. will develop a diagnosable perinatal mood disorder this year! (This does not include women whose babies are stillborn, who miscarry or suffer pregnancy termination). Yet only 15% of these women will receive any treatment. We need to do a better job screening, educating and treating our nation's mothers! The MOTHERS Act addresses these concerns and offers the common sense and needed remedies of screening, education, provision of services and research. Thanks to your efforts it will not go unnoticed! Let's move this out of the HELP committee and into the full senate!!

Who shall I call? What shall I say? Are those your questions?

That's where Postpartum Support International comes in. They'll even tell you if your Senator has already stepped up to co-sponsor the legislation.

The list of links is growing...add your voice to the chorus asking for this legislation to be put to a vote in the Senate and passed.

Blog Day for the MOTHERS Act is October 24th

This year BlogHer's year-long blogging activism project called BlogHers Act is focusing on maternal health. If you want to know why (besides the fact that the community voted for it) check out this post.

We're kicking off the initiative with a specific, actionable project: Blog Day for The MOTHERS Act.

For more info on what it is and why we are supporting it, check out these great other resrouces:

Postpartum Support International

Katherine Stone of Postpartum Progress

Bottom line: Of the more than 800,000 women annually who are affected by post-partum emotional and mental issues, a mere 15% get treatment. The MOTHERS Act aims to change this by requiring screening of women who have given birth.

What do you do:

1. Blog it on Blog Day for The MOTHERS Act, October 24, 2007
2. Share your link at BlogHer
3. Proudly display the badge in this post stating you're going to do the above.
4. CALL YOUR SENATORS AND ASK THEM TO SPONSOR AND SUPPORT THIS LEGISLATION!!! Go to Postpartum Support International to get all the contact info you need.

Here's the code:

<a href="http://blogher.org/bloghers-act-blog-day-mothers-act"><img src="http://blogher.org/files/BlogHersACT_MOTHERSAct.gif" height="155" width="155" alt="BlogHers Act: Blog Day for the Mothers Act" border="0"></a>


Doesn't it feel good to DO something!

I'm in Chicago for Consumer Health World

Consumer Health World has been incorporating a track on blogging and social media for the health care industry for the last year or so, thanks to the efforts of Trusted.MD and its leader, Dmitriy Kruglyak.

I spoke at the inaugural meeting of those two minds last year, and tomorrow I'm re-teaming with diva Toby Bloomberg and we're joined by Carol Kirschner to give a workshop on the nuts and bolts of starting a blog.

While it's clear that this blog and my participation in the medblogosphere has declined as my time has been sucked up by helping run the start-up that is BlogHer, I still have a lot to contribute around some fundamental issues that any organization starting a blog wants to learn more about, namely:

• Identifying your goals for the blog and then measuring how well you've achieved those goals
• Seeing the connection between what kind of blog you want you have, the kind of content that might dictate, and the kind of blogger you need to find
• The difference between being "Web 2.0" and fostering online community
• How and why to establish guidelines and policies for your online community

I'm looking forward to hanging with Toby and Carol and whoever shows up to join in the conversation.

The winning BlogHers Act Issue: Global Health!!

Now, help us narrow it down (yes, Global Health is a dauntingly HUGE topic) by taking this poll and spreading it around! The deadline for voting is August 25th.

PS-I'm going to keep the poll sticky at the top of the blog until the voting closes.

Fee free to share the poll, and here's the post that explains how the project will roll out after voting closes.

Now, aren't you glad Health won as the single red-hot issue? Go help us refine it even further!!