Dim "Some" Thought

The students in my health literacy class (a.k.a. ESL for Seniors) never cease to amaze me. Senior citizens tend to be treated less like citizens because they are seniors. So in an effort to provide equal and interesting education, for the past few months, rather than going off of a boring curriculum, I had the older adults tell me about their health concerns so that I could develop class topics around those issues. By keeping me on my heels I would have to reinvent the way I would facilitate the class based off of those topics, and because they suggested the area of discussion, I would have very little problem holding their attention. They have the right to all knowledge.

3 weeks ago I was approached by the class representative (most likely chosen because his English is the best) and told that outside of class they discussed some issues that were of interest to them. They were given free physicals annually including having blood work done, but had no way of understanding it. They complained that there were acronyms and abbreviations all over the place, and let’s just say even if they did know that HDL meant High Density Lipoprotein, what the hell does it do and why is it important to their health? I went through my own medical records (to avoid any crazy HIPAA violations) and pulled out some results of blood work I had done late last year; Lipid Panels, Urine Panels, Complete Blood Count, Hepatic/Liver Panels. Covering up my name and info, I gave copies of my lab results to the students. For the past three weeks we’ve been discussing every lab item, normal ranges for each test, and the significance of abnormal lab results (being below or above the normal clinical range). Now just imagine: in order to explain the importance of Bilirubin, Creatinine, Albumin in the body, for example, you have to be or become pretty familiar with physiology, concepts of concentration gradient, chemistry, and then some.

Poor old folks with bad memory would never be able to understand.

They understood everything.

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Food for thought.