Center for Health Transformation Georgia Project

Know Your Numbers!

I attended the launch of a new '21st Century Healthy Community' project recently in Fayette County, Georgia.  The Fayette Healthy Community Partnership is a collaboration of health care provider organizations, employers, retailers, and other businesses and groups brought together by locals Daye Bexley and Terry Womack to promote health and wellness in Fayette and Coweta Counties.  Leaders of the Partnership include the Piedmont Fayette and Newnan Hospitals and the Piedmont Heart Institute, Kroger Stores and Pharmacies, the Center for Health Transformation, and Novo Nordisk.

One of the highlights of the launch was the health screening and education held at the local Kroger Store.  Screening included Body Mass Index, blood pressure, blood sugar, total cholesterol, LDL, HDL, Triglycerides and percent body fat.  A 'Heart Health Scorecard' was provided by Piedmont Heart Institute, the Center for Health Transformation, and the Piedmont Fayette and Piedmont Newnan Hospitals.  If every individual knew these numbers, what they meant and simple steps to improving them we would make progress in improving the health of our nation. 

Initiatives such as these are key to better health at lower cost.  Visit the Center for Health Transformation website to learn more about '21st Century Healthy Community Initiatives.'

Blue Zones

My friends at Healthways introduced me to a book and movement on adding healthy years to our lives. The book, The Blue Zones: Lessons for living longer from the people who've lived the longest, is by Dan Buettner.  Dan is the founder of Blue Zones, an organization that helps Americans live longer, healthier lives.  The book is an amazing journey with Dan and his team as they learn from Centenarians from areas of the world with concentrations of the longest living people.  These areas, called Blue Zones, are found in Sardinia, Italy; Okinawa, Japan; Loma Linda, California; and the Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica.

The book concludes with the nine lessons of the Blue Zones - the world's best practices in health and longevity.  The chapter is filled with practical strategies for applying these lessons.  Applying just a few of them will certainly improve one's health.

The Blue Zones website contains a tool - the Vitality Compass - that calculates your potential life expectancy, your healthy life expectancy, the number of extra years you could gain if you optimize your lifestyle, and suggestions to help you with that plan.

I'd be interested in your thoughts about the book and website.  I found the book an interesting read - one that is hard to put down.  It was full of funny and heartwarming stories and of health and longevity information that I put to immediate use.  Applying lessons from the Blue Zones definitely would improve the health of our communities - and who know, perhaps we could turn the tide and create a few more Blue Zones in America with future generations.