Staying Fit
Churches, beauty salons and other community spots have been used to reach groups that often lack access to doctors to promote cancer screenings and other services. Ronald Victor, a cardiologist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, wanted to reach black men.
"Barbershops are a uniquely popular meeting place for African-American men," and many have gone every other week to the same barber for many years, he said. "It almost has a social club feel to it, a delightful, friendly environment" that makes it ideal for improving health.
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Victor did a study in 17 Dallas barbershops a few years ago. In that one, barbers tested patrons and referred them to doctors. Improvements were modest.
In the new study, "we added a pharmacist into the mix" so medicines could be prescribed on the spot, he said.
The new work involved 303 men and 52 barbershops. One group of customers just got pamphlets and blood pressure tips while they were getting haircuts. Another group met with pharmacists in the barbershops and could get treatment if their blood pressure was high.
At the start of the study, their top pressure number averaged 154. After six months, it fell by nine points for customers just given advice and by 27 points for those who saw pharmacists.
Nearly two-thirds of the men who saw pharmacists lowered their pressure to under 130/80 — the threshold for high blood pressure under new guidelines adopted last fall. Only 12 percent of the men who just got advice dropped to that level.
Nineteen of Muhammad's customers finished the program, and "all their blood pressures were down, every single one of them," he said.
Marc Sims, a 43-year-old records clerk at a law firm, is one. He didn't know he had high pressure — 175/125 — and the pharmacist said he was at risk of having a stroke.