Welcome to today's People to People. I'm Brhett Vickery
in for Micah Materre. We're getting things
started this morning with some of the
medical headlines impacting communities
here in Chicago. Here to cover it
all is our medical dream team doctor in Ghazi Zeke president
and CEO of sunny chicago. I hope I said your name right. Beautiful name there. And Dr. Jeffrey Sterling,
author and president, ceo of Sterling Initiatives. Good morning.
Thanks for being with us. Good morning.
Always good to be
with you. Well,
there's a lot going on, Medical. We have a lot to get to. Want to start, though,
with Dr. Sterling. We're talking about preventative
care. We're just getting back
to basics, kind of Talk to me about that.
Absolutely. You know,
it's really very simple. And also, prevention will always
be worth a pound of cure. And the way
things have been going lately, we just want people
to be in touch with the fact
that they are the best stewards of their own health care. People have to take ste
ps
to become empowered, to know when to seek care, how to take care of themselves,
to prevent, to prevent illness, and when to present to places like an emergency department
or the doctor's offices. Yeah. And when it comes to, you know,
battling misinformation, kind of navi ting, you know, there's poor access, maybe
financial limitations, maybe. What do you have
words of encouragement do you have maybe for anyone
battling with that? Rule number one is always
consider the source. You know, there'
s so many would
be cures for cancer these days. If there really was that thing,
it wouldn't be coming from the types
of sources that people tend to grab the information
and send it over to me via social media. Get yourself a trusted provider,
a trusted messenger, and verify that information
when you actually engage. Learn how to get questions so that you can be empowered
in the conversation. Don't just sit there and expect to be told this, that
or the other. Act on yourself.
Act on the situation
. And you actually will do better.
Yeah. And sometimes there are people,
especially in our community, who might be like,
you know, I'm fine sticking through these symptoms. You know,
I don't want to be seen as maybe a hypochondriac
or like, I'm fine. At what point do
people need to power through or go see a doctor and go trust a doctor
rather than just kind of dealing with symptoms? It really disappoints. Again, I'm
an emergency physician, so it really disappoints me
when people come in too late
. Yeah, I tell people all the time
it's my job not to judge, but to treat. It's okay if I don't give
everybody good news. So if you come
and everything works out okay, that's the best possible thing
that can happen. Please
learn to engage the system at the earliest opportunity. And it's okay
if everything checks out. Learn to get engaged. Don't wait
because time is tissue, as we say in emergency medicine. If you wait too long, then the chance of you actually
getting the help you need dramaticall
y lessened. And you can give them good news
when you tell them you came on time,
you came before it was too late. That is good news in whatever
kind of situation, as much as you can be
in a tough situation. Dr. Zeke We're seeing Colon
Cancer Awareness Month is here. You've set the example
for some of your staff members. Kind of talk to me about that
and the importance of even beyond March
addressing that. That's right. So March, you know,
we're at the end of March, but this is Colorectal
Cancer
Awareness Month. And so it's a big thing
because cancer is the number two cause of death
for Americans throughout throughout the country,
men and women. And we are seeing it
come in younger people. You know, and so I think a lot of people might not know
that the newest guidelines, which are are a couple of years
old, say that you're supposed to start the screening at 45
and not 50. And so, you know, the campaign
that the American Cancer Society has out
there is your colon is 45. So anyone who's
45
should really look to get that colonoscopy, because, again,
just following up on Dr. Sterling's comments, you know, if you find it early,
like that's the best thing. Early detection can lead
to great, great outcomes. And that's what we want
for everyone. We don't want to find out that you presented too late
or you're going to need all this extensive care. So early detection. I just had my colonoscopy
this month in celebration of the month
and I encouraging others to do the same and set the co
lonoscopy
as a painless procedure. And so we've got to get
more people doing it. And we also do
see that it is more prevalent. We're having higher rates of
of death in the
African-American community. So we really have to make sure
that that population is specifically tuned in
to get those colonoscopies early and make sure we start
that screening at 45 and maybe earlier, depending
on your family history. Yeah, I was going to say you mentioned it's
a painless experience. As somebody
I'm only 27 ne
xt week, so I'm not that close to 45, obviously, but I'm I'm already
dreading the experience. So for somebody like me
who like, Oh my gosh,
I don't want to do that. Kind of ease
my nerves a little bit and just kind of express again
the importance. No, absolutely. It was like the best. What,
25 minute sleep I ever got. It is completely painless. You know, you are put to sleep
and by the timime you wake up, then you're finding out
how everything went, which I'm really grateful
that everything went
well. You know,
you have to do the prep before. I think that's what's
freaking me out a little bit. But, you know, it's
that can be a process. Sure, sure. But it's definitely worth it
to get a clean bill of health or find out
that there's something that you found really early
and that you can take care of so that you can go on
to live your best life. Yeah,
it's like 48 hours of misery, if you want to call it,
if you want to be a downer. But it's not even that
key here saying it's easy there. We
're hearing of a measles
outbreak in Chicago, Illinois, being one of one of the states that has probably the most cases
right now. We talk about it all the time
in the news and you hear measles and you're like, isn't
that of like the past? Like where did
measles come from? Kind of talk to me about
and you can talk about it to Dr. Sterling if you have any experience
with it right now of just kind of
what's going on in Chicago and what people need to look out
for, since it is those numbers are sta
rting
to ramp up a bit. Yeah, I think some of the latest numbers,
we have more cases in the first three months of the year
than we had all of last year. So there have been
some significant outbreaks. Chicago being the location
for one of the major ones. This is a very contagious viral
infection that, you know, is
almost entirely preventable. In fact, I would say that
it was eradicated from the U.S. When you have those
high vaccination rates, it is you know,
the vaccine is very effective. And so,
you know, anyone
who is not vaccinated, it's very important
that you to get vaccinated. But it is a highly contagious
disease. It's one of those diseases
that if you were exposed to it and you're not vaccinated, there's like a 90% chance
that you will get measles. And it's a serious disease. One in five people can have
a very serious complication. So we really want to go back to the days
when we called it eradicated. We want to make sure we keep our vaccination rates very,
very high. And, you k
now, if you are told that you were exposed to it,
please see your physician to figure out
what the next steps are. Yeah, absolutely. There's a certain amount
of cause and effect that the people that are watching
just really need to appreciate. Number one,
it literally was considered eradicated in the United States
just a couple of decades ago here in Chicago with this, we actually were one of the
highest immunized communities in the entire nation. And thus
the rates were fantastic. Well, it's ve
ry simple. Those that are not immunized
are the ones that are at risk. And if people get on
whatever bandwagon tells them that vaccines are not good
or immunizations are dangerous themselves,
that is where the risk lies. That is
where the growth has occurred. That's
where the cases are coming from. So to the extent to which people have already been vaccinated
and immunized, you're going to be okay. So keep that same energy trust that this wouldn't
be an epidemic of everyone had continued
the sam
e thing that had been going on
for the time frame that led to this being
eradicated in the United States. And does that vaccine, you know,
we get it typically when we're younger. Is that good? Just forever? Yeah. Typically if you you know,
you get it at on your birthday, you know,
maybe not your birthday, but at that one year visit,
you know, 12 to 15 months, you get that shot and then you're supposed
to get another one after about when you're going
into kindergarten. So you know, about four or
five. And so if you get those two,
you are fully immunized. Forget about it
now. Forget about it. Exactly. Well, quickly,
looking ahead to April now, we have black Maternal Health
Week. We have National Minority
Health Month. Just kind of talk to me
about what what are some of the things
that we can expect and look forward to for next
month as far as health goes? You know, basically in Sinai,
Chicago, that's all we do. Like we are out there
trying to make sure that we narrow
these disparities. W
e want to make sure
that every person, whatever your color, whatever
your creed that you are getting, you know, safe, respectable,
quality, comprehensive care. And so we want that for
for maternal health, where we're seeing,
unfortunately, that the rates of maternal mortality
are significantly higher for for women of color, worst
for for African-American women. And so we really want
to identify, you know,
all of the things that we can do to narrow those gaps,
because having a baby should be the
most joyous time in life
and it shouldn't shouldn't result in a death. And so we want to do all that
we can to avoid that awful outcome. And really,
the number to remember is somewhere in 75 to 80%. Those are important numbers
in this conversation because 75 to 80% of the causes
of maternal mortality are preventable. I want to go back
to what we were saying about literally being empowered
to take care of yourself. You can't wait. If you think you may be
pregnant. You need to get evaluated. You n
eed to get plugged
into the system. You need to get prenatal care. And that same 75 to 80% number
is something to remember in terms of the disparities
that exist. Black women
suffer at a much higher rate than the general population
when it comes to these things. So for this particular
community, it's just critical that we get plugged into the system
and things will be better in terms
of lowering your risk. Yes. And when we have you guys
in the community, we can all trust each other
here. Thank y
ou so much. You can find more
on the work Dr. Sterling is doing at Jeffrey
Sterling, M.D. dot com. For more information. You can also visit Sinai
Chicago dot org. Thank you guys for coming
in. Thank you. Thank you.
Comments