How to deal with the health problems of Indians suffering from obesity was the topic of a health conference last week attended by health-care workers from across the country.
The conference at the Bahia Mar Hotel in Fort Lauderdale was sponsored by the Seminole Tribe and the federal Indian Health Service.
According to Seminole Tribe Health Planner Pauline Boothe, the workshops were intended to make people aware that being overweight can cause diabetes, hypertension and heart disease. Those dangers can be avoided by educating Indians to eat less, to eat nutritious foods and to exercise regularly, she said.
``This conference is primarily for people who work in health or tribal programs on the various reservations,`` Boothe said. ``We want them to take this knowledge home and convince other tribe members to take advantage of changing their habits.``
Those habits range from patterns of food buying and preparation to health care and recreation. Professionals from several fields discussed how working together would improve the overall health of American Indians.
``American Indians have the highest incidence of adult-onset diabetes, because they are generally overweight,`` said Dr. Bruce Leonard, who worked for three years with the Zuni Tribe in New Mexico. ``It`s a real slow process, but we can create structured exercise programs to solve that problem. We had 25 people on our reservation who were able to quit using insulin because they lost weight.``
But bad habits must be broken to create a healthy lifestyle. Seeing someone who feels and looks better as a result of a changed daily routine can be more influential than months of classes and workshops, Leonard said.
Habits among American Indians can be changed by educating young children and the elderly, said Donna Carnes, a nurse for the Coushatta Tribe in Louisiana. Nutritional health problems tend to affect those two age groups more than adults, she said.