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UCLA student groups Black Hypertension Project and African Education Project raise awareness about hypertension, healthy lifestyles in South Los Angeles

By Sandy Bui

Oct. 26, 2011 12:43 a.m.

Lexy Atmore
Lexy Atmore

A thought fluttered through 8-year-old Deandre Mosley’s mind as he stood in the park beside his Compton home.

UCLA students had just given Mosley his first blood pressure screening, but there was still one thing he wanted to learn.

“How to read the mon”“” Mosley shyly muttered about the blood pressure monitor, until another child from Compton’s New Wilmington Arms community interrupted him.

The boy scurried up to Mosley with a stethoscope and proceeded to listen to Mosley’s heartbeat.

“You can hear your heart!” Mosley said with a wide smile.

For Mosley and many other children, Saturday was the first time they learned about hypertension, or high blood pressure, and heart health.

Members of UCLA’s Black Hypertension Project and African Education Project student groups collaborated this weekend to extend knowledge about hypertension and maintaining good health to the New Wilmington Arms apartment community in South Los Angeles.

UCLA students performed blood pressure screenings for children and adults in the black community. The purpose of the event was to teach people how to attain healthy lifestyles and diets, said Gloria Obialisi, a fourth-year neuroscience student and external director of BHP.

The event was the first time the BHP created an agenda that targeted the community at New Wilmington Arms, Obialisi said.

Obialisi’s group worked alongside the AEP, a group that works with the New Wilmington Arms community at least seven Saturdays a quarter to teach children about African and African-American history and art, said Xihuanel Tutashinda, a third-year world arts and cultures student and the project director of the AEP.

The complex is defined as “section 8 housing,” a federal housing program that provides housing assistance to low-income renters.

African Americans have the highest rates of high blood pressure, Obialisi said. The reasons for this are unknown, said Dr. Kathryn Murray, a child and adolescent psychiatry fellow and alumna of BHP.

African Americans also have generally lower incomes and limited access to health care resources compared with other groups, Obialisi said. As a result, the black community at the Compton location was ideal for BHP’s mission to increase awareness of high blood pressure, Obialisi said.

Hypertension is often called the “silent killer” because the problem emerges without people realizing it, Obialisi said. One in three Americans has high blood pressure, and a smaller percentage of that statistic does not treat the problem, she added.

Most cases of hypertension are essential hypertension, which means that the cause is unknown, Murray said. Genetic factors, family health history, diet and stress can influence high blood pressure, Murray added.

Diet and exercise can minimize and modify the factors that cause hypertension, although at some point, medication might be needed, Murray added.

The BHP visits about three different sites per quarter to support lower-income black communities. They usually set up at barber shops and health fairs throughout Los Angeles, and they have also extended their services to Latino communities, Obialisi said.

The long-term objective of the BHP is to follow up with the communities they service to ensure that they have made an impact, Obialisi said. The group plans to return to the New Wilmington Arms location each quarter to follow up and reinforce their teachings, she added.

In addition to blood pressure readings, BHP volunteers regularly distribute brochures about healthy eating and perform body mass index screenings. Volunteers are trained through the American Red Cross, Obialisi added.

“Teaming up with (the BHP) is really good because a lot of times, a lot of these parents don’t have health care. We want to make sure the kids learn about their heart,” Tutashinda said.

Education has the potential to change the disparities in the black community, Obialisi said.

“Once you step out of the UCLA campus, you see how much we know and how little the communities around us know,” Obialisi said.

Common behavior for maintaining healthy lifestyles, like exercising, avoiding excessive salt intake and reducing stress, are among the issues these low-income communities are unaware of, she added.

Angela Goodlow, a New Wilmington Arms resident, said she is overweight and that she had her blood pressure checked after her daughter insisted.

Goodlow said she was relieved to discover that her reading was healthy.

“Right here where we are, we need to know that somebody cares,” Goodlow said.

Outsiders tend to think that her community does not want assistance, she added.

“We’re trying to get past that stigma, and so things like this would be a big help,” Goodlow said.

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Sandy Bui
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