Survey uncovers health facts in Capital Region

Founded by the health departments of Albany, Rensselaer and Schenectady counties, the "Healthy Capital District Initiative" included both a random telephone survey of households in the Capital District and a health profile of the three counties involved compiled by SUNY-Albany's School of Public Health.

Catholic sponsors of the initiative included Mercycare Corp./St. Peter's Hospital in Albany, Seton Health System/St. Mary's Hospital in Troy and St. Clare's Hospital in Schenectady.

Findings

* Coronary heart disease is the leading cause of death in the Capital District. Risk factors for heart disease include smoking, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

* Some diseases are more common among black than white people and more common in urban than rural areas in the Capital District, which national surveys attribute to differences in socio-economic circumstances.

These two results, said Dr. Crucetti, while not surprising, mark areas of health care that need work locally in terms of prevention and intervention.

* Chronic diseases account for many premature deaths in the Capital District, including stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer and diabetes. Smoking, lack of physical activity and high levels of saturated fat are risk factors for these diseases. Dr. Crucetti remarked that this section of the survey proved to be powerful in terms of demonstrating years of life unnecessarily lost to these diseases.

* Some diseases have different distributions across the Capital District, especially unintentional injuries among young adults, often through car accidents. These injuries are more common in rural and suburban areas, where longer commutes are necessary, causing an increased risk of collision.

Starting point

He added that it will be good to have published, in one document, a list of statistics that can be updated over time and used as benchmarks in gauging the success of future health efforts.

Those efforts will entail involving the community in deciding how to approach local health concerns. Initiative planners will spend the next several weeks establishing and prioritizing several major areas of concern for the Capital District to address, using data from the profile and survey and from attendees at a recent meeting.

More to come

Dr. Crucetti stated that the groups will be "broad-based, but focused and efficient. We hope to get a lot of community involvement."

The effort will not be a one-shot deal, he added, noting: "I see this as being a sustainable movement. We want the community to help us find solutions to the problems. I always look at the glass being half-full: If we could build a healthy Capital District and make some of the problems go away, it would be wonderful."

(04-23-98)

[[In-content Ad]]