Week 2

I’m sitting on the top floor of the Bo Hua Hospital listening to Korean pop music to prepare for our next trip to KTV (a.k.a. karaoke) with the hospital staff. Karaoke is a big deal here in China. Just in case you are ever invited to KTV, you should know that your group will have its own personal room, complete with microphones, a large flat screen TV, and a smaller touch screen that you can use to can pick your songs and adjust the volume. Don’t worry if you can’t read the Chinese characters—you’ll recognize plenty of artists, from the Backstreet Boys to Michael Jackson to Avril Lavigne. But if you really want to be cool, you’d better brush up on the latest Korean stars. And don’t be surprised if the meekest and mildest members of your group transform with a microphone in their hands. I have never seen anyone sing to the Backstreet Boys as passionately as Dr. Jin, a internal medicine doctor here at the hospital.

When I’m not doing karaoke, attending the Dragon Boat Korean Festival (photo: Korean dancers waiting to perform at the Dragon Boat Festival in Jilin City), or eating some type of cucumber, I am continuing to prepare for the public health plan that I hope to create for the hospital. The health issues facing Jilin City are a little different than the ones in Little Rock. On one hand, many people already do many of the things that doctors, trainers, coaches, public health leaders, and even Ms. Obama with her Let’s Move Campaign, are begging Americans to do. Most eat more than five servings fruits and vegetable and avoid processed foods. Biking and walking are the most common forms of transportation. Along the Songhua River, which runs through the city, there are “playgrounds” for adults, complete with monkey bars, stations for stretching, and my very favorite—something very similar to Tony Little’s “Gazelle” exercise machine (I apologize if you’ve never seen the infomercial, but if you have, you know you’ve wanted to try it. It is as fun as it looks.).

On the other hand, many basic health practices are ignored by the majority of the population. Hand washing, even after doing you know what, is rare. 75% of men, and an increasing number of women, smoke regularly. Calcium deficiency is common, and high levels of sodium cause dangerously high blood pressures.

But, just like in the United States, there are plenty of smart people who know what people should do to live healthier lives. The challenge is turning that knowledge into action—through education, encouragement, empowerment, and policy changes. At this point, I’m focusing on gathering that information, and perhaps providing some models from other countries and other regions that we can use here at Bo Hua to educate the patients.

Jilin City