Health checks bring Lubbockites to salons
Published: Sunday, November 15, 2009
Updated: Sunday, November 15, 2009
 "Photo: Jett Thompson")
Jett Thompson
Rache Fosdahl, a second-year medical student from Wichita Falls, checks Ralph Leggett’s, a Paul’s Barbershop employee, blood pressure.
Ralph Leggett has worked at Paul’s Barbershop on East 19th Street for 26 years, but didn’t start cutting back on heavy meats and salts in his diet until the last Barbershop Health Check hosted by Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center students in May.
A group of Texas Tech medical students hosted another community-wide health checkup Saturday morning in barbershops and beauty salons around Lubbock aimed at helping community members who may not have access to regular health care.
The health check is the second of the year in which the students checked blood pressure and body mass index of people who visited at no cost. The event was hosted in 12 barber shops and beauty salons.
Leggett said the new health check program has been popular with his clients.
“We really need this kind of thing to help people pay more attention to their health,” Leggett said.
He also started paying close attention to his blood pressure, and he said he has been eating chicken and fish and drinking fruit juices since changing his diet in May.
Cofounders of the event and second-year medical students Kweku Hazel and Soheil Daftarian said they hosted the first Barbershop Health Check in May. The community was so receptive to the first event they decided to make it an ongoing effort, they said.
“They were extremely receptive to this event,” Hazel said. “They love it.”
In spite of the time constraints that come along with being a medical student, those involved in the outreach program consistently set aside the time to make a difference in the community.
“We don’t look at this as something that takes up our time. This is why we got into the career,” Daftarian said. “It makes us look forward to going to study.”
Wesley Fletcher, a second-year medical student from McAllen, said the program is about helping the community by giving people information about their health and providing them with information on how they can improve their health.
“It’s important that we be aware of the community,” she said. “Otherwise you spend all your time at school when you could be out in the community helping people and the practicing skills you learn in lecture.”
After a screening the students gave patients information on what they should do to follow up on their screening. The students gave a list of free walk-in clinics to each patient and information on diet and exercise was also made available.
Danielle Ward has been working at the Talk of the Town Beauty Salon on East 23rd Street for 14 years and said she scheduled her Saturday clients around the time frame of the health clinic so her clients could receive the health checkup.
Ward said the tests showed she had low blood pressure Saturday morning — something that could be because she skips breakfast with her busy morning schedule. After consultation with the medical students, however, she said she would take proper measures to raise her blood pressure.
Hazel said the next Barbershop Health Check probably would take place in March and will take a stronger focus on diagnosing diabetes in the community in addition to taking blood pressure and body mass index readings.
Undergraduate pre-med students can also take part in the event next semester, he said.
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