HHS and Data and Technology, Oh My!!

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a talk called, "Unleashing the Power of Open Data to Improve Health" organized by The College of Physicians of Philadelphia-section on Public Health and Preventative Medicine. The speaker was Todd Park, the Chief Technology Officer for the US Department of Health & Human Services (HHS). I have to admit, I was expecting something a little dry (having received my fair share of power point overload at government sponsored presentations). Wow- was I surprised to find Mr. Park on a wireless microphone running up and down the aisles engaging members of the audience!

The presentation focused on how HHS is living up to President Obama's "Open Government Initiative", which promises to have a "system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration". In terms of health data, Mr. Park said let's stop making people find data. Instead, let's "make data find people". In order to develop channels to help data find us, HHS has been engaging leaders from many areas of popular social media and technology (e.g., YouTube and Smart Phone application development). The government team has been sending the message "the data is yours...let's see what you do with it". In order to get the creative juices flowing, HHS has held and continues to hold "Health 2.0 Developer Challenges". The most current being the "Go Viral Collegiate Challenge" which calls on multidisciplinary teams from colleges and universities to develop a web or mobile application to address a significant health problem facing their communities.

Check out some examples of data applications produced through the use of open government health data:

• Community Clash: An online card game that engages you in a discovery of your community's health and well-being status and let's you see how it compares to other communities in a head-to-head clash. (*Warning- apparently this game is incredibly addicting!)
  

• Asthmapolis: A device that uses global positioning satellite technology (GPS) to determine the time and location when an asthma inhaler is used. The data is then stored on a server. The user can use this device to track asthma symptoms, triggers, and medication use- which could lead to an identification of environmental or other factors which improve/worsen their condition.

In addition to these challenges, HHS has also launched multiple websites to assist with the dissemination of this open health data. For example, HealthData.Gov and HealthIndicators.Gov. While this is all fabulous (and I really enjoyed looking at the challenge applications), how is this initiative being evaluated? Is the ultimate goal just about numbers? Does HHS just want to increase the number of people/organizations that are using health data? Do they just want to increase the number/types of data sources they can make available? Or is there some evaluation of the quality and accuracy of what is being produced? The challenge application website is sure to point out that the applications were not produced with federal money and therefore the government does not endorse them. But are they somehow creating an inventory of the applications and evaluating their effectiveness? Do we know which ones are actually increasing knowledge and changing behavior? Are we learning from the ones that do not? I applaud all the excitement around this initiative, but as always- I'm interested in seeing the outcomes. How will this initiative, which "unleashes the power of open data" actually improve health"?

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Michelle Williams is Working to Reduce Barriers to Exercise for Single Moms

As I got my hair cut on Friday, I paged through the February 2011 issue of Marie Claire Magazine. As a major "Dawson's Creek" fan in the 90s, I am always excited to read about the old cast. What a pleasure to read the interview with February's cover girl- Michelle Williams.

As always, she was asked the question about how she coped with the death of her ex-fiance Heath Ledger. This time she spoke about the practice of yoga and how it helped her work through the grief.

The interview introduced us to a project which Michelle helped create called The "Yoga for Single Moms"Project. The project pilot is in Boston and seeks to effectively address key barriers to exercise for single mothers:

1. Expense (of a gym or yoga studio)

2. Childcare

3. Social Support

Michelle tells the magazine, "The idea behind the program is that if you can clear the time, we do the rest. It provides childcare while the mum is in the yoga class, and it's all free."

I'll be watching to see how they evaluate the program and how/if it rolls out nationally. But it appears to be off to a good start as it goes beyond simply educating women about exercise and telling them that they should. The program seeks to work for a single mom's environment, schedule, and unique challenges. Great job Michelle.

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Review on birth control pills (Ortho Tri Cyclen) for acne

I wrote this entry a while ago, haven't posted it due to being busy. Here it is finally, I took the picture recently so that you can get a better understanding of this drug:


It's been exactly 28 days since I started taking Ortho Tri Cyclen for acne. I just wanted to give you guys an update on how this is for me so far. There are lots of mini reviews and experiences on people taking this for acne on acne.org. Good ones and bad ones. Do go there and check it out if you want to get a feel of this drug from real people suffering from acne.

So Ortho Tri Cyclen has four different pills, each 7 pills. The first three have different dosage of norgestimate and ethinyl estradiol. The last seven have no hormones and your period is suppose to come sometimes during those 7 days. see picture below as to what this drug looks like.

I started on Sunday 28 days ago. What I noticed most is the texture of my skin changing after 3 or 4 days of taking this. It was a lot softer and smoother to the touch which I never had before. If you have curious, you can see some of my before photos in an earlier post, post name hyperlink it. My skin was very rough and dull. I still broke out while on this drug. A little bit here and there. Nothing major and usually goes away within a day or two. My period was irregular because it came when it was suppose to right in the middle of the pills and lasted at least 14 days.

I didn't notice any symptoms such as weight gain, vomiting or upset stomach. But again I only took it for 28 days. Overall, I didn't feel any different other than the changes with my skin. I have some pictures of my skin for your reference. Again, you can find the before pictures in my other post. I will give more updates for Ortho Tri Cyclen after I finish another pack.

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How to use Bare Minerals makeup on a daily basis for acne coverage

I know no one wants to cover up forever; we all want perfect healthy glowing skin. But there are tough times and acne coverage can help tremendously with self confidence. See my review on Bare Minerals makeup. So here's how:


First put a little bit of moisturizer all over face (see below, moisturizer is free of parabens, synthetic fragrances and artificial oils). Since, I have oily skin, I just use a little bit of that. I got the sample from Bare Minerals and it seems to be compatible with my skin. Didn't cause any more than usual breakouts.

Secondly, I put the Prime Time Oil Control Foundation Primer all over face in a very thin layer. I use just one pump from the bottom and that is enough for your face.

Let the primer dry before proceeding to the next step. It takes a minute or two. Then I like to do pre-conceal with my foundation on all my red spots and active acne. This is done with the Maximum Coverage Concealer Brush (see picture below). What I do is just dab the brush in the foundation powder and pad it on the areas that I want extra coverage.

After all the spots are covered, I use the Full Flawless Application Face Brush (see picture below) and do the swirl, tap and buff on my entire face for that final result. At this point, all my redness is pretty much completely covered. My face actually looks a little too white.

Next I use the Flawless Face Brush with Warmth All-Over Face Color on my forehead, cheeks, nose and chin. I guess it gives you that healthy glow and also contours the face a little. Well, I like how it looks on me. So, I use it every time but you don't have to if you just want coverage on the acne.

Last step, I use the Flawless Face Brush with the Mineral Veil - original formula. I heard from various online sources that this helps with excessive oily skin which is what I have. So I just use a thin layer of this to finish the look.

Oh, one last thing, the SPF 20 Concealer in Summer Bisque is for extra coverage. If you are seeking more coverage than the foundation, this is what you use on top of it for even more coverage. I don't tend to use this often because I think the foundation does a very good job at coverage.

Here is a picture of everything I have.
 

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Moisturizer for oily, acne prone skin?

I never used moisturizer in my life because of my skin conditions, oily and acne prone. I thought I never needed to moisturize my skin because it over moisturizes itself. When I was younger, every product I put on my face causes some more acne. So, I stopped using everything and just stick to Neutrogena's acne-prone soap for the longest time, maybe 4 or 5 years now.

With my most recent breakout, it made my acne skin care routine change for the better I think. The breakouts, red spots and marks made me want to use makeup for coverage.  The SA at Bareminerals gave me a sample size moisturizer which she says should not irritate my skin.

I use very little bit every morning on my face after I wash my skin in the morning. I feel like it has not made my skin breakout more than usual. The makeup feels better on my skin when I use this underneath. Overall, it is a pleasant experience I think. So I went back and bought the full size moisturizer which was 30% off. How cool is that? It comes in a very cute packaging and on the back it says" free of parabens, no synthetic fragrances, no artificial oils". So it is suppose to be all natural which means it won't irritate even my ultra sensitive skin.

Did it seem to improve my skin in any way? Probably no. If you have oily acne prone skin, you should also give moisturizer a try because it might actually help you produce less oil. I know it sounds crazy; but some people actually experience less oiliness with the use of the right type of moisturizer.

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Over The Counter Cystic Acne Cures - Why None Of Them Will Ever Work

If you're searching for any over the counter cystic acne cures, do yourself a huge favor and just stop! Every single cure you can buy from the local pharmacy is complete junk and will never be able to help you with your acne problems.

I assume you think my next piece of advice will be to seek out a dermatologist, right? I mean, that's what everyone else all over the web says in their incredibly insightful articles. "If you have severe acne, you should seek out a skilled medical professional."

Imagine me rolling me eyes now, please.

If dermatologists were so skilled when it comes to acne, why are so many patients still suffering from severe acne? Better yet, why do they still prescribe accutane, a dangerous drug with some pretty clear health implications?

Really, when it comes down to it, to many people in the acne industry are just here for the money. That's why we hear the same old party lines over and over again: wash your skin twice a day, there's no connection between diet and acne, live with less stress.

It's enough to make you pull out your hair!

Especially when people have documented quite well that there are simple ways to actually clear your acne. What's more, there have been well documented case studies that literally prove some connection between diet and acne! Some dermatologists have slowly learned about these studies and have successfully treated their patients through dietary means, but the majority still act like it's black magic.

And the drug companies? They're really in it only for the money. Proactiv is a billion dollar a year company; do you think they want to give up their paychecks? Heck no, which is why they'll keep on promoting their crappy product that sits on your skin and does nothing to deal with the real acne causing problems inside your body. How can it! It just sits there on your skin!

This is the problem with all of the over the counter cystic acne cures and for any cures that go on your skin for that matter; they can't possibly get to the route problems inside your body. A second ago I mentioned the connection between diet and acne has clearly been proven. The connection between the two is the amount of insulin in our blood stream.

You see when we eat a typical meal, some foods are converted to sugar so the body can use it to burn energy. Insulin is released in response to make sure the sugar get's to where it needs to go. However our diets are so full of junk that our blood streams are flooded with sugar. The body releases a huge torrent of insulin to deal with the massive amount of sugar.

If this only happened once or twice, this wouldn't be so bad. But this happens to us on a daily basis for years, which eventually causes huge swings from high to low blood sugar and corresponding amounts of insulin. This tires out our immune system, which allows the acne causing bacteria, which exists naturally on every single person in the world, to multiply out of control.

Furthermore, too much insulin in our blood streams causes our skin cells to produce to much oil as well as die faster than normal, both of which get clogged in pores and allow bacteria to feed and multiply, leading to pimples. Preventing this problem by putting something on your skin is akin to insanity! If you try to take care of the external problems through gels or creams, they'll just keep on coming back forever.

Click Here if you're ready to start treating your real acne problems and want a complete, step by step system that is clinically proven to cure your acne once and for all.

Check out my Acne No More review if you would like a little more information about the system and how it worked for me.

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A Pop Health Book Review of “Unbearable Lightness”

Welcome back readers! After a holiday, bronchitis, and work travel hiatus- Pop Health is back with a new feature- reviews of books which examine public health and popular culture issues.

Over the weekend I finished reading “Unbearable Lightness- A Story of Loss and Gain”, by Portia De Rossi. I actually mentioned this book back in a November post when it first came out. The story chronicles Portia’s struggle with both Anorexia and Bulimia from approximately age 12 to the present. The strength of the book is in its ability to portray the absolute complexity of an eating disorder. Sometimes these disorders (and other mental or physical health issues) are over simplified. For example, the commonly held belief that someone is Anorexic simply because she/he needs to “have control over something”. However, in Portia’s case, she wove an incredible story that examined causes at multiple levels. And in public health, this multilevel thinking is essential for the development of effective interventions. I have decided to begin with the causes most closely associated with Portia herself and work my way out.

Intrapersonal:

Portia endured a complete lack of healthy coping mechanisms. She dealt with a lot of sorrow and changes in a short amount of time as an adolescent growing up in Australia. Her father passed away and she changed to a more affluent school district. She worked to cope with these challenges by identifying a way to be “special” and “stand out”. She chose modeling because models are special. She also changed her name when she was 15. There was another girl her age with the same name (Amanda Rogers), so she changed it to Portia De Rossi to be more unique.

Portia also felt intense guilt and shame over being gay. Although she realized her sexual orientation early on, she kept this secret until her late 20s. Much of her self hatred focused on feeling as if she was disappointing her family and would ultimately ruin her chances to have a successful career and “normal” life.

Interpersonal:

Portia’s relationship with her mother is examined in quite a bit of detail. Throughout her modeling career as a teenager, her mother was definitely her accomplice in yo-yo dieting. Her mother taught her “dieting tricks” to lose the weight quickly for jobs, but also rewarded her with McDonald's after auditions. However, her mother’s strongest influence seemed to be over the guilt and shame she felt over being gay. After she came out to her mother, the response was “let’s just keep this to ourselves”. Portia was told to keep it from the family and from employers/co-workers.

Besides 1-2 friends and her brother, Portia is very isolated. In addition, her relationships with co-workers on Ally McBeal and other colleagues in the industry seem to have contributed to her eating disorder as well. For example, two of her co-stars (Calista Flockhart and Courtney Thorne-Smith) were famously accused of being Anorexic and underweight throughout the show’s run. So Portia was constantly working with and compared to an unrealistic ideal. In addition, many people who could have and should have recognized the problem and intervened- stayed silent. For example, as Portia dropped from a healthy 130 lbs to sub-100s, her costume designer told her she looked fantastic and asked for her secrets to weight loss. Portia also sought the help of a professional nutritionist. Even though she confided to binging and purging on the first visit, she was still given a food scale and a diet to help her lose weight. The nutritionist did not try to intervene until Portia was almost down to 82 lbs.

Community/Society:

Portia’s existence in several “communities” contributed to her struggle with eating disorders. Her first professional affiliation in the modeling community in Australia is where she developed a strong knowledge of dieting, purging, and excessive exercise. The “older girls” taught her this. It was the norm in that group to be unhealthy in order to get ready for a job.

From Australia, Portia traveled to the United States and the “Hollywood Industry”. Unfortunately, it was a smooth transition from the unrealistic expectations of the modeling to the acting industry. She describes a particularly gut-wrenching fitting that she endured when a photo shoot had to be rescheduled after the client realized that she was in fact a size 8- so no selected clothes would fit her.

In addition to body size, she also felt Hollywood was not accepting of a homosexual lead actress. Several times she spoke of the paralyzing fear she felt after seeing how quickly Ellen DeGeneres’ show was canceled after she came out in the late 1990s.

This is just a brief overview of these complex contributors to Portia’s eating disorder- I could easily go on for many more pages. Overall, I think the book is a fascinating read…for those of us interested in public health, eating disorders, and/or Hollywood. It portrays Portia’s struggle, self hatred, and self destruction with brutal honesty- so be prepared.

A closing word of caution: this book may not be appropriate for someone with a current or recently recovered eating disorder, since it outlines her eating, binging, and exercise rituals in incredible detail.

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Back Acne Treatment - 2 Tips That You Should Be Using

There are a few back acne treatment ideas out that I think work very well for anyone looking to treat the acne on the back. While they can work well, not everyone's skin is the same, and some people may have different levels of success dependent on how bad the acne really is.

While I believe that the only way to truly get rid of any kind of acne is from the inside of the body, where the problem lies, I would like to give you a couple tips that I think will really help you get rid of the acne that you have on your back right now, and hopeful serve as a prep for curing your acne for good.

The first tip that I think is crucial for treating any form of acne, is cleaning away the surface of the skin. You can do this a couple different ways, but what's worked best for me is to use something called Salicylic Acid. This actually cleans away all the dead skin cells that are on the skins surface, and any dirt and bacteria that you might have on your skin.

This is useful because without the bacteria there, the body doesn't send out the red blood cells to fight it, which is why pimples get their "reddish" look to them.

This won't solve your problems alone though. You've only treated the surface, literally.

Second, you'll want to get deep down into the pores and clean them out. To do this, you'll need something called Alpha Hydroxy (better known as Glycolic Acid). This cool little back acne treatment will actually go deep down into the pores, clean out the bacteria, but also help rejuvenate the skin and give it a healthier, smoother look and feel to it.

A little note while using Alpha Hydroxy, it can sting if you use to much of it, or if your just starting out. This is far from a harmful treatment, but it really is strong.

These two tips alone will show incredible results, but if your going to get rid of back acne for good, your going to need more than just these tips alone. Get your hands on this free back acne treatment guide and start seeing results within one week.

Also, make sure you don't miss out on these killer back acne remedies that will only help you get to where you want to be faster.

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