Houston Healthcare invites community to learn about heart health

WARNER ROBINS – Houston Healthcare will host its annual Red Luncheon on Wednesday, Feb. 26 from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Houston Healthcare invites the community to lunch at the Cary W. Martin Conference Center. The event will be feature education about how to prevent and manage heart disease. Tickets are $15 each and must be purchased in advance by Thursday, Feb. 20. Lunch will be provided.

At the luncheon, Dr. La Toya Jackson, Houston Healthcare Family Medicine Residency Program Director, is the event’s guest speaker. Jackson will focus on putting people’s health in their hands and what they can do to prevent heart disease and manage complications. 

The event’s agenda also includes a Hospital Happening’s update from Houston Healthcare’s President and CEO Charles Briscoe. There will also be a Community Health update presented by Director of Post-Surgical, Rehabilitation and Education and Registered Nurse Sheldon Mattox. 

Finally, the luncheon will inform attendees about Houston Healthcare EduCare community classes and training.

Registered nurse Danielle Ray, the event’s organizer, said the purpose of the event is to improve community heart health.

She shared based off of their community needs assessment, heart disease is the biggest cause of death in the area, including coronary artery disease and heart attacks. The needs assessment, conducted every three years, helps them identify what is going to better help the health in their community.

“We try to empower people to prevent and manage those conditions. Even with heart failure those are things that you can live with and live a long time if you manage it properly. This whole event is really geared at prevention and managing different diagnoses related to the heart,” she said.

According to Ray, the percentage of people who die of heart disease in Houston County is 24.4%. This is higher than the state of Georgia and the nation. 43.3 % have high blood pressure and 45.6% have high cholesterol. 99.1% have one or more cardiovascular risk factors. 

Originally, the Red Luncheon was associated with the American Heart Association’s Go Red initiative for women. The event only targeted women, but Ray said they have noticed different symptoms for women and ignored symptoms in men. 

“We wanted to make it for everybody because we believed that it affects everybody in our community. It’s kind of evolved into not just an event for women but also for the whole community,” she said.

Ray said the event’s main goal is to provide services that can help people. She also wants to break the stigma of hospitals wanting people to stay sick.

“A healthy community is a happy community and so we just want to help people manage those conditions that could be indicators or leading to heart disease,” she said

Different ways to combat heart disease include managing blood pressure, managing cholesterol, increasing activity and a healthy diet. 

According to Ray, cardiovascular health is the most preventable and the body is very forgiving. She said the body can heal, even after a heart attack, high blood pressure, high cholesterol or arterial sclerosis and coronary artery; when a person starts to make lifestyle changes, the body can fix itself. 

“Sometimes when people hear heart failure, heart disease or heart attack; you automatically default to, ‘this is the end of your life.’ But really, you can have things happen health wise and recover from those and live the rest of your years out healthy,” she said. 

The Red Luncheon will be held Wednesday, Feb. 26 from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.; doors will open at 11 a.m. The Cary W. Martin Conference Center is located at 233 North Houston Road inside the Roy H. “Sonny” Watson Health Pavilion W3 entrance.

Tickets are $15 and must be purchased in advance by Thursday, Feb. 20. To purchase a ticket, call the Houston Healthcare Community Education Department at (478) 923-9771.