I'm beat
My place of employment got its money's worth out of me today, I would say. I started with my first session at 8:30 this morning and went straight through until 4:00, just grabbing breakfast and lunch and eating them in the sessions. At 4:00, I headed over to the exhibition hall to man our institution's booth. More fun than I expected - saw various people I knew. Had a little "down time," which I used to review what I want to attend tomorrow. Then headed to our alumni reception. I think I got a little high, connecting with people I hadn't seen in years. I loved my time in public health school and a huge part of that experience was my classmates. Many of whom are, and have been, doing great things around the globe.
Just to test my mettle, at 8:30 pm, I headed from the reception to another scientific session. I lasted only through the first two presenters.
Highlights of / interesting things learned during today's sessions:
One of the catastrophes of the recent fires in California was the closing of schools in San Bernardino. For rich areas, they were vacation days. But for poorer areas, it meant kids going hungry or visiting homeless shelters to get the meals they would normally receive at school.
Your blood pressure while sleeping may be more important that that of waking hours, due to the dip your blood pressure takes during non-REM sleep. Non-dipping is associated with many poor health outcomes.
Sleep stars (link to come)
High school biology curriculum related to sleep (link to come)
A program that builds upon social activities of recent Russian immigrants to maintain health lives
My favorite session of the day, which I unfortunately missed the last part of was about race. Very exciting! Including:
Race: a project of the American Anthropological Association
Idea that scientists should be careful about how they use the concept of race, since it is something we've created, rather than biological
The variable of race often masks other things, such as racism
When scientists use race, they should define what it is they're actually using, and why they've chosen to include it
Racism is a system which, among other things, robs society of vast human potential
The BRFSS now includes a module about reactions to race
There is not always agreement between how people identify themselves racially and how others do. When they don't agree, the socially-assigned "race" is a better determinant of a person's health.
Posted by Shokufeh at November 5, 2007 09:22 PM