Innovative Strategies Address Maori Men’s Heart Health

Innovative Strategies Address Maori Men’s Heart Health

A combination of innovative communications, strong Maori male role models, and face-to-face engagement with Maori men, is proving effective in addressing Maori men’s heart health and disease.

“Poor heart health means that Maori men’s life expectancy is around ten years shorter than other groups of men,” Harley Matthews from Te Awakairangi Primary Health Organisation told the Public Health Association’s annual conference in New Plymouth today.

“Maori men are not in the habit of going to their doctor regularly, and this means they often present when health issues are quite well advanced. There is a range of barriers for Maori men. They have large families, and may prioritise the health needs of their children over their own health. There are also financial barriers.

“Some of the barriers are also attitudinal – a she’ll be right attitude, a belief that Maori men need to harden up when they face life’s challenges – these things get in the way of Maori men prioritising their own health.”

Age-specific rates of heart disease for Maori men is two to three times higher than other groups of men. The challenge for health workers, given this profile and the barriers to accessing services amongst Maori men, is how to reach Maori men so that they can assess their risk of heart disease.

A collaborative project between Te Awakairangi Primary Health Organisation, One Heart Many Lives and iwi organisation Taranaki Whanui, at annual festivals – Te Ra o te Raukura held on the first week of February and the Tu Meke Taita Festival held in March – experimented with methods for approaching Maori men and talking to them about cardio-vascular disease.

“Over the course of seven hours at the Te Ra festival 2012, we undertook Cardio Vascular Assessments with 141 Maori men. 43 of these men presented as having a high risk of having a cardiac incident in the near future and needed to visit their GP to continue this conversation about their heart health. Heart disease is a silent killer of Maori men because in most cases it is asymptomatic, and sadly the first warnings of CVD can sometimes be the last

“They responded well to this type of community-based on-site testing. They were comfortable with the setting, and our biggest take-out in terms of learning was that we need to go to them. Because of the myriad of pressures experienced by Maori men, they are not motivated to visit health professionals to monitor their heart health.

“Currently we are also riding the coat tails of the Health Promotion Agency’s “Get your heart checked!” advertising campaign fronted by Buck Shelford. Buck is an important role model for our men, awareness of the ads is high, and we were able to work with his messages at the festivals.”

ENDS

© Scoop Media