University of Geriatric Health

The Elderly Health University is not a marketing cover for selling health care products, nor is it a "public welfare care class" for the elderly to kill time. It is a domestic health service carrier that is suitable for the vast majority of ordinary elderly groups and takes into account medical professionalism and implementation feasibility.

Aunt Zhang, who lives downstairs in my house, was diagnosed with essential hypertension two years ago. At that time, she sent a short video message "Celery Juice Medication Weaning Therapy" and secretly stopped her antihypertensive medication. Not long after, she became dizzy and fell to the emergency room. Later, the community grid officer took her to attend classes at the elderly health college run by the street for half a year. Now she can not only adjust her diet by keeping an eye on her blood pressure, but she can also accurately tell the people who are suitable for different antihypertensive drugs. Last month, she also won the second prize in the community health knowledge competition. Even her husband, who used to buy physical therapy equipment at random, has now learned from her how to read the "blue hat" logo on health care products, and has never been fooled by door-to-door sales again.

But what’s interesting is that the evaluation of the University of Elderly Health has always been mixed, and there have always been two completely different development ideas in the academic and practical fields. One group is the "broad coverage group" who takes the inclusive route. They believe that the core audience of the Elderly Health University is ordinary elderly people with low educational level and almost zero medical knowledge reserve. The content must be shallow and down-to-earth, even if it talks about "Don't exceed the beer bottle cap in salt every day" and "After eating As long as the common sense of "Don't lie down after eating" can be heard, remembered, and used by the elderly, it is considered to be up to standard. After all, among the elderly in my country over 60 years old, more than 60% have a junior high school education or below. Improving the health awareness of these people has already solved a big problem. The other group is the "precision group" who takes the hierarchical route. They feel that many young elderly people have high academic qualifications and strong health awareness. It is a waste of time to teach common sense in a unified way. We should provide hierarchical teaching based on the age, health status and knowledge reserves of the elderly. For example, we can provide classes on exercise rehabilitation and nutritional matching for the young people who have just retired, special disease management classes for the elderly with chronic diseases, home care classes for the family members of the elderly and disabled elderly people, and even cutting-edge health science lectures for high-intelligence elderly people in need to meet the needs of different groups of people.

A while ago, I had dinner with Dr. Li, who works at a community health service center and has been a part-time university lecturer on geriatric health for three years. He said that when he first lectured, he read the "Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents" with a PPT. Half of the old people sitting underneath were dozing and half were knitting. Later, he simply changed the PPT and only taught one or two practical knowledge in each class. Point, the rest of the time is all about practical exercises: teaching everyone how to measure blood pressure correctly, how to give my wife a shoulder massage to relieve cervical pain, how to read the sodium content on food packages, and even added two special classes on how to identify scams selling health care products. Now every class has people occupying seats half an hour in advance. Many elderly people even bring a small notebook with them, and they remember it more seriously than children who go to school. “To put it bluntly, the old man came to the class not to get a medical certificate, but to solve some practical problems, such as what to do with knee pain and what to eat for insomnia. No one will listen if you use too professional terminology, so it will be useful if you translate it into vernacular. ”When Dr. Li said this, there was still a video of last week's Ba Duan Jin class on his phone. A group of old men and women stood in the community square. Although their movements were uneven, they were all very serious.

Of course, not everyone agrees with this "down-to-earth" content. My distant uncle was an administrator at a medical university before retiring. He has a certain amount of medical knowledge. Last year, he was dragged to a class by a community worker. After sitting for 20 minutes, he quietly slipped away. What he talked about was common sense that he knew ten years ago. It was a complete waste of time. In fact, this situation is not uncommon. Many universities in cities for geriatric health have encountered the problem of "both sides are not satisfied": the content is too shallow and the senior citizens of Kochi find it useless, but the content is too deep for ordinary seniors to understand. How to balance it has always been a problem.

Don't tell me, many places have found out about it in the past two years. When I was on a business trip to Suzhou last time, I saw that the local Elderly Health University opened an "advanced class" to teach elderly people with certain health knowledge about post-operative rehabilitation of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, early screening for Alzheimer's disease, and rational use of medication for the elderly. There were a lot of people who signed up, and many elderly people took the initiative to advance to higher classes after completing the basic class. Some places have opened special courses, such as teaching the elderly how to make low-sugar complementary foods for their grandchildren, how to use smart bracelets to monitor health data, and even include the prevention of pension fraud and psychological adjustment of the elderly into the courses. After all, the health of the elderly is not only the absence of physical illness, but also a good attitude and not being deceived.

I passed by the Elderly Health University in the community last Wednesday morning. The glass door was half open. The teacher inside was taking the old man to count the heart rate. There were blood pressure monitors and samples of food packaging bags next to the podium. There was also a grandson with an old man who was building blocks on a mat in the corner. The sun shone in through the window and fell on the crumpled notebook where the old man took notes, making it bright. In fact, there is no need to make the University of Elderly Health very high-end and professional. It is a place that grows up in the community and is full of fireworks. It allows the elderly to learn some useful knowledge and avoid health pitfalls. After class, they can buy groceries on the way and exchange a few words with the old friends on the way about how to do the anti-hypertensive exercises that they learned today. This is enough.