Geriatric disease prevention publicity activities

To make geriatric disease prevention publicity truly effective without going through the motions, the core has never been about how many medical theories are copied or how many brochures are printed. It is about localized design based on the living scenarios and cognitive habits of the elderly, and turning top-down preaching into practical reminders that are closely related to their lives. Only then can the concept of prevention be truly implemented.

Last month, I spent three days at a community publicity point in Yuetan Street, Xicheng District. The initial preparation plan was based on standardization: a roll-up banner with guidelines for the prevention and treatment of hypertension and diabetes was placed at the door, there were brochures printed on coated paper on the table, and a doctor from the community hospital was invited to prepare a one-hour PPT lecture. The result? Almost no one stopped in front of the roll-up banner. The old man took the brochure and stuffed it at the bottom of the grocery cart. Twenty minutes into the lecture, half of the more than 30 old people sitting in the audience had left, and most of the rest were choosing vegetables or taking a nap.

Speaking of which, this is not the first time we have run into trouble. There are two completely different voices in the industry regarding the direction of geriatric disease promotion. One group is academic doctors, who feel that the pathogenesis and evidence-based basis must be explained thoroughly, otherwise the elderly will only half-understand what they have heard, and then turn around and believe the pseudo-science popularization in the circle of friends, which will make it more troublesome. ； The other group is community service practitioners. They feel that the elderly cannot understand the terminology that is too technical. If you talk about "high low-density lipoprotein" for a long time, it would be more effective to say "Don't eat braised pork and pickled vegetables every day."

We had previously invited Director Li from the geriatric department of a tertiary hospital to give a lecture. The courseware he first prepared started with the lipid deposition process of atherosclerosis. After ten minutes of the lecture, he saw the elderly people in the audience starting to whisper to each other. During the intermission, he scratched his head and said that if he had known better, he would have started with "Why do you gasp after walking two steps and have to rest three times when climbing the third floor?" In the second half, he collected the course materials and gave an example to the old man with a blood vessel model. He said that a clogged blood vessel is like scale in the water pipe at home. No matter how much vinegar you pour in, it won't dissolve. It's better to pour less oil into it. Several old people asked on the spot, "Then the lard I usually eat is oil?" ”, it will come up after a short interaction.

Speaking of pseudo-science popularization, Aunt Zhang Guiying in our community used to be a "faithful believer in health articles in the circle of friends". She boiled vinegar water and drank it every day, saying that it would soften blood vessels, but she refused to listen to her advice several times. Last time we held a "Pseudo Science Popularization and Anti-Counterfeiting Arena", where we asked the elderly to share all the folk remedies they usually believe in. The doctor answered questions on the spot. Aunt Zhang was the first to raise her hand to talk about drinking vinegar, so Director Li used a model to calculate for her. The vinegar you drink will be neutralized by gastric acid when it reaches the stomach, and will not enter the blood vessels at all. On the contrary, if you drink too much, it will easily burn your stomach. She never boiled vinegar water again after that day, and now she tells everyone she meets people not to believe those random folk remedies, which are ten times more effective than what our staff advertise.

Later, we gradually figured out how to do it, and no longer held lectures for two hours - many elderly people had to pick up their grandchildren and cook, and could not spare the entire time. We broke the promotion into fragments: setting up a small table at the door of the wet market from 7 to 9 in the morning, free blood pressure and blood oxygen measurements, and saying a few words about wearing a mask when going out to prevent COPD in autumn and winter. ； I was waiting at the entrance of the University for the Elderly at around four in the afternoon. When the old man was on his way out from class, he handed out a canvas shopping bag with the words "Wake up in three and a half minutes" and a casual reminder not to sit up suddenly when you wake up in the morning. ； During the square dance in the evening, say hello to the leader and ask her to speak up during the break. Don't lower your head for a long time, as this may cause you to get dizzy and fall.

Of course, some people say that this kind of fragmented propaganda is too scattered, and the old man memorizes one sentence here and another, and it cannot form a systematic prevention concept at all. Community doctors have mentioned to us before that if you say you should eat less salt today and exercise more tomorrow, the elderly may still not know how to mix it up when they go back. We later thought of a trick and printed a palm-sized health check-in book, in which the prevention points of common diseases in the elderly were printed in order according to seasons. Every time the elderly came to participate in the activities and listened to the knowledge points, they would stamp them. After collecting 10 stamps, they could exchange them for small gifts such as salt control spoons and pedometers. The elderly would turn the corresponding pages every time they came, and gradually a set of prevention plans suitable for themselves was collected.

After nearly two years of propaganda on geriatric disease prevention, my biggest feeling is that it has never been about “what do we want to teach the elderly”, but “what do the elderly need us to say”. You have to know where they like to hang out, whose words they believe, and what problems they are most worried about with their bodies. Otherwise, no matter how many coated paper manuals you print and how many experts you invite, it will only be for our own pleasure. After all, in the final analysis, the ultimate protagonist in preventing geriatric diseases is always the elderly themselves.