As Chief of Cardiology at Harlem Hospital Center, and as a community advocate for Harlem's residents, Dr. Fergus works hard to build trust with Harlem's Hispanic community. Part of doing that starts with speaking their language-literally.
Q: Is there anything specific practitioners should know about helping Latinos to prevent heart attacks?
A: The first thing is to understand their language. Speaking a person's language is the most important thing for most patients. The other thing is to understand that a Hispanic person of the same size as an African American may not have the same cardiovascular outcomes. We are still trying to understand why Hispanics seem to die less from cardiovascular disease than African Americans. There are theories that Hispanics are dying of heart disease at high rates, we are just not seeing it. Some theories suggest that patients may be going back to their countries of origin when they get really sick, which means that they wont be counted in the statistics. Another theory is that when a Hispanic person becomes really sick, he or she will not go to the hospital because they would prefer to die at home.
Q: What are some of the major challenges facing the health of Harlem's Latino community?
A: Throughout Harlem so many people are inactive and have poor eating habits. Obesity is an epidemic in both the Hispanic and African American communities. However, being inactive is a really big problem in the Hispanic community. Statistics show that people in Spanish Harlem are 10 percent more obese than in Central Harlem.
There are programs in Harlem like the Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce (GHCC) Healthy Living Campaign which promotes better eating and physical activity. Dr. John Palmer, the Executive Director of Harlem Hospital Center, has partnered with GHCC to ensure that this is a successful campaign. Some of the other people here at the hospital who are part of this project are Dr. Olajide Williams and Dr. Ben Ortiz (to name a few)-each day they are working with people to get information out to the community about health.