Basseterre, St. Kitts, November 25, 2021 (SKNIS): On the November 24 edition of SKNIS’s ‘Working For You’, the discussion surrounded male health issues across the Federation, particularly the prevalence of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCD’s). During the show, Dr. Jonathan Carty, a physician working at the A&E ward at the JNF General Hospital, indicated that several factors must be taken into consideration when addressing the issue of male health.
“Personally, and for everyone in the general public to know, we first have to acknowledge that there is a problem. As soon as we acknowledge that there is a problem, the next step is looking for that help. Break down the barriers of the false thinking of being vulnerable, being weak, go out and ask for help. And when we face our fear and ask for help then is how we will start expressing feelings and openly talking to our health care providers about what’s actually happening to us. For us to move forward from this point, education and that openness and willingness to express how we are feeling will go a far way, but we first have to get over the stigma by asking for help,” said Dr. Carty.
During the programme, Dr. Carty said that a significant number of men across the Federation suffer from NCDs and advised them to seek medical attention to better understand their conditions.
“Men would have the problems but won’t seek the help, so you would find a great number of males especially males of colour, we will be prone to hypertension and diabetes and other NCD’s and not seek the appropriate help; whereas women will go and seek the help we won’t, we rather stay and suffer in silence. And like I mentioned earlier a lot of these things can be prevented by our habits and how we live our daily lives. So, we will suffer most and have the most illnesses because we do not go out there, we do not do our research and seek that advice. In terms of hypertension or high blood pressure, that of itself we call it in the medical field the silent killer because it can affect several organs in the body and can be diagnosed late and many men sweep it under the ground,” said Dr. Carty.
Many of the poor health effects that affect males are attributed to poor eating habits and the lack of preventative measures. The Ministry of Health through it community health services provides free screening for both diabetes and hypertension at all community health centres across the Federation.
