Northeast Community College hosted a community health fair on Friday, September 14th in the Cox Activities Center.
The health fair is essentially a place where people can go to gain a better understanding of what good health is, learn about different health-care facilities in the city of Norfolk, and receive free screenings such as: health screenings, dental screenings, and blood work.
The City of Norfolk Health Division/Fire Department was there to help make people more aware of the spread of West Nile disease. The city captures mosquitos in traps and collects dead birds to study the disease more closely. John Kouba was there representing the city of Norfolk. He had the eggs, larva, and pupa of mosquitoes to show people, as well as bug-repellant packets to hand out.
The Norfolk family YMCA took over the responsibility of teaching people about Body Mass Index (BMI) as well as effective work outs.
Hyvee was informing people about their newly adopted NuVal system. The NuVal system marks food products with numbers; the higher the nutritional value, the higher the number. This will make it easier for people to make healthier choices when shopping for their food.
The Early Development Network, which is owned by Margaret Jensen, is a service that can provide assistance to parents with children who have trouble learning, or have a developmental disability.
Melony Kennedy was the representative at the health fair distributing information about the foundation. The Early Development Network handles children from birth to three years old. They can provide assistance with physical therapy, speech, occupational skills, and educational services. There is no fee as long as the child meets the criteria.
“It’s a great place for mothers to get help, college mothers too,” Kennedy said.
Some of the other local health-care facilities that had stands set up were: The Meadows Assisted Living, the Norfolk Community Health Care Clinic, the Urgent Care Center in Norfolk, the Herman Chiropractic in Wayne and Pender.
Then, toward the end of the health fair at 2:00 PM, a presentation on stress was held in the Cox Theatre. The demonstration was held by Amy Ries of the HPER department. She started by giving everyone a stress test to measure the level of stress they are under. She taught about the two different kinds of stress: eustress (good) and distress (bad.) Then, she gave helpful tips to everyone on how to better manage their stress.
The health fair is no doubt a useful and helpful source of information about all kinds of health tips. It is also a great place to get blood work and other screenings done if you usually don’t receive them because of financial reasons. In other words: the perfect place for college kids to receive information on healthcare.
