Grant to make Latino health conference a reality

From left: Lois Colburn, Tina Flores, M.D., Kerry Sheehan and Lisa Carlson, both theraputic specialty reps with Pfizer pharmaceuticals.

A conference for health professionals that focuses on Latino health is something Lois Colburn has wanted to host for a long time.

Thanks to a $30,000 grant from Pfizer Pharmaceuticals the Latino Health Conference will be held in May.

“This grant from Pfizer allows us to make this much needed and timely conference a reality,” said Colburn, executive director of continuing education at UNMC.

Colburn said she hopes the conference is the first in a regular series of continuing education activities for health professionals that deal with issues of health disparities and cultural competence.

“The conference, which is aimed at health professionals, will be held in Omaha,” said Tina Flores, M.D. “It will cover such topics as health beliefs, work-related health issues and infectious disease.” Dr. Flores is an assistant professor of family medicine with the UNMC College of Medicine.

The reason the conference is aimed at health professionals, she said, is to help the medical community understand the social and cultural aspects of health care among the growing Hispanic population in Nebraska. Between 1990 and 2000 the Hispanic population in the state grew by more than 150 percent and is now the largest minority group in Nebraska.

While the agenda for the conference has yet to be set by the planning committee, said Dr. Flores, there will be a segment on the use of curanderas or healers, the kinds of self-treatments being used and preventative medicine.

The conference also will focus on women and children and cover such issues as screening for breast cancer and lead poisoning, oral health and preventative medicine.

“Hopefully in a day-and-a-half we can get to most of these,” Dr. Flores said, adding that the committee also would like to videotape the conference and send it to primary care providers in rural Nebraska.

Members of the planning committee include: Jose Romero, M.D., Aura Whitney-Jackson, Paul Paulman, M.D., Diana Lough, Ph.D., Patricia Aoun, M.D., and Lourdes Gouveia, Ph.D., chair of Latino studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.