Media Advisory: Prostate Cancer Screening and Education Sessions at Local Barbershops Sponsored By Pitt’s Center for Minority Health
UPMC News BureauJune 23, 2007
WHO: The Center for Minority Health of the Graduate School of Public Health, barbers and stylists, physicians, public health professionals, American Cancer Society representatives, prostate cancer survivors and members of the community.
WHAT: Prostate cancer screenings and education sessions at local barbershops
WHERE: Big Tom’s Barbershop, 2042 Centre Ave., Hill District, between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., and at Bat’s Barbershop, 5911 Penn Ave., East Liberty, between 1 and 3 p.m.
The Center for Minority Health (CMH) of the Graduate School of Public Health at the University of Pittsburgh, in conjunction with the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and the American Cancer Society (ACS), will conduct prostate cancer screenings and educational sessions in two barbershops in predominantly African-American neighborhoods on Saturday, June 23. The barbershop outreach efforts have been nationally recognized as innovative approaches to the elimination of racial health disparities.
The education sessions are an outgrowth of CMH’s Health Advocates In Reach (HAIR) program in which barbershops and salons are transformed into health promotion sites and barbers and stylists are trained as lay health advocates for CMH’s Healthy Black Family Project. Barbers and stylists participating in HAIR have been trained in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and the use of Automated External Defibrillators (AED). These shops also serve as the setting for CMH’s annual “Take a Health Professional to the People Day,” which takes place each September.
On June 23, a team consisting of a physician, public health professionals, an ACS representative and prostate cancer survivors, will visit the barbershops to discuss the importance of screening and early detection.
The barbershop visits also are part of “Let’s Talk About It”, a program of the ACS, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and 100 Black Men of America to increase awareness and address health disparities. This ACS program provides African-American men with current, accurate and reliable information on prostate cancer detection, treatment and survivorship options.
According to the ACS, African-American males experience both higher incidence and mortality rates from prostate cancer than any other ethnic group in the world. The ACS recommends that all African-American men over age 40 are screened for prostate cancer.
The prostate cancer education sessions will take place at Big Tom’s Barbershop, 2042 Centre Ave., Hill District, between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. and at Bat’s Barbershop, 5911 Penn Ave., East Liberty, between 1 and 3 p.m.
For more information on the barbershop events, contact Mario Browne at CMH: 412-624-5665.
CMH was established in 1994 with a grant from the Richard King Mellon Foundation. CMH is committed to taking a lead role in the nation’s prevention agenda to eliminate racial and ethnic health disparities as described in Healthy People 2010, a Department of Health and Human Services initiative. The CMH has been designated by the National Institutes of Health as a Center for Excellence in Minority Health and Health Disparities.
Founded in 1948 and fully accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health, GSPH is world-renowned for contributions that have influenced public health practices and medical care for millions of people. One of the top-ranked schools of public health in the United States, GSPH was the first fully accredited school of public health in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, with alumni who are among the leaders in their fields of public health. The only school of public health in the nation with a chair in minority health, GSPH is a leader in research related to women's health, HIV/AIDS and human genetics, among others.
To learn more about the Center for Minority Health at GSPH, visit the school’s Web site at .
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