More than 400 women’s health professionals from around Illinois gathered this week to belly dance, shimmy to salsa music and hear the latest news about breast cancer, osteoporosis and weight control.
The conference, held Tuesday and Wednesday in Oak Brook, was sponsored by Illinois Department of Public Health Office of Women’s Health and the Illinois Public Health Association.
The tenth annual conference gave providers a chance to learn about research and techniques from experts, but also allowed them to network, said Shannon Lightner, deputy director of the Department of Public Health Office of Women’s Health.
These days, as not just state funding is dwindling, but private as well, it’s a chance to collaborate with one another, to try to serve people better with less resources,” she said. “They can also learn from each other. If there is a group in rural southern Illinois and one in rural northern Illinois, they can learn from one another… to improve care.”
Etta McGregor-Jones, who promotes breast cancer awareness on the South Side for Amani-Trinity United Community Health Corp., was among the participants. Her group is rolling out a new program in which volunteers will canvass neighborhoods, asking women if they have had a mammogram. If they haven’t, a breast cancer survivor will be sent back to work with the woman to make sure she has the test, McGregor-Jones said.
Her group came to the conference to learn new skills like how to improve their presentations, she explained. We go into the community all the time so we need to make sure we keep things interesting,” McGregor-Jones said.
One of the most popular workshops focused on trends in breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. Dr. Alejandra Perez-Tamayo, chairwoman of surgery at Mercy Hospital and Medical Center in Hinsdale conducted the lecture.
Public awareness of new, expensive technologies like MRI, molecular breast imaging and infrared imaging can make patients push for tests they may not need or that aren’t accessible, Perez-Tamayo said. We can’t do all of these flashy tests on everybody. We have to know what the indicators are [to know they need them],” she explained.
The biggest trend is making sure [patients] enter the health care system so you can get your resources around them.The conference integrated healthy food and exercise for the participants for the first time this year “instead of just talking about it,” Lightner said.
Conference participants took part in a demonstration of Zumba, a fitness program that incorporates Latin music and dance and that claims to burn 500 to 1000 calories an hour. They also tried belly dancing.