Stopping stigma Archives - Most Effective Medical Clinic anywhere

Stigmatizing obese children lowers morale

January 30, 2017

Stigmatizing obese children lowers morale and is quite immoral to do so

Stigmatizing obese children lowers morale: Parental obligations

In making effort to bringing up our children in the best way we can, we are often meet with different challenges hindering our desire to do our part perfectly as we would wish to. Take for example the problem of stigmatizing obese children. Is there any bad thing that can happen to a child than to be discriminated over? Doctor Dalal Akoury MD, President, and founder of AWAREmed health and wellness resource center is going to help us understand more about childhood obesity stigmatization. Childhood obesity is a health problem, but to stigmatize the obese children over their condition is very immoral and demeaning as it is destroying our children causing them to feel secluded, alone and helpless.

We have a duty as parents to find out if our children are being bullied in whichever way to help them maintain their self-esteem. In today’s society body weight is among the common reasons why young people are harassed and while this is taking place and our children are being bullied, victimization of overweight youth continues to be ignored by the media, research and policy discussions. Recent studies indicated that many students are being teased in a demeaning way or during the physical activity classes, they are called names, made fun of because of their overweight problem. I want to pose and ask if overweight a health condition like any other? Why bully? The consequences of weight-based teasing and bullying are many and can be severe. Overweight youth who are teased and bullied are vulnerable to social, psychological, emotional and physical health impairments including:

Increased risk of depression and anxiety
Negative body image
Suicidal thoughts
Avoiding gym class
Skipping school
Academic impairment
Unhealthy weight control
Binge-eating behaviors
Reduced physical activity
Increased body mass index (BMI)

There is an emerging trend of weight related victimization much less known called cyber bullying causing a lot of devastating results among young people. Let’s take a moment to discuss cyber bullying.

Stigmatizing obese children lowers morale: Cyberbullying

This is the deliberate, attempt to inflict injury or discomfort of another person through electronic means. For adolescents, estimates of cyber victims range from 4-72 percent. Cyber-bullying takes a number of different forms including threats, insults, gossip, rumors, impersonation, hacking into other people’s accounts or spreading someone else’s private or personal information without consent. Peers are not the only perpetrators. In fact, youth report being bullied by adults and siblings, and 48 to 79 percent have been bullied by strangers or individuals they have never met in person.

Its anonymity sets cyber-bullying apart from more “traditional” victimization, but cyber-bullying is especially harmful because it penetrates beyond the school boundary and can possibly happen to anyone at any time. The majority (85 percent) of cyber-bullying happens at home, but these experiences may also affect children at school. What may be frustrating is that parents are largely unaware of their children’s roles as cyber-bullies or victims. Youth who are cyberbullied may be especially vulnerable to consequences that differ from more traditional forms of bullying. These include weapon carrying at school, low caregiver-adolescent connectedness, headaches, sleeping difficulties, sexual solicitation, social anxiety and suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Though it may be unclear if these problems are instigated or result from the cyber-bullying, the consequences remain the same and that is why you need to seek professional help from doctor Akoury now.

Stigmatizing obese children lowers morale: Parental obligations

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Discriminating obese and overweight people

January 21, 2017

Discriminating obese and overweight people is wrong and we must join forces to stop it

Discriminating obese and overweight people: How it affect both men and women

It is regrettable that at this point of time people are still living under certain siege of discrimination because of some health conditions that could be avoided like weight gain and obesity. Discriminating obese and overweight people a serious illegality which is very common the world over with the US taking the lead. I will be discussing some of the effects of this uncalled for habit and offer you solutions so that you can live your life freely and void of any discrimination. According to the experts from AWAREmed health and wellness resource center under the leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury MD, people who are affected by excess weight or obesity experience discrimination across a wide variety of settings, including healthcare, employment, schools, public transport sector, social amenities joints and interpersonal relationships.

Discriminating obese and overweight people: Social discrimination

Let us consider the employment settings, job seekers who are affected by excess weight are often less likely to secure job opportunities or even be recommended for promotion compared to their slimmer colleagues and in the very extreme they are also faced with lower remunerations and increased risk of job insecurity based on their weight alone.

In healthcare settings, obese patients often experience prejudice, apathy and lower quality of care from medical professionals, which may result in patients choosing to delay or forgo crucial preventative care to avoid additional humiliation.

Students also face weight-based victimization in educational sector from their peers, teachers and even parents, which may interfere with social support and educational achievement.

Weight stigma is even present in interpersonal relationships with friends, family and romantic partners, such that negative judgment invades almost all areas of the lives of people affected by obesity.

Discriminating obese and overweight people: Gender differences in weight gain stigma

Although both men and women are vulnerable to weight discrimination, their experiences may differ with respect to how much discrimination they are exposed to and the forms that it takes. Most notably, women seem to experience higher levels of weight stigmatization than men, even at lower levels of excess weight. Research suggests that women, especially those who are middle aged or with lower levels of education, experience weight discrimination at significantly higher rates than male peers. Moreover, women report weight discrimination at lower levels of excess weight than men. For example, men tend to report considerable stigmatization at a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 35 or higher, whereas women report experiencing notable increases in weight discrimination at a lower BMI of only 27.

North American ideals of physical attractiveness, which emphasize thinness as central to feminine beauty, may account for some of these differences. Women whose bodies deviate, even slightly, from physical beauty standards may be vulnerable to weight stigmatization. Given that thinness ideals have become deeply ingrained into our society and are heavily promoted by the mass media, diet industry and fashion industry, it’s not surprising to see widespread weight stigmatization toward women, even if they are not “obese.” For women, weight discrimination has been associated with poorer body image, low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, and a range of unhealthy eating behaviors, including binge eating. We must get out of this madness and scheduling an appointment with AWAREmed health center should be the starting point to getting a leaner body weight.

Discriminating obese and overweight people: How it affect both men and women

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Reducing stigma and shame of addiction

November 15, 2016

Reducing stigma and shame of addiction paves way for patients seeking for treatment and support to face the future with confidence

Reducing stigma and shame of addiction: Addiction is a disease of free will

Over the last few decades of my practice as a medical professional I have come a cross so many patients from across the globe with different disturbing health conditions coming to my office for treatment which we have gladly offered to them to a resounding positive feedback. We have made it a routine in our facility (AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center) to give our very best to all our clients irrespective of their limitations because we believe in offering lasting solutions to all health complications that we can professionally handle. This has made us to move from strength to strength over the years. However one problem of drug addiction keeps recurring owing to the nature of its effects to people differently. This one story disturbs me the most because it came to my attention several years after I was first introduced to the couple. That story is going to form part of our discussion in this article even as we focus on reducing stigma and shame of addiction both internally and externally.

But before we get there we want to assure all people reading this article now that drug addiction is a real medical problem and the sooner we deal with it the better. It is very painful seeing people losing hope and giving up on treatment because they keep relapsing every time they are about to have a break through. We are taking seriously the issue of relapse so that we can be on the front lane in defeating the beast of addiction. Therefore if you or anyone you know is struggling with any kind of addiction, our doors are always open at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury to help you recover from it professionally and with a lot of dignity. So don’t keep in hiding come up and purpose to regaining your life back with us professionally.

Reducing stigma and shame of addiction: Stop the humiliation and disgrace

Back to the story, three decades ago a couple visited my office with an addiction problem. The man who was alcoholic was in company of his wife to seek for help. Before we could even start the session, they excused themselves shortly and I felt that they were consulting on something before the session. I was surprised several minutes and hours later that my client vanished never to return. Several years later one of my student narrated this story to me and I was astonished. The student said “when I was five or six years old, my maternal grandfather died of what I was told was complications of heart disease.” She believed that because that is what she was told. It was not until several years later, after she had graduated from a medical school in psychiatry, and had secured a job for a very long time using neuroimaging to study the addicted brain, that she learned the real reason for the death of her grandfather. One day her mother gave her the revelation that shocked her life. This was coming when her mother was sick and almost breathing her last, “I need to tell you something I have never spoken to you about.” She disclosed to her that her grandfather had been an alcoholic, and that he took his own life in his distress at not being able to control his strong urges to drink.

“Oh Jesus I almost lost my grip.” Her mother had out of fear of stigma and shame kept the real reason for her grandfather’s death a secret from her that long. What surprised her is that even though she knew that in her whole professional life was devoted to trying to understand what drugs do to the brain, and that she had heard her speak of addiction as a disease of the brain, still she was not going to tell her the whole truth.” So she wondered how she had miscommunication, and how she had not made her realize that it was not a taboo to speak about addiction and that there should be no shame in it. This really troubled her and so she came to confide in me. stop stigmatizing patients and lets support them get better.

Reducing stigma and shame of addiction: Addiction is a disease of free will

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Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery

November 15, 2016

Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery will go along way in facilitating quick recovery

Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery: Is addiction a brain disease?

Is addiction a brain disease? Ideally in addiction there is nothing like physiological malfunction. Addiction may be defined in many different ways however, for the purpose of this article, addiction is a chronic relapsing brain disease characterized by compulsive drug seeking and use, despite the harmful consequences. Addiction is seen as a brain disease simply because drugs has the power of making changes in the brain. These change then alters the brains structure and how it works. When this happens users may develop certain characters and behaviors that are likely to be viewed negatively in the community. It is this negativity that makes observers within the community to start isolation and pointing fingers. That is why we want to create awareness on stopping addiction stigmatization to give treatment a chance says doctor Dalal Akoury MD and also the founder of AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center.

Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery: Dopamine

All drugs of abuse, whether legal or illegal, cause large surges of dopamine in brain areas crucial for motivating our behavior—both the reward regions (such as the nucleus accumbens) as well as prefrontal regions that control our higher functions like judgment, decision making, and self-control over our actions. These brain circuits adapt to these surges by becoming much less sensitive to dopamine, a process called receptor down regulation. The result is that ordinary healthy things in our lives like all the pleasurable social and physical behaviors necessary for our survival (which are rewarded by small bursts of dopamine throughout the day) no longer are enough to motivate a person; the person will therefore needs a big surge of dopamine from the drug just to feel temporarily okay and they must continually repeat this, in an endless vicious cycle.

Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery: Addiction and suicide

Finally addiction and suicide are closely linked together and if you followed our last posting about the story of this grandfather who committed suicide because he could not control his drinking problem and the daughter who could also not share about the actual cause of his death freely because of shame and stigma, then you will notice that the shame was not just because the father had been an alcoholic, but because he committed suicide, out of hopelessness and helplessness at his inability to control the strong urges to drink. We all have a duty to play in stopping addiction stigmatization so that patients can seek for treatment freely. It pains very painful that something that could be treated caused this great damage simply because of stigma, shame and fear. Dear reader if you’re following this story, let this be the last one, addiction is a treatable condition and stigma or shame are just perceptions that should not result in death. Come quickly for help today and together lets kick out of our lives the problem of drug addiction.

Stopping addiction stigmatization for quick recovery: Is addiction a brain disease?

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