Saturday, February 12, 2011
Exciting News!
While I was in Mexico, I received an email from a music therapist in Australia asking permission to use the Pediatric Inpatient Music Therapy Assessment Form (PIMTAF) that I developed as part of my master's project at Iowa and published in a 2006 edition of Music Therapy Perspectives. It is the second request that I have received from a facility in Australia requesting permission to use the form, which I find very interesting. I asked that the music therapist requesting permission to use it provide me feedback on how well the tool works in her setting. It is nice to know that all of my hard work is being put to some use! It is also re-ignited my passion for academic writing. I have revisions that need to happen from my nursing master's project, as well as several other articles that I would like to write to submit to various journals, so I am happy to have some inspiration to get started!
Monday, February 7, 2011
Hola from Mexico!
I am writing this post from the balcony of the beautiful condo we are renting in Playa del Carmen, Mexico with our friends Mark and Julie. Playa is about an hour south of Cancun on the Caribbean Sea. The weather here is beautiful- in the 80s and humid- and is providing some much needed sun after the huge blizzard in Chicago last week.
Since we are staying at a private condo, we have the luxury of having a full kitchen to use to prepare food. Yesterday was our first full day here, and included a trip to the local "Mega" (basically a Mexican version of a Super Target) to stock up on food. Several people recommended that we just head to the local Super Wal-Mart, but we decided we preferred to get the more authentic experience by shopping at a store where everything is not in English (plus we have found we get better prices on things when trying to speak Spanish and staying away from the super touristy areas).
One of the things being a nurse has made me much more aware of is the importance of taking steps to prevent chronic disease. I am very interested in working with people to help them make healthy lifestyle changes to help prevent obesity, hypertension, type II diabetes, and heart disease, among other things. However, during my community practicum at a clinic in a rough neighborhood on the west side of the city, I realized how difficult this can be for people who do not have much money or resources. Buying healthy foods can be expensive, and getting enough exercise can be hard when the streets may not be safe to walk on and buying a gym membership is out of the question. I really enjoyed helping my patients brainstorm ways that they can eat more healthy foods and incorporate exercise in a way that works for them.
Shopping at a Mexican store was quite the experience. We had fun navigating the aisles, trying to figure out how to say "turkey" (pechuga), which type of cheese would work best on sandwiches, trying to find the milk (all shelf stable here in Mexico), and deciding what flavor of yogurt to buy. The flavors in itself were interesting as the options only included strawberry, peach, mango, or apple (no lemon, lime, or vanilla). Even in juices and sodas the only flavors available were the ones I mentioned (Mike tried to buy lime juice to make margaritas, but instead had to make his own by juicing limes). The most interesting thing I noticed is that all of the food here seems to be fortified. There was special yogurt for women that had folic acid in it. Other types of yogurt had fiber and omega-3 (we are still trying to figure out if the yogurt with fiber had actual cereal in it or just included soluble fiber). The bread has omega-3s and folic acid. Even the peanut butter (hard to find- only 2 options, clearly not a popular choice in Mexico) includes Vitamin A & E, folic acid, omega-3s, magnesium and phosphorus. Artificially sweetened yogurt was almost non-existant, and all of the dairy products had no hormones or antibiotics. As my friend Julie just mentioned, it did not appear to be all a marketing scheme either. Essentially all of the packaged products were fortified with the various vitamins and nutrients, regardless of brand. Now, I am clearly not a proponent of eating only processed foods. In fact, we definitely try to limit them in our everyday diet at home. However, in a country where people may not be able to afford to eat as much, and fruits and vegetables are very expensive, I found it to be an interesting concept for nutrition.
Since we are staying at a private condo, we have the luxury of having a full kitchen to use to prepare food. Yesterday was our first full day here, and included a trip to the local "Mega" (basically a Mexican version of a Super Target) to stock up on food. Several people recommended that we just head to the local Super Wal-Mart, but we decided we preferred to get the more authentic experience by shopping at a store where everything is not in English (plus we have found we get better prices on things when trying to speak Spanish and staying away from the super touristy areas).
One of the things being a nurse has made me much more aware of is the importance of taking steps to prevent chronic disease. I am very interested in working with people to help them make healthy lifestyle changes to help prevent obesity, hypertension, type II diabetes, and heart disease, among other things. However, during my community practicum at a clinic in a rough neighborhood on the west side of the city, I realized how difficult this can be for people who do not have much money or resources. Buying healthy foods can be expensive, and getting enough exercise can be hard when the streets may not be safe to walk on and buying a gym membership is out of the question. I really enjoyed helping my patients brainstorm ways that they can eat more healthy foods and incorporate exercise in a way that works for them.
Shopping at a Mexican store was quite the experience. We had fun navigating the aisles, trying to figure out how to say "turkey" (pechuga), which type of cheese would work best on sandwiches, trying to find the milk (all shelf stable here in Mexico), and deciding what flavor of yogurt to buy. The flavors in itself were interesting as the options only included strawberry, peach, mango, or apple (no lemon, lime, or vanilla). Even in juices and sodas the only flavors available were the ones I mentioned (Mike tried to buy lime juice to make margaritas, but instead had to make his own by juicing limes). The most interesting thing I noticed is that all of the food here seems to be fortified. There was special yogurt for women that had folic acid in it. Other types of yogurt had fiber and omega-3 (we are still trying to figure out if the yogurt with fiber had actual cereal in it or just included soluble fiber). The bread has omega-3s and folic acid. Even the peanut butter (hard to find- only 2 options, clearly not a popular choice in Mexico) includes Vitamin A & E, folic acid, omega-3s, magnesium and phosphorus. Artificially sweetened yogurt was almost non-existant, and all of the dairy products had no hormones or antibiotics. As my friend Julie just mentioned, it did not appear to be all a marketing scheme either. Essentially all of the packaged products were fortified with the various vitamins and nutrients, regardless of brand. Now, I am clearly not a proponent of eating only processed foods. In fact, we definitely try to limit them in our everyday diet at home. However, in a country where people may not be able to afford to eat as much, and fruits and vegetables are very expensive, I found it to be an interesting concept for nutrition.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)