Welcome to the National Hispanic Medical Association Alzheimer’s Disease Task Force Forum Discussion which will occur over the next few weeks.  The purpose of this Forum Discussion is to develop a powerful message about the importance of raising awareness about Alzheimer’s Disease to primary care physicians in the NHMA network, including the presidents of the NHMA Council of Medical Societies to share with their members as well as the NHMA members.  We all recognize that part of this message will be to refer the Hispanic physician to utilize the campaign of the Alzheimer’s Association Early Detection Alliance, “Knowing the Ten Signs”.

As per our conference call this week, we have identified some initial priority areas to start developing this message:
Many Hispanic families may bring a patient to see a doctor for evaluation of what they think is old age or depression and not know about Alzheimer’s Disease.

Primary Care Physicians need to refer patients with Alzheimer’s Disease to specialists for a better understanding of the disease progression and for care of co-morbid diseases that often occur, most often, hypertension and vascular disease.
Physicians need to discuss the need for long term care options and decisions with the family and caregiver of the patient who has Alzheimer’s disease and the referral to the Alzheimer’s Association, for example.   These options include caregiving and associated stress, home health care, community resources or institutional care and resources needed.
Please comment on these statements. Please add more priority comments to be included in the MESSAGE From the NHMA to its Networks this summer.  Liz Chavez, consultant will be helping us craft the message with your expert input. We will acknowledge your participation on the NHMA Portal and in the Newsletter as well in the Letter we send this summer to the NHMA and Medical Societies. Thank you for your time.

Dr. Hellmann, Dr. Vargas, and Dr. Corredor Again thank you for agreeing to become members of the NHMA diabetes mellitus editorial board. The board’s mission will be to establish criteria and provide guidance to NHMA staff tasked with the responsibility of obtaining diabetes and obesity-related information for NHMA and other physicians serving Hispanic diabetic patients. As experts on diabetes we are also asking you to identify information sources, including specific journal articles and studies that can be useful to educate physicians caring for Hispanic/Latino patients along the following four categories: 1. Nutrition 2. Prevention 3. Medical management 4. Model programs The online community deliberations will have a one month time limit. Your online conversations will be driven by email alerts to each of you whenever any one of you posts a comment. I will be more than happy to answer any questions at our conference call. Elena

This forum concerns the type of information currently available online on Diabetes- its advantages and disadvantages.