There were a lot of great things about coming of age in the 1980s—innovative movies geared to our generation and some great songs. But there were scary aspects about that decade too, including the emergence of a condition known as HIV, or human immunodeficiency virus.

At first unnamed, HIV and the condition that back then it invariably developed into, AIDS, or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, hit the gay community hard, and specifically gay men.
Many began to develop severe cases of pneumonia and a type of skin cancer called Kaposi sarcoma that previously had been known to strike mostly older men of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern heritage.

Eventually, AIDS had a name but still no cure. The world was shocked when heartthrob actor Rock Hudson died of AIDS. It did not stop there. Elizabeth Glaser, the wife of “Starsky and Hutch” actor Paul Michael Glaser, developed AIDS after a blood transfusion and unknowingly passed the disease to the couple’s two children. She and her daughter died. And a young Indiana boy named Ryan White, who had hemophilia and got HIV through blood products, attracted national attention when he was not allowed to return to school. He passed away in 1990.

Some people were terrified of catching HIV, although it is not a disease one can get casually. Instead, it is transmitted through the exchange of bodily fluids such as blood, semen and breast milk during actions such as drug users sharing needles, sex and breastfeeding.

Then, in 1987, the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approved the drug AZT, and that treatment and other antiretroviral therapies gave people with HIV a new lease on life. For many, HIV became a condition that could be managed, although the tide did not turn immediately. Very few people who heard basketball star Magic Johnson announce in 1991 that he had been diagnosed with HIV would have thought that he would still be around 26 years later, living a healthy and happy life. But he is.

It’s great that there are drugs that treat HIV, and that people can also take advantage of PrEP, or pre-exposure prophylaxis, in which they take HIV drugs to lower their risk of developing the disease. But in 2017, 35 years after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began referring to the disease as AIDS, younger people do not have the same memories of the early, horrific days of the illness.

Some health care providers worry that they have become complacent in their vigilance against HIV. Ways to avoid HIV including evaluating sexual partners, using condoms and not sharing needles if you are an intravenous drug user. The latter method is especially problematic as the country—especially in West Virginia—is experiencing an unprecedented opioid epidemic.

For nearly 30 years, since 1988, Dec. 1 has been recognized as World AIDS Day so that people around the globe can unite in the fight against HIV and AIDS.

This year, to commemorate World AIDS Day, which is this Friday, the Monongalia County Health Department’s Clinical Services program will hold an HIV Testing Clinic from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 6. Anyone can walk in and receive the OraQuick test, which consists of a mouth swab, and get the results in 20 minutes. Anyone with positive results will be linked with care.

Who should get tested? The CDC recommends that everyone ages 13 to 64 be tested for HIV at least once. Some sexually active gay men should consider more frequent testing, as often as every three to six months. Pregnant women should be tested as well.

You should be tested once a year if: You’re a sexually active gay or bisexual man; you’ve had sex with an HIV-positive partner; you’ve had more than one partner since your last HIV test; you’ve shared needles to inject drugs; you’ve exchanged sex for drugs or money; you have another sexually transmitted disease, hepatitis or tuberculosis; or if you’ve had sex with anyone who has done anything listed above or with someone whose sexual history you don’t know.

About 1 in 7 people in the United States who have HIV don’t know it. The sooner you know about it, the sooner you can go on drugs that will help manage it.

Testing for STDs is always free at MCHD Clinical Services, and if you can’t make it to the clinic on Wednesday, feel free to call us at 304-598-5119 to make an appointment for another day for the test.

Researchers have made a lot of strides in HIV therapies, but now is not the time to let up our guard against this condition. We need to do our part to avoid situations that expose us to HIV in the first place. And if you’ve never had an HIV test, now is the time to consider it.

Mary Jane knew something was wrong when she began losing weight for apparently no reason last December. She went from about 128 pounds to 113.

“I thought, ‘Wait a minute. Something’s not right,” said the Morgantown woman. “I went to the doctor and told her, ‘I am losing weight. I think I have cancer.’”

The doctor performed a finger prick blood test and found out that Mary Jane’s glucose was 451. Ideally, a person’s blood glucose should be under 100. A range of 100 to 126 is pre-diabetes. Mary Jane had full-blown diabetes.

That surprised her because she thought of Type 2 diabetes as being an illness that overweight people have. She learned that losing weight and feeling hungry also can be a symptom of the disease. To her, being small makes her situation more difficult.  

“Overweight people can lose weight and they might be able to get rid of their sugar,” she said. “With me, I didn’t weigh much. With me, I have no weight to lose. I will always have sugar.”

That does not mean that Mary Jane cannot manage the disease. She learned that by attending the Diabetes Clinic at the Monongalia County Health Department, she could put several tools in her arsenal to fight the illness, thanks to Kendra L. Barker, DNP, a Certified Diabetes Educator (CDE) who is also certified in Advanced Diabetes Management (ADM).

Barker leads the diabetes clinic from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Fridays, by appointment. She can perform or order testing, figure out what medications are best, recommend diet and exercise strategies—and, like she did for Mary Jane, cut through red tape that can make getting a prescription difficult.

In Mary Jane’s case, Barker could provide aid on all fronts. She taught Mary Jane that she needed to eat three healthy meals a day and count her carbs for each one. She switched her medication and added another one into the mix to help flush out Mary Jane’s kidneys. She constantly checks Mary Jane’s feet for sores because of the peripheral neuropathy that people with Type 2 diabetes can develop. And she encouraged Mary Jane to get an eye exam because of the swirls she was seeing.

After fighting diabetes for nearly a year, six months of that with Barker’s help, Mary Jane finally has begun to feel like her old self again. Her weight has gotten back up to the 120s and she no longer sees swirls. Her glucose ranges from the 200s and 300s, which is still high, but better than 451. And her A1C, which measures her glucose over a three-month period, has dropped from 11 percent to 7 percent since she began attending the Diabetes Clinic. Normal is under 5.7 percent and pre-diabetes is 5.7 to 6.4 percent, so 7 percent is a solid number for Mary Jane.

She was seeing Barker once a week but now they both feel confident in Mary Jane’s progress that she will now have an appointment once a month.

It’s just a coincidence that Mary Jane’s progress comes during November’s American Diabetes Month. But it’s a good time to go over how to avoid this disease if you can, or how to manage it if you do have it.

If you have any concerns that you might be at risk for diabetes, make an appointment with a health care provider. You also can take a simple online quiz available on the American Diabetes Association’s website.

In West Virginia, 11.2 percent of the overall population—11.9 percent men and 10.7 percent of women—have been diagnosed with diabetes, according to statistics released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2013. That’s higher than the overall rate for the United States of 9.4 percent.

What’s more, according to the CDC, not only have 23.1 million Americans been diagnosed with diabetes, but it is also estimated that 7.2 million, or 23.8 percent of the population, has diabetes but has not been diagnosed.

As Mary Jane found out, a diagnosis can lead to healthier eating and exercise habits and medications that can manage the symptoms of diabetes, which can include urinating often, feeling very thirsty and/or very hungry even though you are eating, extreme fatigue, blurry vision, cuts and bruises that are slow to heal, tingling pain or numbness in the hands and/or feet.

So make an appointment to see Barker at the Monongalia County Health Department’s Diabetes Clinic. You also may attend Tuesday’s 5:30 p.m. kick-off for a new Diabetes Support Group led by Barker, who will discuss managing diabetes with a healthy diet. Family and friends are also welcome. You can call 304-598-5119 or email Barker at Kendra.L.Barker@wv.gov to reserve your space. You also can find more information at monchd.org.

How much do I hate cigarette smoke? Let me count the ways.

I grew up in a house with two smoking parents. When my grandmother would visit, that would be even more secondhand smoke for me to inhale.

Luckily, both of my parents eventually quit. My dad caught a cold and stopped smoking for the duration and never took it up again. He became a staunch anti-smoking advocate and grew to hate secondhand smoke as much as I did. He learned what I already knew: Once you are no longer around smoke, you can’t believe how bad it smells and how difficult it makes it to breathe.

I write this not to make smokers feel bad but to try and explain this topic from the view of a non-smoker. And to encourage smokers to become non-smokers.

Tomorrow—Thursday, Nov. 16, 2017—is the Great American Smokeout. It’s an event created by the American Cancer Society that encourages smokers to give up cigarettes for one day, in the hopes that it will lead them to quit for good.

This is especially important in West Virginia, where smokers make up about 25 percent—one in four— of the population. That’s one of the highest rates of any state in the nation. In fact, there are only two other states in the same high category of 23.7 percent to 27.4 percent, Kentucky and Arkansas. The rate for the United States is about 15 percent.

The idea behind the Great American Smokeout is to illustrate that if you can quit for one day, maybe you can quit for the next, and the next. The benefits start happening almost immediately. Twenty minutes after quitting, your heart and blood pressure drop. Twelve hours after quitting, the carbon monoxide level in your blood drops to normal. Forty-eight hours later, your ability to smell and taste begin to improve. Two weeks to three months after quitting, your circulation improves and your lung function increases.

Those benefits continue over time. One year after quitting, the excess risk of coronary heart disease is half that of someone who still smokes. Your heart attack risk drops dramatically.

Five years after quitting, your risk of cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus and bladder is cut in half. Your stroke risk can fall to that of a non-smoker after two to five years. Ten years after quitting, your risk of dying of lung cancer is about half that of a person who is still smoking. Your risk of cancer of the larynx and pancreas decreases. And 15 years after quitting, your risk of coronary heart disease is that of a non-smoker’s.

In short, your life expectancy will increase if you quit smoking, as well as your quality of life. I remember once going to a bar to watch a friend’s band perform, only to have to leave early because I could not breathe. I told a co-worker, who at the time was a smoker, and he said essentially that that’s what I should expect from a bar. I disagreed, and eventually, after he quit and realized how horrible smoke smells, he concurred. Like my dad, he was a convert.

Consider not smoking just for one day. And if you want to quit for good, there is help out there. Nicotine replacement therapy and/or a prescription drug can help with the withdrawal symptoms. The West Virginia Tobacco Quitline at 1-800-QUIT-NOW also is a useful tool, as are in-person and online support groups, counseling and even your friends and family.

There are more tips and statistics available online, through both the Coalition for a Tobacco-Free West Virginia and the Great American Smokeout.

So put your cigarettes down. Maybe pick up a new hobby with the money you save. Taste your food better again. And breathe easier.

It’s a sad story that happens too often, especially in this day and age. Proud parents take their newborn to an event, where friends and relatives hold the infant and fuss over him or her.

Or perhaps a grandmother who doesn’t realize she is a “silent” carrier of whooping cough babysits her new granddaughter.

Newborn and young babies are very susceptible to illness. One of those diseases, pertussis, or whooping cough, is very contagious and can result in hospitalization and even death for a baby. A couple of cases have cropped up in Monongalia County recently.

Four years ago, in another area of the country, Jazzlyn’s parents learned about whooping cough in the most devastating way. About three weeks after Jazzlyn was born, she developed a cough.

Al the onset whooping cough can seem like a common cold, but a hallmark, crow-like cough—a noise made as the sufferer struggles to take deep breaths—develops and can worsen.

Jazzlyn’s pediatrician recommended a humidifier, but several days later, she began having trouble breathing. Her parents took her to the emergency department. Even though doctors gave Jazzlyn several medications and performed surgery, the baby died just over a month after she was born.

Of those babies who get treatment for whooping cough in a hospital, about one out of four will get pneumonia and one or two out of 100 will die. The younger the baby is when she gets whooping cough, the more likely it is that doctors will need to treat her in the hospital. Other complications include violent, uncontrolled shaking; life-threatening pauses in breathing; and brain disease.

Even though the DTaP vaccine protects babies against pertussis, as well as diphtheria and tetanus, they cannot get their first dose until the age of 2 months. Five doses are recommended in all: at 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, 15 through 18 months and 4 through 6 years old.

Because it takes some time for a child to become fully protected, there are other steps that parents can do to protect their infants. The first one is for the mother to get a Tdap vaccine—the same inoculation, but for anyone 7 years old or older—during pregnancy. The mother should get this vaccine between weeks 27 and 36 of her pregnancy, and the earlier in that time frame, the better.

When a pregnant woman receives a whooping cough vaccine, her body creates protective antibodies and passes some of them to her baby before birth. These antibodies provide the baby some protection against whooping cough until he can receive his series of vaccines.

Although a Tdap vaccine for the pregnant mother, along with following the inoculation schedule for the child, are great first steps to keeping the baby safe from whooping cough, there is more that can be done.

For instance, in addition to following the timetable for baby’s DTaP inoculations, it is recommended that adolescents and adults receive one Tdap vaccine. Take stock of who will be around the baby and assess whether those people are up-to-date on their pertussis shots.

This would include everyone from siblings to grandparents, as well as any other close kin, friends and babysitters who might come into contact with the infant. This is called “cocooning”—surrounding the baby with the protection of vaccinated family and caregivers.

Of course, the world is a big place and you can’t ensure that everyone you might encounter has had their Tdap or DTaP vaccine. Another layer of protection can be added by being careful of the situations you expose your baby to.

An internet search will bring up articles on the etiquette of taking your baby to a social gathering, such as a wedding. And sure, there are parents who want to show off their baby at such functions. But you might want to think twice about such exposure. It’s not healthy for infants—especially very young ones—to be kissed and held by a lot of different people. Adults can carry pertussis without even knowing they have it, and they can unknowingly pass it on to babies.

As with all communicable illnesses, especially as flu season approaches, it is always a good idea to follow these simple rules: Make sure babies and people who will be handling the baby regularly get all recommended vaccines. Limit your young baby’s exposure to people whose vaccine and health status are unknown. And before you or anyone handles your baby, make sure everyone’s hands have been washed thoroughly.

For more information on pertussis, including a video that demonstrates what a “whooping” couch sounds like, check out cdc.gov/pertussis/.

Perhaps it’s just a coincidence but November is both COPD Awareness Month and the Great American Smokeout, which takes place on Nov. 16 and encourages smokers to give up cigarettes for a day.

My dad had his own personal Great American Smokeout about 40 years ago. A smoker since he was a teenager, he caught a bad cold that prompted him to quit. He stopped lighting up for the duration and never picked it up again. He completely lost the urge and, as time went on, secondhand smoke bothered him more and more. I always say it was the cold that saved his life.

Alas, he still developed COPD—Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. Whether it was the smoking in conjunction with being around his dusty building supply business and a predisposition to lung ailments that began as childhood asthma, my father spent the last 15 years of his life dealing with shortness of breath and slowly giving up activities he loved. Toward the end of his life, he hated being chained to an oxygen canula even though he added extra tubing so he could walk the length of his ranch-style home.

My dad, who died a little over three years ago, was not alone. According to the COPD Foundation, someone dies of COPD every four minutes in the United States. The disease causes 285,000 emergency hospitalizations annually in the country. Approximately one in five Americans over the age of 45 lives with COPD. And according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, almost 15.7 million Americans have reported that they have been diagnosed with COPD. The COPD Foundation puts that number at 24 million, with only half knowing they have it.

A person might have COPD and not know it, at least until it reaches the moderate stage. If you think there is a chance you might have COPD, you can ask your doctor to give you a spirometry test that measures how well your lungs are working. It’s a simple and easy test that can help diagnose this disease.

Risk factors for COPD include being a former or current smoker, of course. Also, exposure to harmful lung irritants over a long period of time and a history of COPD in your family also can be factors.

It’s important to get an early diagnose of COPD so you can get medication and therapy to keep the symptoms from worsening faster. Exercise also helps. Many adults are incorrectly diagnosed with asthma. The proper diagnosis allows you to get the right treatment as well as follow-up monitoring. There is no cure for COPD, but treatments are available that can help you get through your days with less wheezing and more of doing the things you enjoy.

If you are on the fence about getting tested, you can go online and take a short and easy screener quiz to gauge the probability that you might have COPD. Even though I never smoked a cigarette in my life, I still worry that exposure to secondhand smoke and my family history could put me at risk. I just took the quiz and scored a 1—a 5 or above means you might have COPD.

I admired my father for many reasons, including how he coped with his COPD. He grew to be extremely vigilant about his health. Because of that, he made it to the age of 80, a milestone for which I’m very grateful. Getting a diagnosis early can mean a longer and more productive life. And if you smoke, consider trying to give cigarettes up for at least one day. It could be the first step to a smoke-free life.