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| January 14, 2013- In This Issue |
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Home
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Launch of Great Start Georgia |
Wellness Ambassadors |
Interns Launch Careers at DPH |
One-Time Flu Vaccine |
App Tracks Workout Performance
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PHNEWS |
PHRECIPE |
PHTRAINING |
PHEVENTS
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From left, Katie Jo Ballard, executive director of
the Governor's Office for Children and Families,
First Lady Sandra Deal, program participant Kirrena
Gallagher and DPH Commissioner Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald
spoke at the State Capitol during the launch of
Great Start Georgia. Photo by Emily Salguero. |
Georgia
officials have launched a new statewide program aimed at
promoting optimal early development for the state's
children, especially those from at-risk families.
Great Start
Georgia, an initiative piloted by the Governor's Office for
Children and Families and the Georgia Department of Public
Health (DPH), lends support to parents across the state
through in-home visits in which they can receive guidance on
nurturing the physical and mental development of their
children.
Georgia First
Lady Sandra Deal and DPH Commissioner Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald
announced the start of the program at an event at the
Georgia State Capitol on Jan. 7.
"Research has
shown that it's so very important to give children a good
start from birth," Deal said. "We want every parent to know
how to rear a child properly and how to reach those
milestones of development."
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DPH wellness ambassadors, including Ebony Thomas
(center), work with the Office of Worksite
Wellness to promote health and fitness among
their coworkers. |
Ebony
Thomas, vaccine preventable disease epidemiologist for
the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH), got in
the habit of promoting fitness among her co-workers when
she started jogging during her lunch hours in 2011.
"I was
always looking for people to run with me. I got on
everyone's nerves asking them to run with me," Thomas
said. "But the good news is I got a few people
interested in running."
Now,
Thomas is organizing those interested co-workers into a
DPH walk-to-run group. She's planning a "Couch to 5K"
training group to help her coworkers prepare for a 5K,
many of whom have never been regular runners.
"Most
people have said they've wanted to do a 5K before, but
it's a tad bit intimidating if you say you're going to
have to just start running," Thomas said. "We'll start
everyone by just walking, then build up over three
months to run three miles without stopping."
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After a summer internship
at DPH in 2012, Jamir Ford started a part-time
position in acute disease epidemiology
in December. |
Jamir
Ford was working on his master's in public health degree
at Mercer University, and he was eager to find some
real-world experience in the field. He said he thought
the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) was the
ideal place for him to get it.
"I had
heard a lot about DPH, and I wanted to get my feet wet
dealing with public health at the state level," Ford
said."At the same time, I knew that once you got into
the department, there was a lot of opportunity for
advancement as well."
Interested in epidemiology, Ford began an internship in
the HIV surveillance unit in the summer of 2012. Before
long, his opportunity for advancement arrived. When a
part-time position in acute disease epidemiology opened,
Ford applied, was hired and started the job in December.
He said the work with data and surveillance he did as an
intern gave him the skills he needed for the job.
"The
one-on-one mentoring I received as an intern definitely
prepared me to deal with what I'm doing right now," he
said.
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Georgia State University Associate Professor Sang-Moo
Kang. |
A new process to
make a one-time, universal influenza vaccine has been discovered
by a researcher at Georgia State University's Center for
Inflammation, Immunity and Infection and his partners.
Associate
Professor Sang-Moo Kang and his collaborators have found a way
to make the one-time vaccine by using recombinant genetic
engineering technology that does not use a seasonal virus.
Instead, the new
vaccine uses a virus' small fragment that does not vary among
the different strains of flu viruses.
By using the
fragment and generating particles mimicking a virus in
structure, the immune system can learn to recognize any type of
flu virus and attack the pathogen, preventing illness. The
research appears in a recent edition of the journal Molecular
Therapy, published by the Nature Publishing Group.
"We can now
design a vaccine that makes it easier to induce a good immune
system response to recognize a pathogen, regardless of how the
surface proteins of the virus change," Kang said.
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The RunKeeper
mobile running app lets you track your workout performance
over time, while connecting with your friends to make your
workouts social. Track your running, walking, cycling,
hiking, biking and more using the GPS in your phone. With
Runkeeper you can:
- See
detailed stats around your pace, distance, time and
calories burned.
- Get
stats, progress and coaching through your headphones
with built-in audio cues.
- Listen
and control your music during your workout.
- Measure
your heart rate with many available sensors (appropriate
heart rate zones depend on your weight).
- Update
your weight to keep calories burned accurate.
Runkeeper
also allows you to measure your performance over time. You
can view a detailed history of your activities (runs, walks,
bikes, etc.) to see how you are doing, get notified when you
hit new personal bests and milestones, measure your progress
against your goals and targets and follow detailed plans to
help you achieve specific fitness objectives, like running
for weight loss or running a 5K. You can also share your
progress with friends via Facebook and Twitter.
Click here
to download for iPhone and Android.
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PHRECIPE |
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Home
|
Launch of Great Start Georgia |
Wellness Ambassadors |
Interns Launch Careers at DPH |
One-Time Flu Vaccine |
App Tracks Workout Performance
|
PHNEWS |
PHRECIPE |
PHTRAINING |
PHEVENTS
|
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