Barbados Heart & Stroke Week -
Open Day at the Foundation
As part of the week of activities leading up to World Heart
Day, the Heart & Stroke Foundation of Barbados held an Open Day at its
headquarters on Jemmotts Lane on Tuesday September19th, 2006.
A steady stream of visitors throughout the day were able to
interact with the Foundation’s staff and to learn more about the range of CPR
and First Aid courses that the Foundation provides, including training and
certification in Basic Cardiac Life Support (BLS) and Advanced Cardiac Life
support (ACLS), also A Heart Saver First Aid programme the gives instruction in
the use of the Automated External Defibrillator.
Emmerson White,
right, having his blood sugar & cholesterol checked by, from left, Donna
Lewis & Carolyn Archer of the Barbados Reference Laboratory. Looking on is
Marlon Small
Members of the public also learned about the function of the
CDP&R programme, known as “The Gym with a Difference”, which promotes healthy
living and offers specific rehabilitation and prevention through regular
prescribed and monitored exercise, dietary and psychological counselling to
persons who have had heart surgery, a heart attack, heart failure, a stroke or
are at special risk.
Associated companies took the opportunity to set up booths
to display their products and to provide sampling to the public. These included
Pine Hill Dairy, promoting their Light Delight low sugar juices, and BICO who
provided samples of their lactose free and diabetic ice cream. Among BICO’s
range of products was Diabetics Delight, a frozen dessert suitable for diabetics
and those who wish to reduce their calorie intake. This product has no sugar
added and the Mango and Strawberry flavours contain fruit puree also with no
sugar added.
Pharmaceutical manufacturers Sanofi Aventis were also on
hand to display of their range of products, and a representative of Stokes &
Bynoe Ltd. gave a demonstration of the Automated External Defibrillator.
Visitors were treated to healthy snacks and non-sugar
juices. They also had the opportunity to peruse several leaflets and other
educational material on heart disease and stroke.
Those who wanted were able to have their blood pressure,
blood sugar and cholesterol tested at the station that was set up by the
Barbados Reference Laboratory. During the week the Heart & Stroke Foundation
hosted similar testing stations at Cave Shepherd in Bridgetown.
