If you think being Rh positive indicates you are infected with a deadly virus, or that the islets of Langerhans are near Hawaii, you are suffering from the most common malady plaguing our country - a non-existent health awareness quotient, or total ignorance when it comes to issues remotely medical.
The easiest excuse is the non-availability of educational material on health. But now, HELP is literally, at hand. The Health Education Library for People (HELP), a non-profit organization started by Dr. Aniruddha Malpani and his wife Dr. Anjali Malpani, two years ago, is the first health education resource centre in India.
With a collection of over 5,000 books, 10,000 pamphlets and numerous magazines and news letters, it has been recognized by the Medical Libraries Association, USA, as one of the world's largest health education libraries. There is also a sizeable collection of audiovisual media, including 500 videotapes and over 30 CD-ROM titles on health and medical topics.
"We Indians are a very passive lot. Irrespective of financial position and educational qualifications, we don't educate ourselves about the state of our health. The doctor is seen as a god. It is the duty of every person to explore one's options, get a second opinion and be informed. This can boost the doctor-patient relationship, since a well-informed patient will not make the doctor a scapegoat, if, for some reason, the treatment doesn't work," asserts Dr.Malpani, infertility specialist by profession and health awareness activist by choice.
"Our inspiration for starting HELP ca me during our studies abroad, when we saw the number of magazines and pamphlets kept at clinics, for patients. So my wife and I decided to start collecting books and materials on medical topics, and set up a centre where people could walk in and access health-related information," he explains. They modelled their library on the lines of the Planetree Library in San Fransico, since there was no existing model for them to emulate.
The educational material at HELP is classified into the following categories:
- Reference sources: volumes like the Human Body Atlas, the AMA Family Health Guide,
Encyclopedia of Common diseases, etc.
- Promoting health/Preventing diseases: books on nutrition, weight control, fitness, exercise, sports medicine, etc.
- Mental health/illness: books on various mental disorders.
- Substance Abuse: books dealing with addiction to substances like drugs, alcohol and nicotine
- Therapies/Treatments: publications on First Aid, Surgery, Drugs, Yoga, Massage, and books on alternative therapies like acupuncture, acupressure, Chinese herbal healing, Metaphysical medicine, Pranic healing, Reiki, and so on.
- Body systems and Diseases: Under the immune system category there's quite a good selection of books and pamphlets on AIDS.
- Life Processes: books on pregnancy, childbirth, family planning, infertility, genetic disorders, women's health, etc.
The catalog is computerized to simplify the search. According to Dr. Goel, naturopath and a frequent visitor to HELP, "The collection of books is very good. Even though I have a large personal collection, I find this library very useful." The library is visited by people from all walks of life. However, Dr. Malpani complains, "We get a maximum of 15-20 people during the course of the day. Indians just don't have a healthy attitude towards libraries and books. In fact, we have given up on this generation. Our focus is on the next generation - the school and college students."
Another valuable service offered by the Malpanis is MISS-HELP
(Medical Information Search Services from HELP) through which queries
on any health topic, can be answered. Since HELP has access to specialized
medical databases such as MEDLINE, Cancerlit, AIDSLINE and Health Star,
it can search and provide the necessary information in published form or
on a floppy within 7 working days by registered post. The queries can be
sent by post or e-mail. For those who cannot go personally to the library,
may access the HELP Website www.healthlibrary.com,
which has text-books, magazines, databases on medical colleges, libraries,
doctors and hospitals, as well as archives of medical news. All this isn't
enough for Dr. Malpani, though. He is a man with a mission, who thinks a
lot more remains to be done. "I want to propagate our ancient tradition
of Yoga and Ayurveda through databases on Yoga and Ayurvedic clinics. There
is a pressing need to translate medical information in regional languages
into English. I also want to convince more doctors to encourage patients
to use the library," he adds. With this aim in mind, he even distributes
special 'Prescriptions for Information' to other doctors.
While Dr. Malpani goes about propagating health education with his characteristic
zeal, you can drop in at HELP to pinpoint the exact location of the islets
of Langerhans.
Address:
HEALTH EDUCATION LIBRARY FOR PEOPLE
Excelsior Business Center,
National Insurance Building,
Ground Floor, Near Excelsior Cinema,
206, Dr.D.N Road, Bombay 400 001.
Tel: 91-22- 65 95 23 93/ 65 95 23 94
Timings; Monday - Saturday, 10.00 am - 6.30 pm.
E-mail: malpani@vsnl.com
Following are the other links:
If you like what you see, and would like to support us in our activities,
please do consider helping us ! Books , videos ,models and other patient
educational materials would be very welcome ! Donations would also be very
useful , and are eligible for Income Tax benefits under Section 80G, as
we are a registered charitable trust.
This article about HELP has been kindly reproduced with permission from
Bombay's ezine, at www.awaaz.net ,
and the author, Shwetal Parekh.
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