Otsego County Ranked 39th for Overall Health

According to County Health Rankings, Otsego County is ranked 39th out of 62 counties in New York State.  The Rankings were made designed to measure the health of a community as a whole.  The factors considered include death before the age of 75, high school graduation rates, access to healthy food, air pollution, socio economic status, and the prevalence of smoking and obesity.

Why is Otsego County ranked 39th?  The overall ranking is an average of several categories.  Otesgo county was ranked 21st for mortality and 52nd for morbidity.  Mortality is a measure of premature death and morbidity is a measurement of how healthy people feel.  The graph below shows mortality in Otsego County compared to New York State and the United States.  In this regard Otsego County is below the national average (a good thing) and roughly average for New York.

However, in regards to morbidity ( 52nd out of 62 counties), Otsego County is doing quite poorly.  The morbidity was calculated by using the number of residents who reported poor general health, poor physical health days, poor mental health days, and low birthweight (7.4%).  Otsego County was most remarkable compared to the the rest of the state in the number of poor physical health days and the number of poor mental health days.

When it came to a measurement health behaviors Otsego County was ranked 21st.  There were two factors in particular that were above average (not a good thing) when compared to the other counties.  Of the adults in Otsego County 21% self reported that they smoke.  Also the prevalence of obesity is 28% ( a BMI greater than 30).

Clinical Care was another category used to describe the health of the county.  According to the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care, Otsego County has 71 preventable hospital stays per 1000 patients.  This is a measure of patients admitted to the hospital that could have been treated in an outpatient setting.  The average number of preventable hospital stays for New York State per 1000 patients was 69.   Although Otsego County is unremarkable in this aspect, there is definitely room for improvement.

There are a number of factors (such as socioeconomic status), that I did not evaluate in this post.  However, if you would like to see the ranking of Otsego County  or the sources used please follow the links.

If you have been reading this blog and have never visited Otsego County, let me take a moment to give a brief history.  Otsego County was formed on February 16, 1791 after being split from Montgomery County.  Cooperstown became the county seat.  The largest city in the county is Oneonta (population 13,901).

Promoting Health through Prevention

The Rural Health Education Network of Delaware, Otsego, Montgomery, and Schoharie County (RHENDOM)  helps to promote rural health by prevention.  RHENDOM works to prevent disease through health education in areas that have been for intervention by research.

RHENDOM runs several education programs.  They include dental health education, physical fitness education, nutrition information, YogaKids, New Visions program, Summer Medical Academy, and the chronic disease self-management programs.  These programs are aimed at raising a healthy generation.  Some of the programs invest a great deal in the future of young people.

The New Visions Program is a program for high school students.  It involves students spending their senior year attending an aggressive program of college credit and medical field exposure at a local hospital.  I had the opportunity to do new visions and I cannot say enough wonderful things about my experience.

For seventh graders in eight different counties there is an Up Close Cardiac Surgery program.  The program was started by Dr. Robert Lancey, the Chief of Cardiac Surgery at the Bassett Medical Center in Cooperstown.  The program was developed in response to rising cardiovascular disease.  As part of the program students have the opportunity to watch a live video feed of an open heart surgery.



Another program aimed at elementary aged children is Nutrition Detectives.  Children can learn nutrition while using their sleuthing skills.

Check out the link to 2012 Rural Future Newsletter.  If you are interested in advances in rural health (by reading this far I assuming you are) then you might want to give it a read.

Trusting Your Physician

Traditionally, the physician patient relationship was built on trust.  The town doctor cared for an entire community and the community in turn trusted themselves to the care of the doctor.  Below is a photo from 1942 of a physician in Missouri treating a child.  It would not be unusual for a doctor to assist the birth of every child in a town.  The doctor was in many ways an extended member of the family.

Medicine is no longer this simple.  Medicine has continued to advance and has grown into an expansive scientific discipline.  There is no longer just one doctor.  A visit to the hospital could involve many specialists.

Is the physician-patient relationship as sacred today as it was 50 years ago?  The answer is complicated.  I searched the intenet (always a good place to start) and found very few patients extolling the modern physician-patient relationship.  Medical education never stops emphasizing the importance of the patient trust.  A quick visit to a clinic will remind one of confidentiality and its extensive legal protection.  Despite all this effort very little seems to be said from the patient's perspective.

However, the future is bright.  As long as the physicians of tomorrow continue to genuinely care for their patients and to put the interests of others before their own, medicine will be admired.

Alcohol Abuse and Chemical Dependency in Otsego County

As a member of the more technologically savvy generation I am always on the lookout for services that are easily found on the Internet.  With this approach in mind I searched for programs in Otsego County that treat alcoholism and drug addiction.  The best website for Otsego County is the LEAF Council on Alcohol and Addictions.  LEAF was founded in 1982 and fosters a healthy community environment that is not affected by the negative affects of alcoholism and addictive disorders.  If the website is not helpful enough you can always visit at 80 Water Street, Oneonta, NY.  LEAF works to reduce addiction through counseling, education, and cooperation with other programs. 

LEAF partners with organizations to bring educational programs to schools in Otsego County.  LEAF is affiliated with the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (NCADD).  Raising awareness of alcoholism and addictive diorders encourages the community to reach out to individuals with the correct diagnosis and treatment.

If you have read this far, I hope you have been wondering exactly what LEAF stands for.  It's the easy way of saying Leatherstocking Education on Alcoholism/Addictions Foundation.  

Mental Health Services in Otsego County

According to Healthiest State 2013, A New York state program designed to improve healthcare, mental health services in Otsego county need to be prioritized for improvement.  A study compiled by the Bassett Research Institute of county health statistics showed adult alcohol abuse and DWI's among youth.  Substance abuse education and programs are a crucial part of mental health services.  The study cited these areas for improvement:

"Access should be affordable and not limited to health insurance participation or reimbursement, office hours, or transportation in rural areas. Investments should be made to expand chemical dependence treatment options within the county so that more residents may receive care close to home instead of having to travel elsewhere. Additionally, improving availability and access to existing chemical dependence treatment and services may encourage residents in need to seek treatment."

There are several reasons why mental health services are sparse in upstate New York.  It can be difficult for mental health providers to work with a work poor uninsured in rural areas.  The study of Otesego County said "understaffing remains a chronic problem due to high turnover and low recruitment rates."  A possible solution is to train primary care providers to treat depression and anxiety.

Welcome!

If you stumbled across this blog you are most likely a fellow student at SUNY Upstate interested in rural healthcare.  If you do not fit this description I  congratulate you on stumbling across this page!  I hope that the posts will be useful and informative.

I am a first year student at SUNY Upstate Medical University and part of the Rural Medical Scholars Program.  As part of my education I will be periodically updating this blog with health information relevant to Otsego County.  I grew up in Cooperstown and I have a great fondness for medicine and rural New York.