Brownsville Herald, Aug. 16, 2009
UTMB's Dr. Kirk Smith is quoted in this article about a project, authorized by the Legislature, that broadens a diabetes-prevention, community-outreach program run by the Stark Diabetes Center at UTMB. As a medical student in 1998, Smith traveled to Brownsville from UTMB to get hands-on experience with local physicians. He soon realized how much he had to learn. While his university classes taught Smith to instruct patients with high blood pressure to get out and walk every day, he found patients would rarely take this advice."After a couple of weeks, I went to visit some of the patients' neighborhoods for the first time and I saw loose dogs, streets without sidewalks and fast-moving cars," Smith said. "I realized that I was telling people, ‘Go out and get run over, get bitten by a dog.'" Smith realized that people in poor areas didn't need clinical advice about exercise. Instead, they needed the infrastructure and skills that make living a healthy life realistic. Without places to exercise or cooking lessons, people would continue to practice unhealthy habits.