Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

HeartPower! Available For Children Through ACH Funding

Funding from Arkansas Children's Hospital (ACH) and St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center will help provide HeartPower!, the American Heart Association's (AHA) new preschool-middle school supplementary kits, to Arkansas schools.

Details were unveiled at a HeartPower! kickoff conference on Saturday, December 14, in the Raymond and Mary Williams Conference Center of the American Heart Association, Arkansas affiliate office in Little Rock.

James Fasules, M.D., associate professor of Pediatric Cardiology UAMS/ACH and president-elect of the Arkansas affiliate, discussed the problem of cardiovascular disease in Arkansas children.

Dr. Fasules and C.J. Snell, program administrator of cardiovascular cervices from St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center gave overviews of why each hospital decided to partner with the American Heart Association.

Rosie Phillips, physical education teacher gave a "teacher's perspective" of the HeartPower! kits and plans on implementing the kits into her curriculum.

The kickoff concluded with a special performance by the American Heart Association's jump rope demo team from Sallie Cone Elementary of Conway.

Robert White, M.D., president of the American Heart Association, Arkansas affiliate, said, "The American Heart Association is truly grateful for Arkansas Children's Hospital and St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center's generosity and support for our children's well-being by providing Arkansas schools with our new HeartPower! materials."

Created and classroom-tested by more than 100 educators, HeartPower! aligns with common preschool, elementary and middle school curriculum goals in four key areas:

1.learning how the heart works;

2.nutrition;

3.fitness; and

4.resisting tobacco.

HeartPower! builds on the success of the AHA's previous Schoolsite program, which has reached more than 78 million students since its launch in 1985.

HeartPower! provides teachers with multiple teaching options, from beginning each day with a short heart starter activity to investigations and full theme units based on highly motivating literature.

Kits come in five levels from preschool through middle school: pre-kindergarten; pre-kindergarten through grade one, Spanish edition; kindergarten through grade two; grades 3-5, and grades 6-8.

The components of each kit make teaching heart-healthy behaiors easy and enjoyable for today's Nickelodeon generation of students.

Why do schools need a program about heart health?

"Cardiovascular disease is still America's numbre one killer. More than 42 percent of all deaths every year are from it," said White. "And more than 60 million Americans (about one-fourth of our total population) have some form of cardiovascular disease.

"If present trends continue, approximately 31 million of today's 76 million children will eventually die from heart and blood vessel disease," White said.

Those statistics are tragic enough, but equally tragic is the fact that so few people know that heart disease and stroke can be easy to help prevent.

"Several of the risk factors that may lead to heart disease and stroke come from lifestyle habits, many of which are formed early in life," White said.

"Heart disease begins in childhood and manifests itself in adulthood," he continued. "We can do something to help prevent heart disease by learning from the earliest years to make heart-healthy choices: eat a healthy diet, get enough physical activity and live tobacco-free."

Caridovascular disease is also a costly disease to treat.

It costs about $2,500 per person every year to treat cardiovascular disease #_ more than $151 billion annually in the U.S.

The AHA created HeartPower! with today's packed curriculum in mind. Teachers can use a little or a lot, depending on their time and curriculum requirements.

AHA made sure the program lends itself to the variety of ways teachers may wish to teach about heart health, nutrition, fitness and living tobacco-free," said White.

The components can stand alone or work together. Each component supports the others, allowing the kit to be easily tailored to any teaching style."

The American Heart Association spent more than $236 million during fiscal year 1994-95 for research support, public and professional education, and community programs. With more than 4 million volunteers, the AHA is the largest voluntary health organization fighting heart disease and stroke, which annually kill more than 950,000 Americans.

For information about HeartPower! call your local American Heart Association at 1-800-242-8721 or 1-501-375-9148. The AHA website is http://www.amhrt.org.