Physician Rani Whitfield has found a unique way of merging Hip Hop and medicine to bring about heart disease and obesity awareness to the African American community.
“I started to notice there was an affinity towards Hip Hop music,” Whitfield, who splits his time between seeing patients and producing rap songs in the studio, said to CNN. “I was hoping maybe I could get involved in the culture and have some positive influence on it.”
Positive influence is definitely needed in an era when heart disease is the number one killer of African Americans. According to the U.S. Department of Health, African American adults are 40% more likely to have high blood pressure than the average American. This puts them at higher risk for stroke, heart failure, and heart disease.
AD LOADING...
Although many of the reasons for these disparities involve factors such as genetics, socioeconomic standing, and access to affordable health care, environment actually plays a huge role in one’s ability to avoid heart disease. In low-income neighborhoods, access to healthy food, quality health care, simple walking routes, or the gym tends to be limited.
This is why Dr. Whitfield, who is nowadays referred to as the “Hip Hop Doc,” believes that traditional messages of heart disease prevention aren’t working. In his most popular song, Walk the Walk, which is aimed at younger generation minorities, the doc teams up with New Orleans rapper Dee-1, rhyming:
“A stroke’s no joke and heart disease comes with ease/ Hypertension smokin’ and diabetes/ So watch your cholesterol like you watchin’ 106/ If you eat healthy there will be less for me to fix.“
AD LOADING...
“It’s not just African Americans I’m speaking to,” he explained. “It’s white, black, Hispanic, Asian; I’m speaking to many groups with the urban concept, the urban message.” Whitfield hopes that in uniting Hip Hop and health education, he will be able to get across an important message, using language that minority youth will be willing to listen to.
“It’s going to take young African American, Hispanic and Asian doctors to go out to talk to their communities to convince them,” Whitfield ended.
