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[[image - black and white photograph of two men in Shriner's Fez (hats), one taking the other's blood pressure]]

[[caption]] TESTING NOBLES AND DAUGHTERS FOR HYPERTENSION (High Blood Pressure) is one of the many programs of the PH Shrine Health and Medical Research Foundation, to be held during the annual 83rd Imperial Council session, to be held in August of 1976 in Los Angeles, California. [[/caption]]

PRINCE HALL SHRINE MEDICAL CHAIRMAN TALKS ABOUT HEALTH

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. --- Dr. G. Wesley Allen, Imperial Medical Director and Chairman of the Prince Hall Shrine Health and Medical Research Foundation of the Ancient Egyptian Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of North and South America and its jurisdiction, Incorporated, Prince Hall Shriners, said recently that Blacks in America are dying of hypertension at an alarming rate.

Speaking to a group of PH Shriners and Daughters of Isis members preparing to attend the 83rd annual Imperial Council session in Losangeles, Calif., August 15-21 of 1976, Dr. Allen said that his foundation wants to do something now about this important medical matter.

Dr. Allen is one of the outstanding physicians in North Carolina and is a member of Kindah Temple 72, PH Shriners in Fayetteville. He also is a 33rd degree PH mason in the Southern Jurisdiction, PH affiliated.

He urged members of the craft and non-members alike to take advantage of the many screening centers all over the country which have been set up to detect hypertension [high blood pressure] and other serious ailments.

Dr. Allen, along with his co-chairmen, Dr. Aaron Wells of New York a noted internist and Dr. Henry Ladrey of Alexandria, Va., Alphonso L. Robinson of Mounds, Ill. and George H. Starks of Sanford, Fla., are working around the clock to set up the screening program in time for the 83rd imperial council session during the week-long meeting in L. A., Calif., in August of 1976.

The program includes a report that one out of every 24 million has high blood pressure and from this number, almost six million are Blacks. Of the 60,000 Americans who die annually as a result of high blood pressure, strokes and heart attacks, 13.5 percent, or more, are Blacks.

The medical research foundation staff members said that one of the big causes of hypertension among Blacks in America is the stress under which they live in the USA. Other factors, not limited to the black population only, are diet, heredity and obesity.

The foundation called on the US government to use federal dollars to fund community screening and education programs for this public health program. Dr. Allen said that with adequate funds to combat this health menace, we can treat high blood pressure and bring it down to within normal limits.

The medical director noted that there are three basic types of high blood pressure we deal with - mild, moderate and severe. "Physicians must select appropriate drugs, consider the pharmacologic properties and weigh its possible adverse effects in the drug's selection," Dr. Allen said.

"We don't know why but Blacks are twice as likely to have the disease, will develop it at an earlier age than others and have a more severe form than other races," he went on to say.

For more information on this health matter, Dr. Allen suggests that you write to the High Blood Pressure Information Center, 120/80 National Institute of Health, Bethesda, Md. 20014.