Taking Charge of Your Health [www.takingcharge.csh.umn.edu], a comprehensive new website for consumers, is now live and helping people “take charge” of their health and well-being. Created by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Spirituality & Healing in collaboration with the Life Science Foundation, the site invites visitors to better manage – and expand – their health-care options by providing information and tools in three main sections:
- Create a healthy lifestyle – Offers self-assessments and an interactive goal-setting process that focuses on eight aspects of health: diet, physical activity, emotions and attitudes, life purpose, relationships, stress mastery, self-care, and the environment.
- Navigate the health-care system – Helps people find a provider, evaluate information on the web, prepare for an appointment, make treatment decisions, evaluate insurance options, and increase the likelihood of a healthy hospitalization.
- Explore healing practices – Provides in-depth information about the most commonly used integrative therapies, including Reiki, acupuncture, mind-body approaches, music therapy, chiropractic, healing touch, botanical medicine, and more. Site users can watch video clips of sample therapy sessions and download audio for a guided meditation.
First introduced in 2005, the updated site invites visitors to expand their options with integrative and complementary therapies, become more informed and involved health-care consumers and care for overall body, mind and spirit. Another new interactive feature is a “Taking Charge” blog written by the Center’s director, Dr. Mary Jo Kreitzer. A leader in integrative health and healing, Dr. Kreitzer will leverage her numerous roles in education, research and advancing health-care policy to share her own insight with consumers. Kreitzer’s blog will be regularly updated and readers are encouraged to post their comments to her entries.
“The reality of our health-care system today is that we all must take personal responsibility for our own health, and the best way to make wise decisions is to have access to credible information,” she said. “Our goal in creating Taking Charge of Your Health was to provide practical information that helps people make healthy lifestyle changes, learn to better navigate the healthcare system, and explore integrative therapies and healing practices with conventional care.”
For more information about the Center for Spirituality & Healing, please visit www.csh.umn.edu. To learn more about the Life Science Foundation, go to www.lifesciencefoundation.org.
