Matthew Moore, a Health Coach at Ascension’s Lourdes Hospital, Binghamton, New York, began his recent TEDxSyracuse Talk with a question to the audience: “Why do you want to be healthy?”
Soon after, he made the distinction between “health” and “wellness,” arguing that wellness – the ability to find fulfillment in day-to-day life – should be the ultimate goal. Following a discussion of two primary barriers to wellness – instincts and a healthcare system that prioritizes treatment of illness and disease – Matthew discussed an alternative.
“We found that a population health approach, pairing with nurse navigators, community health resources workers, dieticians, social workers, and, my favorite, a health coach, we were able to bring wellness back to a population,” he said.
Lourdes implemented a new, simple form of health coaching with its prediabetes and weight management patients. Matthew said that within one year, Lourdes found that more than 80 percent of the prediabetes patients had such a significant reduction in their blood sugar that they were no longer considered at risk. They also saw a lot more than just weight loss.
“But my favorite part are the people being taken off of medications for high blood pressure, high cholesterol, even anxiety and depression … or the grandmother getting on the floor and playing with her grandkids for the first time. Or the father going outside and playing ball with his kids again,” Matthew said. “There were people finding fulfillment in their day-to-day lives again. … All we did was support, motivate and empower people to make the changes they already knew they needed to make.”
He ended with a challenge to everyone to take control of their own health, wellness and life as well as to healthcare professionals to begin implementing preventative programs like health coaching to help people be well.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. TEDx events include live speakers and recorded TED Talks and are organized independently under a free license granted by TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design).
Click here to watch Matthew’s TedxSyracuse Talk.
