FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTUU/KTVF) – Preventative health screenings provide people a chance to get ahead of any medical issues that may present problems. On Saturday, Sept. 27, residents in Fairbanks were able to get a handful of preventative screenings at an affordable price with no appointment needed.
The Alaska Health Fair has about 100 events per year, allowing residents to receive health screenings of different kinds while connecting with community healthcare providers. The health fair at Anne Wein Elementary School was just one of those opportunities for residents in Fairbanks.
Residents were able to attend the fair “at no cost, except for the blood work,” explained Sharon Phillips, a program director for the Alaska Health Fair.
At the fair on Saturday, residents were able to get 14 different blood tests that screened for heavy metals such as lead and mercury “Our most popular, we call it our Costco chicken, is our chemistry hematology profile with lipids. There’s 27 panels, and it’s heart, liver, and kidney function,” Phillips explained.
Those tests are given directly back to patients that came to the fair, allowing them to bring results directly to their doctor without a physician requesting the test.
Phillips said another benefit to the screenings at the fair is the affordability. “It’s about 25% of what you pay at a doctor’s clinic’s office,” she said. “Second is it’s a community group, so you get to see people maybe you haven’t seen in a long time. You get to visit with exhibitors, you get some health screenings, blood pressure, you get to talk to a nurse at no cost, vision screening, sometimes we have other screenings.”
The screenings have helped residents discover illnesses that they can then start treating. “We find leukemias, anemias, cancers, chronic health conditions, diabetes, liver conditions, heart conditions, all through the blood work we do,” said Phillips.
She added that some folks have utilized the health fair for decades, helping them to build a medical history that can be traced with consistency. “they can actually go, oh, doc, this is a concerning factor to me, here’s my copies over the past five or ten years, and you can see where it’s, you know, gone negative in some way and so doctors love seeing that history.”
According to Phillips, about 100 residents were served at the fair on Saturday. About 18 volunteers staffed the event.
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