Hundreds of Caribbean and other nationals on Saturday attended and participated in Caribbean Life’s Health & Wellness Exposition at the Major R. Owens Health and Wellness Community Center on Bedford Avenue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
More than 20 vendors participated in the event that also featured a presentation by LiveOnNY.
Besides, LiveOnNY, vendors included: CenterLight Healthcare; ERG Clinical; Tribeca Pediatrics; National Blood Clot Alliance; Verizon; CABS Homecare; One Brooklyn Heath; American Cancer Society; Oak Street Health; OHEL; Healthfirst; NYS Department of Health; AMAYU Institute; VillageCareMax; Wealth Building with Jen; Caribbean Business Connection; Jamaica Nurses Group of NY; MJH Health System; and S&A Unified.
“I feel good; I love doing this,” Michelle Dawkins, senior care manager at the Brooklyn-based OHEL told Caribbean Life. “It brings joy to my heart.”
Gigi Mannique, community outreach manager at VillageCare in Manhattan, said: “We’re providing information to the community about health services.
“It’s always good to work with the community,” she said. “See what’s possible when healthcare gets personal tagline.”
Egypt Bryant, of the National Blood Clot Alliance for Pulmonary Embolism, said she was “really enjoying this, because I’m able to educate the community and share my story.”
After introducing LiveOnNY’s presentation, Elizabeth Aloni Schneps, senior vice president of events at Schneps Media, Caribbean Life’s parent company, told Caribbean Life: “We’re thrilled to bring the Caribbean community and the health vendors together, and being able to educate to help them live healthier lives.”
During the presentation, Paula Brown, a Jamaican-born kidney recipient, praised God for His blessings, stating: “Getting this kidney is one of the amazing things that can happen to me.
“I was able to go Canada; and, without this, I wouldn’t be able to,” she said.
Eddie Soto, a Bedford-Stuyvesant resident, said his son, Nicholas, died on Jun. 20, 2014, and Soto was able to donate Nicholas’s kidney.
“LiveOnNY has been very helpful,” he told the presentation. “It only takes three times to say yes; it only takes one person (to donate a kidney to).”
Shani Audain — community and government affairs liaison at the Long Island City, Queens-based LiveOnNY, whose father hails from Trinidad and Tobago – disclosed that her sister is a kidney donor.
“We transport the organ,” she added. “This is a heavily and very regulated process.”
Ayesha Khan, a pediatric dental resident at One Brooklyn Health, told Caribbean Life that it was “nice to participate in community events.
“It’s very rewarding to educate people on their oral health,” she said.
Haitian Guenor Destine, account manager at CenterLight, said his insurance company covers “all over-the-counter items for free.
“This is a hands-on plan,” he said. “This is a very good benefit for our community.”
Sitting at the American Cancer Society table, Annette Spellen, a lung cancer survivor, said “the community needs this.
“They need to know about these events about health,” she added.
Brooklyn resident Nathalia Delpeche, the daughter of Haitian immigrants and a breast cancer survivor, who sat at the same table, said: “It’s important to know and get involved”, adding that the decisions that elected officials make impact the community’s health.
Spellen and Delpeche’s colleague, the Rev. Anthony Sandusky, originally from Lexington, Kentucky, who currently resides in Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan, disclosed that he had an aunt who died within two years of being diagnosed with cancer in 2018.
He was impressed with the turn-out at the health exposition.
“It’s empowering to see so many folks from the community, who are concerned about their health and wellness, and learning what they can do be to be healthy,” Rev. Sandusky added.
In representing NYState of Health, Elvis Nunez said he felt “alive.”
“I love to do what I do,” he said. “I provide health insurance through the NYState of Health. It could be low-cost or no-cost health insurance.”
Maha Attieh, who also represented NYState of Health, chimed in: “We love serving the community to give information about health insurance and give information to different programs.”
US Army veteran and Brooklyn resident Alice S., who preferred that her last name not be used, said that she felt “great participating in this event.”
Vincentian Betty Trent brought along her Brooklyn-born daughter, Anya Trent, to the event.
“It thought it was very interesting,” Betty said. “I think the community needs this health expo. I love the vendors.
“The organ donation talk, it made me want to sign up just in case, because it could be a family member,” she added. “I was very impressed.”
Anya shared similar views.
“It’s good for the community to get information and different resources,” she said about the health and wellness exposition. “There’s a lot of information people don’t know. So, people come together to get resources. A lot of people here are from the community.”
Haitian Saindyse Germain, owner of Germain Consulting Services in Brooklyn, which provides healthcare consulting to organizations, described the event as “amazing, well-organized, great resources for the community.”
