There is life in healthy living centers.

The Erzurum Provincial Health Directorate’s citizen-focused efforts continue. In the context of primary healthcare services, district health directorates, community health centers, family medicine units, and Healthy Life Centers (SHM) are providing services.

SHMs aim to protect individuals and communities from health-related risks, promote a healthy lifestyle, strengthen primary healthcare services, and facilitate access to these services by providing services to citizens. The purpose of opening these centers is to implement the Ministry of Health’s mission to “invest in health, not disease.” SHMs offer services to help individuals adopt a healthy lifestyle, improve their physical and mental health, and increase their level of well-being in health. With the services being free, it is planned to increase accessibility for individuals. There are 5 SHMs in Erzurum.

Mehmet Ali Dorman, who lives in the Aziziye district of Erzurum, stated that with the support he received from the Aziziye SHM, he started to perform daily activities more easily. Dorman mentioned that the back and neck pains he had for about 5 years have decreased, and his quality of life has increased. Expressing his satisfaction with the service, Dorman said, “I couldn’t walk long distances for about 5 years, and I even had difficulty standing for long periods. I struggled to get up from my seat. Sometimes my pain intensified. During this period, I also visited the hospital. I was taking medication for my pains, but when the effect of the medication wore off, my pains increased again. About 6 months ago, I applied to the SHM as a consultant. I am still being followed up here. I learned exercises for back, neck, and back pain here. My pains have decreased, and I have started walking. My sleep quality has improved, and I can go up and down stairs more comfortably. I have literally returned to 5 years ago.”

Hasan Basri Yaman, a specialist physiotherapist working at the Aziziye SHM, emphasized the importance of patient satisfaction and stated: “For Mr. Mehmet Ali, who has been our client for about 6 months, we organized an exercise program once a week. We demonstrated exercises for back, neck, and back pain. During this time, we observed a significant reduction in his pain. Physical activity and exercise are very important in preventive health services. We create special exercise programs for our clients who apply with complaints of back, neck, back, and knee pain. At the same time, we prepare exercise programs for clients with chronic diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, and obesity and monitor them. For clients who come with respiratory problems such as asthma and COPD, we teach breathing exercises, techniques for coughing, and clearing mucus. We teach simple exercises that can be applied at home to increase physical fitness capacity related to health for all age groups, especially for children in their growth phase. Additionally, in SHMs, nutritional counseling services are provided for individuals diagnosed with obesity on healthy eating topics, as well as information, education, and consultancy services about individual nutritional counseling. They can receive consulting services on psychosocial support activities such as preventive mental health, smoking cessation, child development, social services, and risk group counseling. They can also receive counseling for early diagnosis of cancer through the Cancer Early Diagnosis, Screening, and Education Center (KETEM). You can apply to our SHMs individually or with the referral of your doctors. All of these services are free of charge. In short, we invite you to our SHMs to live healthily and age healthily.