{"id":45744,"date":"2025-01-31T15:07:42","date_gmt":"2025-01-31T20:07:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blackhealthmatters.com\/?p=45744"},"modified":"2026-02-02T12:40:49","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T17:40:49","slug":"how-a-health-non-profit-took-hip-hop-and-found-its-secret-sauce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blackhealthmatters.com\/how-a-health-non-profit-took-hip-hop-and-found-its-secret-sauce\/","title":{"rendered":"How a Health Non-Profit Took Hip Hip and Found Its Secret Sauce"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hip hop as a music genre has spanned five decades and counting. Its message has ranged from descriptions of the gritty realities of urban life to the way Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five described them in 1982\u2019s \u201cThe Message.\u201d\u00a0 And it\u2019s come as far as the declarations of power Glorilla celebrates in 2024\u2019s \u201cHol\u2019 On.\u201d But hip hop can do much more for Dr. Olajide Williams, a practicing stroke neurologist at Columbia Irving Medical Center. So he\u2019s set out on a mission to connect the culture, the people, and his vocation: health.<\/p>\n

In 2006, he teamed up with legendary rapper Doug E. Fresh to found Hip Hop Public Health<\/a>, a nonprofit that promotes health education messages through hip hop culture and interacting with the community, meeting them where they are.<\/p>\n

Now Dr. Williams says his group has expanded its message to 42 cities and has set its sights on the mental health space as well as continuing to spread learning about stroke, diabetes, and heart disease, all major killers of people who live in urban areas.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He gave an example of how hip hop resonating with children helped improve results with stroke patients<\/a>, who had only a short window to recognize symptoms and get the necessary treatment.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf three hours had lapsed, we could no longer give them clot-busting medication. And, at the time, we had less than two percent of our patients who had strokes coming in within that three-hour window in Harlem.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWe tested the efficacy of utilizing children as what we call proximal targets,\u201d he continued. \u201cWe make the kids stroke literate and empower them with the skills required to communicate that information effectively to their parents and grandparents. Those are the folks who are at risk for stroke. And we found that these children are incredibly smart. It shows that they can actually take up the responsibility of educating their entire families. And that’s what these kids did. They were able to transmit that information to their parents and their grandparents.”<\/p>\n

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Dr. Williams said that Harlem saw a quadrupling of treatment rates, from less than two percent to more than eight percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd the magic, the secret sauce, was not so secret, but it was hip hop,\u201d said Dr. Williams. \u201cHip hop could teach. To engage these children and their families. Hip hop ability, hip hop’s ability to build enough confidence and self-esteem in the children that will enable them to communicate that information effectively.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Prior to that time, hip hop had not been used in a manner that supported and promoted health care in such a way: making it fun for kids to learn about symptoms of an ailment like stroke to save lives. The project Williams and Fresh started was called \u201cStroke Ain\u2019t No Joke\u201d and featured animated characters learning the symptoms of a stroke while dancing to a hip-hop beat rapped with Fresh\u2019s lyrics.<\/p>\n