<p> HEALTH</p><p>U.S. Surgeon General's Family History Initiative</p><p>Because family health history is such a powerful screening tool, the Surgeon General has created a new computerized tool to help make it fun and easy for anyone to create a sophisticated portrait of his or her family's health.</p><p>This new, revised version of the tool, called “My Family Health Portrait” is a web-enabled program that runs on any computer that’s connected to the web and running an up-to-date version of any major Internet browser. The new version of the tools offers numerous advantages over last year’s version, which had to be downloaded to the user’s computer, but only those running the Microsoft Windows operating system. </p><p>A family health history is a catalog of illnesses suffered by family members (biological or blood relatives) across the generations. An informative family history captures descriptions of disorders that may have an inherited or genetic component and that may be used to evaluate risks to an individual’s health. Collecting details about health conditions, health habits, and environmental factors experienced throughout the generations, provides a picture of the family’s health history. Gathering health details about immediate relatives such as parents, siblings or children is a start. Documenting additional information about aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, and grandparents provides a comprehensive portrait of the family history.</p><p>Health care professionals have known for a long time that common diseases such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and even rare diseases like hemophilia, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell anemia can run in families. If one generation of a family has high blood pressure, it is not unusual for the next generation to have similarly high blood pressure. Tracing the illnesses suffered by your parents, grandparents, and other blood relatives can help your doctor predict the disorders to which you may be at risk and take action to keep you and your family healthy. </p><p>With a copy of your family health history, you and a health care professional can individualize your care to prevent and screen for conditions for which you may be at higher risk. Family reunions or Holidays, offer a great chance to gather the information for “My Family Health Portrait.”</p><p>“My Family Health Portrait” is available both in English and Spanish and can be accessed at http://www.hhs.gov/familyhistory. The tool works by guiding you through steps on how to collect and enter family history information and results in a printed family health portrait similar in format to a genetic family tree. For those without access to a computer, there are printed materials that can also help you gather this information.</p><p>SOUTH CAROLINA BUDGET AND CONTROL BOARD EMPLOYEE INSURANCE PROGRAM DECEMBER 2005</p>