IGH - Rochester, #191 JULY 2021

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JULY 2021 • ISSUE 191

Top Issues

Affecting Women's Health

Special issue on Women's Health and Wellness. Begins on p. 14

WEIGHT LOSS DOCTOR Meet your doctor: New Highland Hospital bariatric surgeon, Aaron Sabotta. p. 4

POST-PANDEMIC MINGLING? it’s OK to feel apprehensive about things "going back to normal" post-pandemic. p. 7

LIVING ALONE IS NO LAUGHING MATTER — OR IS IT? p. 6

Is a Pandemic Baby Boom on the Way? Experts: A drop in pregnancy and birth rates seen during the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic is about to be reversed. p. 5

Adler said.

From 2018 to 2020, nearly eight in 10 nonfatal drowning injuries also occurred among children younger than 5.

The data show that the number of pool or spa-related, hospital emergency department-treated, nonfatal drowning injuries fell from 2019 to 2020, but the decline is not statistically significant, according to the CPSC. The lower number of drownings is likely due to limitations on summer activities—including group or public swimming—during the COVID-19 pandemic, the agency said.

Water Safety Tips

Child Drownings in U.S. Pools, Spas Are on the Rise Higher incidence seen in residential pools

P

ool and spa drowning deaths among U.S. children are spiking upwards, and restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic may also mean that fewer kids are getting the swimming lessons that might keep them safe, the Consumer Product Safety Commission warns.

On average, there were about 400 reported pool/spa drowning deaths among children younger than age 15 each year from 2016 through 2018, according to new CPSC data.

Three-quarters of those deaths

involved children younger than 5, and 83% of those occurred in residential pools.

Child drownings remain the leading cause of unintentional death among U.S. children aged 1 to 4, according to the CPSC. “As we enter the summer months, parents and caregivers must be mindful of the pandemic’s impact on their children’s swimming ability and water safety skills,” said Robert Adler, CPSC acting chairman.

“CPSC’s latest report confirms

that most child drownings involve children under the age of 5, whose limited experience around the water due to recent social distancing restrictions could put them at greater risk of drowning,” he added in a CPSC news release.

“With fewer children attending swimming lessons during the past year, it is critical to refresh these and other lifesaving skills, while practicing increased vigilance both anywhere children are swimming and during non-swim times as well,”

• Never leave a child unattended in or near water. The designated adult water watcher should not read, text, use a phone or otherwise be distracted while watching children. This advice includes situations involving bathtubs, buckets, decorative ponds and fountains.

• If you own a pool or spa, install layers of barriers to prevent an unsupervised child from getting to the water. These measures can include door alarms, pool covers and self-closing, self-latching devices on doors that access the pool and on gates of four-sided fences.

• Learn how to perform CPR on children and adults.

• Learn how to swim and teach your child how to swim.

• Keep children away from pool drains, pipes and other openings to avoid entrapments. Your pool or spa should have drain covers that comply with federal safety standards. If you’re not sure, ask your pool service provider about safer drain covers.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

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Page 3

Meet

Your Doctor

By Chris Motola

Aaron Sabbota, M.D.

New Highland Hospital weight loss doctor motivated to get in the field because mom, brother faced obesity FDA Approves Diabetes Drug for Weight Loss Aid

W

egovy, a high-dose version of the diabetes drug semaglutide, has been approved as a new aid to weight loss by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Studies funded by drug maker Novo Nordisk showed that participants who received weekly injections of the drug had an average weight loss of 15% and lost weight steadily for 16 months before leveling off, the Associated Press reported.

In comparison, participants who received a placebo had average weight loss of about 2.5%.

“With existing drugs, you’re going to get maybe 5% to 10% weight reduction, sometimes not even that,” physician Harold Bays, chief science officer at the Obesity Medicine Association, told the AP. Bays has helped conduct studies of Wegovy and other obesity and diabetes drugs.

In the United States, more than 100 million adults — about 1 in 3 — are obese.

Dropping even 5% of one’s weight can bring health benefits, such as improved energy, blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels, but it often doesn’t satisfy patients who are focused on weight loss, Bays said.

Bays said Wegovy’s most common side effects were nausea, diarrhea and vomiting.

Those usually subsided, but led about 5% of study participants to stop taking it.

The drug also shouldn’t be given to people at risk for some cancers, because of a potential risk for certain thyroid tumors, the FDA said.

Wegovy is a synthesized version of a gut hormone that curbs appetite. That’s a new strategy in treating obesity, physician Robert Kushner, a member of Novo Nordisk’s medical advisory board who heads Northwestern Medicine’s Center for Lifestyle Medicine, told the AP. Novo Nordisk said it also is developing a pill version that should start final patient studies later this year.

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Q: Bariatric surgery has been around for a few decades now. I’m assuming we have good information on the long-term efficacy of it in combating obesity. Are patients keeping the weight off?

A: It depends. I would say there is a percentage of weight regain that we see that’s significant. And all patients do gain some weight back when you look at them long-term.

What I tell patients is that their BMI will drop between 12 and 17 points within the first year. And you’ll usually regain three points back.

So five to 10 years out, patients will typically be about 10 points less than before the surgery. So if you had a BMI of 45, you’ll probably level out around 35. I think it’s important to let patients know this upfront so they can set their expectations. I do see patients with severe obesity with BMIs greater than 50 or 60 — even with surgery their BMI is probably going to level out in the 40s. So some patients look at that as weight regain or inability to lose weight. These tools that we have to treat obesity are only so effective, and patients need to understand that.

Q: How common is major weight regain?

A: Overall about 30% of patients will gain a significant portion of their weight back over the course of 10 years.

Q: What can you do for those patients to help them control their obesity?

A: Obesity affects multiple aspects of people’s lives, and there are different severities of the disease. To simplify it, we use BMI but each level of the disease requires increasing levels of therapy, surgery being the most effective. Patients post-surgery, who are still struggling with obesity, should know that surgery isn’t the only option.

What I typical-

ly do is reinstate good nutrition and active lifestyle, but also weight loss medications. Behavioral therapy can also help for maintenance of weight loss and continued weight loss. But I think, really, to treat patients with obesity you need to incorporate all of these things and weigh the risks and benefits of each.

Q: So bariatric surgery can’t necessarily be viewed as a cure?

A: The truth is bariatric surgery isn’t a cure for obesity, it’s just a very effective treatment for it. So even though they may lose weight and do very well, they’re always at risk of recurrence of the disease. I really think it exemplifies the fact that patients need to have long-term follow-up. It’s usually much easier to intervene with a patient who is struggling when they’re first starting to have issues.

Q: The COVID-19 pandemic has really destabilized people’s lifestyles and added massive stressors to people’s lives. What kinds of effects are you seeing that have on people struggling to control their weight?

A: I would say the pandemic has had negative effects on a lot of things. In terms of mental health it’s created a lot of stress, which can lead to increased eating and decreased activity. So we’ve definitely seen a lot of patients gain weight. There have been some positive effects in getting people to be more active by being outside more because you can’t really go to social gatherings like you did before. But overall I think it’s made patients more conscious of the need to watch what they eat and exercising. I don’t know if it’s really helped, but it has highlighted the obesity epidemic in some ways.

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

Q: What got you interested in bariatric surgery and obesity?

A: Before I started medical school my mom had a sleeve gastrectomy when she was in her mid-50s. She struggled with her weight after having children. She was a teacher, she worked all the time. She really just didn’t have the energy level I think she wanted. She did every weight loss program you could think of, every diet. The truth is, for patients who have obesity where their BMI is more than 35, diet and exercise doesn’t really work. There’s really no evidence that suggests diet and exercise works, but there’s this blame that occurs by society, and patients blame themselves. We try to practice evidence-based medicine, but patients still get told things that there’s no evidence for. But yes, my mom ended up having the procedure. She did really well with it. It really changed her life. She has tons of energy now and is probably going to live to 100. I think that’s part of the reason I got into bariatric surgery.

Also my brother had a gastric bypass.

He did very well with that as well, but he did have some weight regain.

But I think his level of disease was more than what my mom had. He’s struggled with obesity his whole life, which is a little different than what my mom dealt with. But in the end I think it’s given me some respect for what patients have to go through, not just in the physical sense but the social as well.

Q: Do we yet have a clear understanding of why, sometime in the '70s, our obesity rates started to skyrocket?

A: It’s obviously multifactorial.

We didn’t have to deal with this stuff when we were cavemen. We’re not running from saber-toothed tigers anymore. Part of it is the work most of us do now is more sedentary. We have addictive, very available foods.

I think our evolution has made us susceptible to it. There’s the assumption that it’s a lifestyle choice and that patients who develop it are just lazy and lack willpower. It’s really a dysfunction of how the body interprets energy. Patients who benefit from bariatric surgery or weight loss medications, when you really talk to them, they have increased hunger or difficulty reaching fullness or satiation. People who are normal weight usually eat when they're hungry, but their body isn’t usually telling them to be hungry all the time. Patients who are obese usually are hungry all the time. What we see after surgery is this hunger and satiation are improved. There’s some kind of disregulation between the GI tract and the brain that makes a lot of humans susceptible to obesity.

Lifelines

Name: Aaron Sabbota, M.D. Position: General surgeon at Highland Hospital Hometown: West Bloomfield, Michigan Education: Wayne State University School of Medicine Affiliations: Highland Hospital, Strong Memorial Organizations: American College of Surgeons, Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons; Association for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Family: Wife (Stephanie), son, twin girls Hobbies: Hockey, video games

Is a Pandemic Baby Boom on the Way?

A

merica, get ready for a baby boom.

That’s the likelihood anyway, according to a new forecast that suggests a drop in pregnancy and birth rates seen during the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic is about to be reversed.

“We expect a dramatic rebound soon,” said study lead author physician Molly Stout, maternal fetal medicine director at Michigan Medicine Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital, in Ann Arbor.

“We’re already seeing signs of a summer baby surge,” Stout added.

Using a modeling system based on Michigan Medicine data, her team found that pregnancies rose from 4,100 in 2017 to 4,620 in 2020.

Between November 2020 and spring of 2021, though, they dropped by roughly 14%. The researchers attributed the drop to a downturn in conceptions associated with pandemic-related lockdowns that began in March 2020.

Now, the modeling system suggests that over the summer and fall of 2021, there will be 10% to 15% more births than would normally be expected, according to the report published online June 3 in JAMA Network Open.

While previous media reports have suggested a pandemic-linked

baby boom, they were mostly speculative and not based on data, Stout noted.

“What we have shown here is that through modeling of pregnancies within a health care system, we can project birth rate increases and decreases associated with major societal shifts,” she said in a Michigan Medicine news release.

Stout pointed out that major societal changes seem to influence reproductive choices, population growth and fertility rates. She cited the 1918 flu pandemic, the Great Depression in 1929 and the recession of 2008 as examples.

“Usually, we see the effects by modeling birth and death rates, only as the changes are occurring,” Stout said. “With this methodology, we can accurately project anticipated birth rates ahead of the actual changes.”

Being able to predict upcoming birth trends may help health systems better plan for labor and delivery needs, she said.

Experts suggest that the drop-off in pregnancies after pandemic-related lockdowns in March 2020 may owe to several factors. Among those are economic uncertainty; lack of child care or other support systems; the impact on working women; and postponement of reproductive and fertility care.

Get back to being together.

SERVING MONROE AND ONTARIO COUNTIES A monthly newspaper published

by Local News, Inc. Distribution: 33,500 copies throughout more than 1,500 high-traffic locations.

In Good Health is published 12 times a year by Local News, Inc. © 2021 by Local News, Inc. All rights reserved.

P.O. Box 525, Victor NY 14564.

Phone: 585-421-8109 • Email: Editor@GVhealthnews.com Editor & Publisher: Wagner Dotto Writers: Jim Miller, Deborah J. Sergeant, Gwenn Voelckers, Anne Palumbo, Ernst Lamothe Jr., John Addyman, Mackenzie Park Advertising: Anne Westcott, Linda Covington Layout & Design: Joey Sweener • Office Manager: Nancy Nitz

No material may be reproduced in whole or in part from this publication without the express written permission of the publisher. The information in this publication is intended to complement—not to take the place of—the recommendations of your health provider. Consult your physician before making major changes in your lifestyle or health care regimen.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 5

Live Alone & Thrive

By Gwenn Voelckers

Practical tips, advice and hope for those who live alone

Living Alone Is No Laughing Matter — or Is It?

W

hen was the last time you laughed until your side hurt? Acted silly? Or felt like a kid again?

If you are like me, it’s been a long time. Too long!

The pandemic knocked the funny out of my funny bone.

But happily, things are changing for the better.

Life is opening up and there is plenty of fun to be had for everyone, including those who live alone.

Sure, living solo can be serious business, what with all the chores and responsibilities that rest solely on our shoulders, but let’s not forget to laugh a little and enjoy ourselves along the way.

“Why focus on fun?” you might ask. Because having fun, letting your hair down, and relaxing means letting go of your problems and worries for awhile. When that happens, you have time to “breathe” emotionally.

When you are not occupied with troubling thoughts, your mind is free to wander, which can make room for new insights, understanding, and creativity. You may see things in a different light. And what might seem insurmountable at the moment (a Saturday night alone) can become more manageable.

My life was no barrel of monkeys after my divorce. In fact, having fun was a low priority on my to-do list. I was busy trying to put my life back together as a single woman. Finding entertainment wasn’t among my goals.

But then I took a trip that

changed everything.

A couple of friends, determined to rescue me from my somber existence, coaxed me to join them on a road trip to Martha’s Vineyard. Warning everyone that I would be no fun to be with, I reluctantly squeezed into the backseat of the Volvo.

We poked around the island for a few days and then found our way to one of its most charming harbor towns, Oak Bluffs. It’s a magical little place that is home to colorful, whimsical cottages.

Oak Bluffs is also home to the Flying Horses Carousel, the oldest platform carousel in America.

I stood there admiring it, commenting on the warm patina of its bobbing horses and remarking on how much fun the kids were having.

That’s when my friends elbowed me and said, “Oh, come on, let’s take a ride.” After complaining that I was just too old for that sort of thing, they ignored my protests and literally lifted me onto a bright yellow horse.

It was so much fun! I loved it! I even grabbed for the brass ring, in hopes of winning a second free ride, but a fresh-faced 11-year-old beat me to it. His joy brought a smile to my heart.

Riding that carousel made me giggle and laugh and feel like myself again. It felt foreign and unfamiliar.

But more than that, it felt fabulous!

I was reminded of how much better my life could be if I just got back on that horse and made having fun more of a priority.

“My life was no barrel of monkeys after my divorce. In fact, having fun was a low priority on my to-do list. I was busy trying to put my life back together as a single woman. Finding entertainment wasn’t among my goals.”

Back home, I started weaving fun and entertainment into my life. And I encourage you to do the same. Below are a few tips to help you tickle what may be a dormant funny bone: • Hang out with fun (and funny!) people. My sister Anne is the funniest person I know. Opportunities to be with her trump almost everything else on my calendar. We laugh, poke fun at each other, and otherwise just enjoy being together.

When I’m with Anne, my cares drift away and life is good. So, take a look at the people you hang out with.

While we all need supportive friends with whom we can sort through life’s difficulties, we also need some fun-loving souls. Be sure to connect with them on a regular basis.

• Diversify your entertainment.

While I love classical music performances and can’t resist a good documentary, those activities don’t invigorate my inner child nor make me chuckle. No, to have fun, I need to dance as if no one’s watching, enjoy a two-scoop ice cream cone, or watch – for the umpteenth time – the 1980 comedy “Airplane!” with Leslie Nielsen.

When’s the last time you went bowling, rode a tandem bike, played board games with friends, blew bubbles, or went to a comedy club?

There’s no time like the present!

• See the humor around you. I’ve also discovered that we don’t have to manufacture our own amusement.

It’s there for the taking, if we just

look around.

Yesterday, I saw something funny happening right in front of my eyes.

A dog was pacing back and forth in the back seat of the car ahead of me, sticking its head out the windows on each pass. It looked ridiculous!

I could have observed this scene with indifference, but I decided to enjoy the moment and embrace its inherent humor. Do the same. Pause and enjoy the absurdity that surrounds us.

• And finally, be silly and don’t take yourself too seriously. Oh, come on, you can do it! Let go, let loose. If this year has taught us anything, it has taught us that life is short, time is precious. Join your kids or grandkids on the playground and feel the wind on your face while you pump a swing higher and higher.

There’s nothing like a little fun and a good laugh to brighten your day and lift your spirits, whether you live alone or not. So go for it. Grab for that brass ring. And enjoy the ride!

Gwenn Voelckers is the founder and facilitator of Alone and Content, empowerment workshops for women and author of “Alone and Content,” a collection of inspiring essays for those who live alone. For information about her workshops, to purchase her book, or invite Voelckers to speak, visit www.aloneandcontent.com

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Not Ready for PostPandemic Mingling?

W

hile some people may be ready and eager to reconnect with family and friends at social gatherings post-pandemic, it’s OK to feel apprehensive.

As restrictions loosen because infection rates are plummeting and more people are getting vaccinated, many people are experiencing feelings that they didn’t expect — such as anxiety about returning to social situations, according to a psych services expert.

“For some people, these changes are exciting, and for other people, they’re daunting,” said physician Itai Danovitch, chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral

neurosciences at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

It’s normal to struggle with change, even when it’s positive, Danovitch said. After so many months spent at home, returning to the workplace or attending a family barbecue can cause many to feel worried, anxious or even panicked.

“Fear or anxiety is normal,” he said in a center news release. “We feel things for a reason, and anxiety is basically a threat response.”

These feelings will vary from person to person. Even one individual’s perception may change from day to day.

It is possible to work through

these feelings, Danovitch said. He suggests that people take the time before a social event to think about exactly what parts of the upcoming interaction make them anxious, then strategize about what they can do to work through their concerns.

“Think about what factors are within your control,” Danovitch said.

“For example, if you have concerns about an upcoming event or a gathering, talk to the host about those concerns early. Get the information you need to make a decision about your comfort level, and don’t be afraid to communicate that decision.”

This may mean having to limit the time spent at a social gathering or even declining an invitation.

“We need to have honest conversations with each other,” Danovitch said. “It takes a certain amount of bravery and courage to do that, to be honest about how you feel, because there’s risk of being misunderstood.”

These feelings aren’t always a sign of an anxiety disorder, he said.

They may just be trepidation or shyness that will be alleviated over time.

That’s not the case when anxiety and fear cause dysfunction, impairment or severe distress. For those who struggle with social anxiety to the point where it impedes their lives, Danovitch recommends talking to a primary care provider about care and treatment options.

“For example, if you’re so anxious about returning to work, which is a social setting, that you’re not coming into work at all,” he said, “if you are having recurrent panic attacks, or if your anxiety is persistent, pervasive and affecting your function, then it makes good sense to seek professional help. Anxiety disorders are very common, and there are a number of effective treatments available to address them.”

strategies by placing early childhood and development experts in pediatric offices serving high percentages of Medicaid patients.

tage plans currently require a video call but that restriction would be removed as well. Prior to the pandemic, the vast majority of providers and payers were highly skeptical of the efficacy and cost benefit of telehealth and its acceptance was slow to say the least. Interestingly, the majority of commercial payers expect they will not raise premiums due to the pandemic or telehealth. One third report they will adjust benefits, primarily for telehealth and mental health.

Healthcare in a Minute

By George W. Chapman

2020 Leading Causes of Death (COVID-19 Doesn’t Top the List)

C

OVID-19 was the No. 3 cause of death behind heart disease and cancer.

Early in the pandemic, naysayers believed COVID-19 would be no worse than the annual flu which was the ninth leading cause of death. Here are the top 10. No. 1, heart disease, 690,882 deaths;

New CMS Administrator The Senate has confirmed Chiquita Brooks-LaSure as administrator of Center for Medicare and Medicaid Service (CMS), which oversees the Medicare and Medicaid programs. She replaces Seema Verma. Brooks-LaSure previously was director of Affordable Care Act (ACA) coverage policy with the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). Several industry trade associations, including the Association of Health Insurance Plans and some physician groups, lauded her confirmation.

Pharmacy Fraud: 300% Increase Last year’s pandemic and resultant chaos provided some shifty pharmacies with an opportunity to scam unsuspecting consumers and their insurers. One national pharmacy benefits manager (PBM) found fraudulent claims submitted by participating pharmacies increased 300% in 2020 from 2019. The average audited recovery in 2020 increased 70% from 2019. The fraud was concentrated almost entirely in independent pharmacies versus pharmacy chains like CVS or Walgreens. Scheming pharmacies would hire telemarketers to call consumers to inquire about any pain or symptoms they may be experiencing. The unsuspecting con-

2, cancer, 598,532; 3, COVID-19, 345,323; 4, accidents, 192,176; 5, stroke, 159,050; 6, respiratory disease, 151.637; 7, Alzheimer’s, 133,382; 8, diabetes, 101,106; 9, flu/pneumonia, 53,495; 10, kidney disease, 52,260. Experts believe deaths from COVID-19 are underreported.

sumer would provide their insurance information. The pharmacy would then bill the insurance company for unwanted or unnecessary items such as topical pain creams, expensive vitamins, migraine therapies, etc. Often, the pharmacy would supply the consumer with a generic drug, but then bill the insurance company for a more expensive brand name. This would increase the consumer’s out of pocket cost considerably. 112 pharmacies were fired from the PBM’s network.

2022 Healthcare Budget Here are some of the major healthcare-related priorities being proposed by President Biden for fiscal 2022. 1. Increase Health and Human Services budget by 23%.

HHS services include aging, alcohol and drugs, emergency medical services, disabilities, mental health, children and families and public health. 2. Make permanent the rule that those buying coverage on the exchange don’t have to pay more than 8.5% of household income on insurance if their income is above 400% of federal poverty guidelines.

3. Provide $400 million in grants for proposals to expand telehealth and electronic records into rural areas and to integrate the electronic records of rural veterans with private providers and the VA. 4. Expand rural maternity and obstetric management July 2021 •

Drug Prices As frequently reported here (ad nauseam), there are virtually no controls on drug prices. Biden is proposing to merely allow CMS to negotiate prices, (versus set prices like it does for physicians and hospitals), and have Medicare and Medicaid pay for some highly expensive drugs. The federal government negotiates prices on practically everything it buys, except drugs. The potential savings from the list of expensive drugs could be $50 billion a year for each of the next 10 years — or a total of half a trillion dollars. It would easily pay for all of the aforementioned priorities in Biden’s budget and more. But all of this depends on enough members of Congress to stand up to the ubiquitous and powerful drug lobby.

Recent senate hearings have exposed the fact that Big Pharma spends far more enriching themselves on stock buy backs than on research and development. The drug industry as always argued it needs high profits to support research and development.

The top 15 CEOs earned a combined $470 million in salary. The top three are: Len Schliefer of Regeneron, $135 million; Stan Erck of Novavax, $48 million; and Alex Gorky of J&J, $30 million.

Telehealth Bill The pandemic will be credited with expanding the use and acceptance of telehealth by providers, consumers and payers. However, some telehealth services were in jeopardy of being terminated by CMS, (no longer paid for), once we were clear of COVID-19. The most important of these temporary services was audio only (by phone) telehealth. A bipartisan and bicameral bill allowing CMS to pay for phone-only telehealth, permanently, is sure to be signed into law shortly. Geographic and originating site restrictions (like calls from the patient’s home to their provider) would be removed. Medicare Advan-

Care Delayed If you have experienced a delay in the care or services ordered by your provider lately, you’re not alone. A recent survey conducted by the Medical Group Management Association found that 80% of medical groups report a dramatic increase in the number of services, procedures, therapies and drugs that require a prior authorization or approval by the patient’s insurance company. This has resulted in more delays and outright denials of care.

Medical groups have added staff just to stay on top and track hundreds of prior authorizations. Fortunately, Congress is well aware of this costly and potentially dangerous practice. A bipartisan bill called “Seniors' Timely Access to Care Act” requires Medicare Advantage plans to adopt electronic prior authorization and several other reforms to speed the process up. Several studies in the past have demonstrated that the added costs associated with prior authorization, for both providers and insurers, often exceeds any savings in unnecessary care.

George W. Chapman is a healthcare business consultant who works exclusively with physicians, hospitals and healthcare organizations. He operates GW Chapman Consulting based in Syracuse. Email him at gwc@gwchapmanconsulting.com.

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 7

What Dentists Want Parents To Do Adults play crucial role in promoting good dental health among children, say experts

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

I

n a sense, dentists treating children see two patients with each visit: the child and the accompanying parent. While the dentists treat the child, the parent receives dental education to improve home care.

Several issues consistently come up during these visits. Cynthia Wong, pediatric dentist and program director for the pediatric dentistry residency program at URMC, said that one of these is grazing.

“Parents don’t know that when kids have cavities, it might be that

they’re grazing a lot, even on healthful foods,” Wong said. “It doesn’t matter the quantity but the frequency. If we keep munching all day long, it’s like a car being used 24/7. It breaks down.

Cynthia Wong Cavities usual-

Is the COVID-19 Vaccine Safe for Children?

T

he U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have recently expanded the emergency use authorization for the COVID-19 Pfizer vaccine to adolescents aged 12 – 15.

Pediatrician Lorna Fitzpatrick, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield vice president of medical affairs, discusses vaccine.

Q: Children are unlikely to have a severe case of COVID-19. Why should they get vaccinated?

A. Although most children will Page 8

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not get seriously ill from COVID-19, transmission and serious cases still happen. About one in five new cases of COVID-19 are in children. As activities outside the home resume, that number could rise even higher. Socialization is important for a child’s mental and social health. We want to reintroduce socialization as safely as possible.

Q: Will children have different side effects than adults? Should they stay home from school after getting the vaccine?

A. Children have had similar

ly happen more when there’s more frequent food intake. We suggest that if they need a snack, time it.”

Instead of allowing all-day Goldfish snacking from the package, parents should offer one portion for five minutes. If it is not finished, the remainder of the portion should be taken away.

For children who frequently claim they are hungry, parents should remain strict about eating times. Many times, it is just boredom or thirst instead of hunger.

“They will develop a sense of hunger that will train them to eat enough,” Wong said.

It takes about 30 minutes for saliva to reduce the acid in the mouth.

However, a drink of water can help.

In addition, children should begin seeing the dentist by one year of age. Although it seems too early to many parents, Wong said it is important so that dentists can detect oral problems early, help children feel comfortable visiting the dentist and establish good home care with parents.

One aspect of home care that many parents overlook is flossing.

Stuffing large hands into tiny mouths is challenging. However, floss picks may make it easier.

“When there are older children and the compliance isn’t always good, keep the flossers where they rest, like in cars, near the TV or computers,” Wong said. “A lot of kids have video game time. It takes time for a game to load and that’s time to floss. Ideally, it should be before bed.

Flossing during the day would be a good way to integrate it.”

Brushing should occur at least twice daily: after breakfast and before bed. Not every patient consistently complies with this guideline.

“Often, even with adults, sometimes they brush more in the morning but often forget at night,” said Lindsey Behrman dentist and pediatric dental attending at Pluta Dental Center in Rochester. “That’s super important because you want to make sure all the food that’s been on your

teeth all day is off your teeth.

It’s an all-youcan eat buffet for the bacteria.

You usually have less saliva at night.”

Brushing after lunch is good as well.

However, most children are not Lindsey Behrman able to do so at school. Rinsing the mouth with water can help reduce the bacteria load after lunch.

Parents should help their children brush until age 7 or when their manual dexterity is sufficient to do a good job. Otherwise, Behrman said that it is easy for children to miss spots.

She also encourages brushing the tongue.

“We have papillae,” she said.

“It’s like a carpet for food and plaque to accumulate. After you brush the teeth, brush the tongue.”

She also cautions parents about allowing children to sip beverages all day (unless it is water). Diluting it with water does not make a difference regarding its affect on teeth.

“Drink juice only with meals and keep it to one serving a day,” Behrman said. “I try to tell parents, have them use water in a bottle. Anything like juice or milk, keep it at the table in an open cup or sippy cup. Take it away when the meal is over and then give a water bottle back.”

Behrman also reminds many parents to have their children wear a mouthguard for sports beyond just football and lacrosse. A collision with other players, equipment like the net or ball or falling during play can endanger teeth.

“Get a fitted mouthguard, not a floppy one that moves in the mouth,” Behrman said. “If they have a very deep bite or their top teeth are farther out than the bottom ones, they’re more at risk for a dental issue.”

side effects as adults, including pain at the injection site, fatigue, headache, chills, fever and some aches and pains. Your child does not need to stay home after being vaccinated and can continue with their regular activities. But, if they don’t feel well or have a fever after the vaccine, it’s a good idea to let them stay home and rest.

all my children should get vaccinated, and they all are.

Q: Should a parent be concerned about the vaccine affecting their child’s growth or development?

A. There is no indication that the COVID-19 vaccine will interfere with a child’s growth and development.

Q: What if a child has allergies?

A. Currently, the recommendation is that the vaccine should not be given to anyone who has a history of severe or immediate allergic reactions to vaccines. If your child is allergic to any component of the COVID-19 vaccine, they should not get it. Reach out to your child’s doctor for guidance.

Q: As a mother, are you comfortable with your children getting vaccinated?

A. I am. Each parent should make decisions for their own child. I researched the information, relied on experts, and made the decision that

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

Q: What would you say to a parent who is hesitant about vaccinating their child without having access to long-term Lorna Fitzpatrick studies?

A. I would encourage them to reach out to their child’s doctor to ask specific questions and share their concerns. I also recommend they seek out reputable, fact-based resources, such as the Centers for Disease Control and the American Academy of Pediatrics. Your child’s doctor can help you sort through the information and make an informed decision.

Q: Any update on vaccines for children younger than 12 years old?

A. The vaccine is currently being studied in children as young as 6 months old. The hope is that it will be just as safe and effective as it is in children 12 and older and receive approval.

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You You may have be eligible to participate in this studyimpacted if: You are years and in older You willYou bemay asked be to: eligible to18 participate thisAND study if: You haveand at least wisdom tooth in the lower jaw ❑You Attend 2-3 visits (screening/surgery andimpacted follow-up visit) are 18 years olderone AND ❑You Take medicati on if needed have at least one wisdom tooth impacted in the lower jaw You will be asked to: ❑ Complete morning and evening eDiaryand questi onnaires q Attend 2-3 visits (screening/surgery follow-up visit)on your smartphone You will be asked to: ❑ Wear watch-like device if needed q aTake study medication q Attendq2-3Complete visits (screening/surgery andeDiary follow-up visit) morning and questionnaires your smartphone ❑ Return unused medicati on evening and study supplies at your on follow-up visit q Take study medication if needed q Wear a watch-like device

qreceive Complete morning andparti evening your smartphone You will $125 for your cipatieDiary on. q Return unused medication and questionnaires study supplies aton your follow-up visit q Wear a watch-like device q Return unused medication and participation studyplease suppliescontact at your follow-up visitat To determine if you qualify, Stacie Ellis You will receive $125 for your

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Class at New York Chiropractic College in Seneca Falls. The college has recently been renamed Northeast College of Health Sciences.

NYCC Becomes Northeast College Of Health Sciences

L

ong recognized as a leading institution for the education of healthcare professionals, New York Chiropractic College has announced that it will now be known as Northeast College of Health Sciences.

The new name was chosen to best reflect the transforming scope of educational opportunities offered at the college and to support the evolving range of growing healthcare professions.

“Today we proudly proclaim Northeast College of Health Sciences as our new name, one that strongly reflects our interprofessional nature and our position as innovators in healthcare education,” said Northeast College President Michael Mestan.

Changing the college’s name has long been discussed. The charge to do so was formally addressed in the NYCC BLUEprint Strategic Plan 2018-2021, and in June 2019 the college’s board of trustees voted unani-

mously for a name change.

Though the process was put on a short hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the college was granted authorization for the new name by New York state in June.

The new name reflects Northeast College of Health Sciences’ focus on connecting students from a variety of academic backgrounds to a robust range of integrated healthcare programs. The change also signals a new chapter for Northeast to create even more space for new collaborations and opportunities advancing healthcare education.

The college remains committed to its strong foundation of chiropractic and plans to move forward with both growth in its doctor of chiropractic program as well as the development of diverse new academic programs to support in-demand career paths. President Mestan noted, “As we continue to prepare July 2021 •

our students to be leaders in an ever-more diverse variety of healthcare disciplines, it is fitting that our strong history of academic excellence in chiropractic will remain as our college’s core.”

Always Progressing Throughout its more than 100 years of existence, the college has always been an organization that embraces change. The original name of the college was Columbia Institute of Chiropractic (CIC), founded by Frank Dean in a brownstone in New York City in 1919. In the 1970s CIC became New York Chiropractic College (NYCC), moving to Long Island and receiving accreditation of its doctor of chiropractic program from the Council on Chiropractic Education.

The college moved to its third location in Seneca Falls in 1991, expanding onto a 286-acre campus with

space for new facilities including an extensive library, athletic center and residence halls. Yet another academic expansion, in the early 2000s, resulted in the addition of graduate degrees in disciplines including applied clinical nutrition and human anatomy and physiology instruction.

Northeast College recently saw a strong spring 2021 doctor of chiropractic program enrollment, seating the largest incoming spring cohort since 2018. As well, the college has a significant impact on its region’s economic health. According to a recent report from the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities in New York (CICU), Northeast College contributed just about an estimated $65 million to the state’s economy in 2019 and was responsible for a total estimated employment of close to 600 jobs.

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 9

equity to the attention of the public in Rochester long before the Black Lives Matter movement brought it out nationally. We issued two reports that have laid out how grave the disparities are in every realm for our communities of color. There’s higher infant mortality, shorter lifespans, higher housing costs, less availability of housing and we have the highest child poverty rate of any mid-sized city in the country.

[Note: the reports are "Hard Facts: Race and Ethnicity in the Nine-County Greater Rochester Area" (2017) and "Hard Facts Update: Race and Ethnicity in the Nine-County Greater Rochester Area" (2020).]

Most Hospitalized COVID Patients Have Long-Haul Symptoms

Q. What were some of the results of that research?

A. That helped lead to the formation of racial equity and justice initiatives. We’ve done an enormous amount to raise awareness and so have others in Rochester, including libraries, schools, universities, colleges and arts organizations. The Community Foundation has been there with grants to support the educational process, the discussion groups, the efforts to reform policing and the court system.

I

f you land in the hospital with a COVID-19 infection, there’s a good chance you’ll still be suffering symptoms months later, researchers report.

A wide swath of lingering health issues plagued more than 70% of these patients, investigators found.

“Early on, we completely ignored the long-term consequences of getting sick with this virus,” said study senior author Steven Goodman, a physician and a professor of epidemiology and population health and medicine at Stanford University.

“People were being told this was all in their heads. The question now isn’t is this real, but how big is the problem.”

To determine that, his team analyzed 45 studies that were published between January 2020 and March 2021. The studies included more than 9,700 COVID-19 patients. Of those, 83% had been hospitalized.

They found that 72.5% of study participants reported still having at least one of 84 persistent symptoms or clinical signs, with the most common being fatigue (40%), shortness of breath (36%), sleep disorders (29%), inability to concentrate (25%), depression and anxiety (20%), and general pain and discomfort (20%).

Other problems reported by patients included loss of taste and smell, memory loss, chest pain and fevers.

Persistent symptoms were defined as those lasting at least 60 days after diagnosis, symptom onset or hospital admission, or at least 30 days after recovery from acute illness or hospital discharge.

If even a portion of these patients require continuing care, they could pose an immense public health burden, said Goodman.

“If something on the order of 70% of those coming out of moderate to serious COVID-19 are showing persisting symptoms, that is a huge number,” Goodman said in a Stanford news release. “It’s astonishing how many symptoms are part of what’s now being referred to as long COVID.” The study was published May 26 in the journal JAMA Network Open.

Page 10

•

Q A &

with Jennifer Leonard

CEO of Rochester Area Community Foundation talks about helping those in need

By Mike Costanza

S

ince it was founded in 1972, the Rochester Area Community Foundation has grown to be the largest grant-making foundation in the Rochester region. With just 32 employees and an annual operating budget of $4.3 million, the nonprofit seeks to improve the lives of those who live in Monroe County and seven of its contiguous counties.

In Good Health spoke to Jennifer Leonard, the Community Foundation’s president and CEO, about its aims, accomplishments and goals.

Q. What is the Rochester Area Community Foundation’s mission?

A. The Community Foundation empowers donors and community partners to strengthen our region through philanthropy. We have many families, many individuals and many organizations that put their dollars together to make a better region.

Q. What are your nonprofit’s sources of funding?

A. We are an umbrella for nearly 1,500 charitable funds established by individuals, families and groups that

love the greater Rochester region. We are the largest grant-making foundation in this region and the second largest in Central and Western New York.

Q. The Community Foundation dispenses more than $30 million in grants each year. Where do you direct those funds?

A. Our board [of directors] has only a portion of that that they can direct toward our goal to create a more equitable community and strengthen the vitality of our region.

It’s about 15%. Our other grants are distributed at the request of donors.

Many living individuals, couples or families create donor-advised funds that support a variety of organizations, including some recommended by the Community Foundation.

Q. One of the Community Foundation’s main goals, according to its website, is to address the racial inequities that exist in the Rochester area. How has your nonprofit approached that task?

A. We have worked in many different ways to help bring racial

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

Q. You said that the Community Foundation has sought to improve local educational systems. How has it done so?

A. We supported early childhood development and education for more than a generation and the creating of an early childhood system in Rochester. We also host the Greater Rochester After-School and Summer Alliance, which works to create engaging and educationally supportive after-school activities and summer activities that allow students’ parents to be at work and know that their kids are learning and growing safely.

Q. The coronavirus pandemic has left a number of those living in the Greater Rochester area unable to meet their basic needs. How has the Community Foundation tried to help them?

A. We co-led, along with the United Way of Greater Rochester, the Community Crisis Fund to support nonprofits on the front line. The fund provided grants to nonprofits that were helping people get food, shelter, healthcare, transportation and child care during the height of the pandemic. One group working with refugees was able to secure legal aid and translations with the help of grants from the Community Crisis Fund. We also helped school districts in the city and the region obtain digital devices and Internet service for students who needed to be able to learn remotely during the pandemic shutdown, closing the digital divide.

Q. What challenges might the Community Foundation face in the next few years?

A. We actually have an immediate interest right now in fostering an inclusive recovery for Greater Rochester. The federal and state governments are directing about a billion dollars to Rochester. We are interested in seeing that the federal and state dollars particularly help people who historically have not had access to the best schools, have not had access to the best housing and places to live, and have been in some cases systematically denied access to fair policing.

For more information on the Rochester Area Community Foundation, go to www.racf.org.

Post COVID-19 Life: Ways The Pandemic Has Affected Health Unrelated health issues developed unnoticed during the pandemic

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

V

arious facets of the COVID-19 pandemic have affected health in a variety of ways that healthcare providers did not expect at its onset.

While illnesses from coronavirus captured the world’s attention, other health issues developed unnoticed.

One of the reasons is that routine and preventive care plummeted.

“At the height of the pandemic, outpatient office visits were down 60% and that is pretty consistent across the country,” said physician Jane Salamone, executive medical director of Rochester Regional Health’s Primary Care Institute.

That means many people skipped regular physical examinations. All health screening visits ceased entirely for weeks. Some patients skimped on care for chronic health issues like diabetes and hypertension. Even after the quarantine was lifted, many patients feared visiting the hospital or doctor’s office.

“We’ve seen at our acute care

facilities an uptick of intakes to conditions not related to COVID,” Salamone said. “For the past year and half, they’re not taking care of their diabetes, high cholesterol and hypertension and we’re seeing manifestations of those. For years to come, we’ll see the fallout from the decreased number of health maintenance screenings and lack of attention to chronic conditions.”

She also fears that missed screenings for breast cancer, colon cancer and prostate cancer may result in an increase in undiagnosed cancer.

Salamone has noticed that mental health has suffered since the pandemic began.

“There’s an increase in depression and anxiety,” she said. “It spans all ages. Young people have seen their lives change dramatically.

Parents were stressed about teaching their kids while working at home.

Elderly people who are at high-risk couldn’t see their family members for quite a long time.”

Rochester Regional has been working on its outreach to encourage patients to return to their previous healthcare regimen.

As a positive result of the pandemic, telehealth has helped more people connect with healthcare providers for routine matters. Before COVID-19, “there wasn’t a good impetus to get telehealth going,” Salamone said.

Like many providers, Rochester Regional is still offering telehealth to help increase access to care when applicable. Topics like mental health, skin rashes and general patient education can often be handled through telehealth.

Debra Kostiw, owner of No Place Like Home Senior Care in Henrietta, said many older adults have struggled in a variety of ways during the pandemic, including physically, since they lacked a means of engaging in physical activity such as at a senior center or gym.

“They’re weaker,” she said. “A lot of older adults lost bone mass.

They’ve gone downhill significantly.”

She added that without mental stimulation and socialization, many older adults experienced cognitive decline. Staying secluded for months was harder on older adults who may not have as many social connections, since many relatives and friends have passed away. They may also lack means of reaching out to others remotely, such as a tablet or smartphone. Or they may feel like calling others on the telephone makes them burdensome.

Some older adults rely upon programs like Meals on Wheels for both nutrition and a friendly check-in.

Since senior centers closed last year, the programming older adults have

missed out on the socializing and stimulation to which they were accustomed.

“During the pandemic, they were not physically, socially or mentally as active,” Kostiw said. “If you Jane Salamone even neglect one of those, you have significant decline.

If you put all of those together, it’s a tsunami.”

She encourages relatives and friends to help their older loved ones to regain some of their losses by Debra Kostiw engaging them as often as possible.

In addition to not attending school in person, children experienced another important effect of the pandemic: cavities.

“We’ve seen a lot of ‘COVID cavities,’” said Cynthia Wong, pediatric dentist and program director for the Pediatric Dentistry Residency Program at URMC. “The caries rate is off the roof now.”

A combination of skipped dental cleanings, stress munching on sweets and constant access to food while at home has meant many children have new cavities. Now that the backlog at dental offices has cleared up, Wong wants parents to make sure they take their children in for a check-up.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 11

Sunscreen Vital For Skin Health

Taking steps to protect your skin from the sun helps prevent cancer, signs of aging

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

T

he benefits of wearing sunscreen have been known for three decades.

The sun is a major cause of skin cancer and signs of aging, which sunscreen can help prevent. But many people do not bother applying it regularly. They may slather it on for a day at the beach or amusement park to avoid a painful sunburn, but not more often than that.

Dermatologist Emily Lambert at Geneva General Hospital spends

much time talking with patients about making sunscreen part of their daily routine.

“I think some people are not in the habit,” she said. “Everyone has aging of the skin and wrinkling. If those are things that bother you, that’s another reason.”

She advises using a facial lotion containing SPF-30 before leaving home in the morning. During the lunch hour, avoid exposure by using a physical barrier, such as a large

Address Psoriasis Naturally Tips from local pros

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

I

f taking medication is not your ideal only means of addressing psoriasis or you would like more tools to reduce flare-ups, you have more options than prescriptions. ========= Tips from physician Francisco Tausk, professor of dermatology, allergy, immunology and rheumatology at University of Rochester School of Medicine:

• “The National Psoriasis Foundation supports the Mediterranean Diet. The only study that had controls was one in Iran where they looked at a vegan diet with low sodium. They saw patients’ psoriasis improve in a month with low calorie, low-carb, plant-based eating. These diets are a little difficult to follow in that they are st–rict. They are anti- inPage 12

•

flammatory as there are antioxidants in vegetables and fruits. There’s not been too much scientific work done on the effect of diet.

• “If you lose weight, you respond much better to the biologic—medication. By far, patients will improve overall. Fat tissue produces a lot of inflammatory issues. A lot of mediators—molecules involved in producing psoriasis—are the same as those made by fat tissues. If you have a lot of waist circumference fat, it makes sense your psoriasis will be worse.

• “Mindfulness meditation has been shown to help psoriasis. It became extremely popular in the US. It helps patients deal with the stress and it leads them into the path of meditation. Stress makes most patients with psoriasis worse.

Addressing that is important. With depression, the brain releases inflam-

brimmed hat while taking a walk or sitting under a patio umbrella at the café instead of in direct sunlight. Or apply a dusting of SPF powder if you wear makeup and do not want to take it off.

“If you’re wearing thick foundation, probably not a lot of sun is getting in there,” Lambert said. “With tinted moisturizer, you might want to reapply.”

Some people worry about applying chemical-based sunscreens to their skin.

Lambert said that physical sunscreens with zinc or titanium offer a good alternative.

“Protective shirts and pants and hats can help those who don’t want to apply something,” she added.

Sunscreen rated SPF 30-plus is ideal. Lambert said to apply onehalf teaspoon on the face and one teaspoon on each extremity. Water resistant sunscreen is recommended while swimming or excessively sweating. Reapply sunscreen every couple of hours and after toweling off.

Many cosmetics contain SPF, which makes it easier to protect the skin for those who wear makeup.

One of those is the TIM line, developed by Deanna Cahill, owner of The Brow Diva. She has worked in the makeup business for more than 30 years in Rochester.

“The importance of SPF in your skincare, whether it be a day cream or a tinted moisturizer, is because of the exposure that you get just from walking from the car to a building or walking out in a parking lot or taking a short walk,” Cahill said. “It’s the accumulation of the daily exposure we get from the sun that does the most damage.

“That’s why it’s important to wear sunscreen every day to protect your skin from the harmful rays. Vitamin D is great, but it’s also important to protect us from the harmful rays.” matory markers. It’s a vicious cycle.

Psychotherapy and antidepressants are of importance. Exercise is also important in the same vein as depression and meditation. Yoga can help.

• “I do recommend to patients certain supplements, including turmeric. Studies show it reduces psoriasis. For others, there are not that many control trials, but I recommend certain supplements as anti-inflammatories, like vitamin D. Everyone here has very low vitamin D levels.

Resveratrol is an extract from grapes that is a strong antioxidant that protects against inflammation. I tell patients to take omega-3 fatty acids.

I prefer they take them not from fish but algae. If you go with fish, buy wild caught fish, not farmed. The wild caught salmon feeds itself on plankton that has the omega-3. To get the right oils, you need salmon that were feeding off the algae that contain the oils. Since it’s very expensive, I tell patients to buy plant-based omega-3 oils. Some studies have been for it and some are against it. But there are more for consuming the oil.

I also tell patients to try sulforaphane supplements. It turns on your natural antioxidants in your own cells. ========= Tips from Emily Lambert, dermatologist at Geneva General Hospital:

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

Sunscreen is For Everybody People of color often overlook sunscreen, according to a recent Consumer Reports survey of 2,007 people. The survey responses revealed that 61% of blacks and 23% of Hispanics said they never wear sunscreen. While it is true that skin containing more melanin is less prone to sun damage than lighter skin, it’s not a free pass to skip sunscreen. Darker skin can still suffer the effects of sun-induced damage, including sunburn, lines, wrinkles, spots and skin cancer.

“People of color can get skin cancers and can get very bad skin cancers, including melanoma on the bottoms of their feet,” Dermatologist Emily Lambert at Geneva General Hospital, said.

Considering how few ads for sunscreen include people of color, some may not bother with sunscreen because they do not think the products are meant for them.

Advertisers may feel that showing people with darker skin tones may cause people to mistake their natural skin tone for a suntan—the exact opposite effect of what their products are meant to do.

Nonetheless, the unspoken, incorrect message is that only people with light skin tone need sunscreen.

Another factor is the small selection of cosmetics that match darker skin tones. When it’s hard enough to find the right shade of tinted moisturizer or foundation, why worry about whether or not it contains SPF? Lighter skin tones have a much broader selection of products that are more widely available.

• “Tea tree and lavender essential oil can help psoriasis as well, applied topically in a carrier oil.

• “Avoid high alcohol, dairy, red meat, and saturated fat. These make it worse.

Emily Lambert • “Alcohol in excess can cause flare-ups.

• “Keeping your skin well hydrated helps. Using a moisturizing cream; avoid sunburns. Psoriasis likes to come up where the skin is broken." ========= Tips from Beth Lertzman, dermatologist at Rochester Regional Health: • “Indigo naturalis, compounded with olive oil, has been shown to have some benefit applied topically.

• “Aloe vera, applied topically three times a day for four weeks has shown some benefit.

• “Deep sea climatic therapy or thermal spring waters have been found to be helpful.

• “Possibly diet modification through caloric restriction may help.

• “Remember that natural isn’t always safe.”

SmartBites

The skinny on healthy eating Nutritious Great Northern Beans Make Delicious Baked Beans

E

ver eat something without giving a wit about its nutritional chops? Say, a yummy side that accompanies your main course like no other?

Baked beans has always been that side for me. Come summer, it’s all I ever want with whatever’s on the grill.

For years, I never thought much about baked beans, other than that they slipped out of a can and tasted delicious! But once I inspected the can’s nutrition label, I realized that while canned baked beans indeed feature some important nutrients, some of the other ingredients — sugar, salt, additives — make them less nutritious and more caloric than they need to be.

So I started making my own baked beans with canned Great Northern white beans, a popular bean that’s nearly identical to the hard-to-find canned pea (aka navy bean) that’s traditionally used to make this dish.

Like most beans, Great Northerns are your heart’s best friend.

They’re chock full of cholesterol-lowering fiber; they’re super rich in folate, a B vitamin that lowers levels of an amino acid associated with greater risk of heart disease and stroke; they’re low in fat and calories (only 200 calories per cup); and

they’re loaded with heart-protecting antioxidants.

For vegetarians and those trying to reduce their intake of meat, Great Northerns are an excellent source of low-fat, plant-based protein (about 15 grams per cup), a nutrient we need to build up, keep up, and replace tissues in our body. Although the protein in this versatile bean is incomplete, it can easily be combined with other foods, such as pasta, rice or grains, to yield a complete protein.

Despite its small size, this tasty legume boasts a whopping 13 grams of fiber per cup: 50% of our daily needs. Because Great Northerns contain both soluble and insoluble fiber, we reap multiple benefits: improved digestion and elimination, lowered cholesterol and blood-glucose levels, and greater satiety for better weight management. In fact, according to a study published in the “Journal of the American College of Nutrition,” people who eat beans are less likely to be obese and more likely to have a smaller waist and lower body weight than people who don’t eat beans.

Lastly, this nutritious bean is an impressive source of manganese, phosphorous, and iron—essential minerals that support brain and nerve functions, bone and teeth health, and energy production, respectively.

Healthier Baked Beans Serves 6-8

1 tablespoon olive oil ½ onion, diced (about 1 cup) 1 cup tomato sauce 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar 1 teaspoon paprika or smoked paprika 1 teaspoon garlic powder 1 tablespoon brown sugar 1 teaspoon Kosher salt ¼ teaspoon coarse black pepper ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional) 2 15-ounce cans Great Northern beans, rinsed and drained Preheat oven to 350 F. Lightly oil an 8-inch square baking pan.

Heat olive oil on medium heat in large skillet. Add onions and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally until translucent.

Turn off the heat and add tomato sauce, mustard, vinegar, paprika, garlic powder, brown sugar, salt and pepper. Stir well, and then gently mix in beans, adding more sauce if preferred.

Pour into prepared baking pan and cover with foil. Bake the beans for about 25 minutes and serve.

Note: If using dried beans, about 1½ cups will yield the approximate canned amount.

Helpful tips Look for canned beans labeled “Low Salt” or “Low Sodium” and thoroughly drain and rinse before using. Nutrition-wise, canned beans and dried beans are about equal.

Cooked beans, whether prepared from the dried state or retrieved from a can, can be covered and chilled for up to 5 days.

Anne Palumbo is a lifestyle colum-

nist, food guru, and seasoned cook, who has perfected the art of preparing nutritious, calorie-conscious dishes. She is hungry for your questions and comments about SmartBites, so be in touch with Anne at avpalumbo@aol.com.

Remember Garden in Highland Park Gets Facelift Garden is a living memorial to those who died while institutionalized over a century ago at the Monroe County Insane Asylum

D

ePaul’s Remember Garden, located in Highland Park in Rochester, recently received a complete makeover thanks to donations of supplies, materials, labor and time from a number of businesses and individuals.

Benches and pergolas at The Remember Garden were recently rebuilt thanks to a project led by Christa Construction President Mike Seaman, Vice President Gail Morelle and Project Executive Jay Weaver. Lakeview Lawn and Landscaping, Inc. provided the plantings and mulch, Tim Dewey of TMD Contracting provided installation, and Pat Clancy and Chuck Buscemi of Wm. B. Morse Lumber Co. supplied the materials.

In addition, volunteers from Bond, Schoeneck & King Law Firm helped clean up The Remember Garden for the Rochester United Way’s Day of Caring!

“It is truly amazing to work with an organization like DePaul to

help support their mission and be a part of the work they do to enhance the communities and the people in them,” said President of Lakeview Lawn and Landscaping, Inc. Rich Snook.

The garden is a living memorial to those who died while institutionalized over a century ago at the Monroe County Insane Asylum, Almshouse and Penitentiary, the approximately 700 unnamed graves that were discovered at Highland Park, and the strides that have been made to erase stigma surrounding mental illness.

“Throughout our lifetime, each and every one of us has contributed to our surroundings, big or small,” said Christa Vice President Gail Morelle. “It is vitally important to be aware of the value of human life, and The Remember Garden embraces that value. We are honored to work with DePaul on this important project because we believe in honorJuly 2021 •

Some of the volunteers who helped renovate Remembering Garden, a living memorial to those who died while institutionalized over a century ago at the Monroe County Insane Asylum, Almshouse and Penitentiary. ing all lives. The lives that have been forgotten, they matter.”

DePaul Community Services coordinated development, building, planting and maintenance of the garden. The Remember Garden appropriately marks the grave, lending dignity and respect to those buried there, while heightening community awareness to the site and the history

of institutionalization.

“Thanks to the generosity, thoughtfulness and support of our community, The Remember Garden will continue to serve as a fitting tribute to the recognize those who were buried at this site,” said Vice President of DePaul Properties, Inc. Gillian Conde.

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

•

Page 13

OMEN'S HEALTH

Back Health Through Pregnancy

Experts offer tips for a more comfortable pregnancy

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

P

regnancy can certainly do a number on a woman’s back, both from the extra weight gain—much of it concentrated in the belly—and also postpartum hunching to nurse. Plus, joints naturally loosen up during pregnancy to allow for easier birth.

Moms can easily mitigate some of these effects.

William “Bill” Fletcher, an OBGYN at Unity Hospital, recommends that ideally, women should plan to become pregnant. Part of that should include developing a level of pre-pregnancy fitness.

“They generally do better on a skeletal muscular level,” he said.

“Regular, low-impact aerobic and strength exercises is one of the best things you can do. I recommend exercises that engage the core and pelvic muscles like prenatal yoga and Pilates. It can add some strength and stability. Low-impact aerobic exercises helps maintain muscle tone.”

He also advised avoiding excessive weight gain, as that can worsen back pain and cause complications with pregnancy.

Remaining stationary may seem like a good idea to alleviate pregnancy back pain; however, Loralei Thornburg, an OB-GYN and maternal fetal medicine specialist with URMC, advises the opposite.

“Not moving will make back pain worse,” she said.

In a similar vein, slouching may feel comfortable to ease a painful back. However, not hunching over can help prevent pain. Thornburg said to adjust the height of the keyboard and chair at the desk to the right height.

As moms gain more weight up front, they tend to try to compensate by arching their backs for better balance.

Thornburg said that yoga, massage and stretching can help.

A pregnancy support belt can also transfer the effect of the weight to the shoulders.

“You don’t want a support to be a crutch to use all the time,” she added. “Use it for walking events or if you find some things required for your job are uncomfortable. It’s another tool to use.”

What Women Should Know to Live a Healthy Life

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

I

n many ways, men and women have different health needs and issues. Area experts shared with us a few of the top issues women face.

From William Fletcher, an OB-GYN at Unity Hospital: • “Over the past generation, we’ve seen pregnancy become higher-risk. Women are a bit unhealthier overall with body mass index. The age at which women are getting pregnant is older, as women delay childbearing. We’re seeing other comorbidities. We see higher rates Page 14

•

of pregestational diabetes and high blood pressure. Care needs to be taken to optimize health before getting pregnant to optimize the health of pregnancy. Once they’re pregnant, we’re chasing our tails trying to get them healthy. Being in a healthy state before pregnancy lowers the chances of complications. A lot of pregnancies are unplanned. We sometimes see women in their early 20s who are not in a healthy state and they should take six months or a year to get healthy.

• “We’re seeing pelvic floor

Modalities like prenatal yoga and pregnancy massage can help, as can floating in a pool. However, hot tubs are off-limits because of the heat.

“That is too hot for little people inside,” Thornburg said.

It is OK to apply ice to the back to relieve pain.

Many women in the latter stages of pregnancy find that pregnancy pillows and body pillows can support the belly and knees while lying down in the safest pregnancy sleeping position, the side.

According to the American Pregnancy Association, “it provides the best circulation for you and your baby. It also places the least pressure on your veins and internal organs.

Sleeping on your left side will increase the amount of blood and nutrients that reach the placenta and your baby. Plus, good circulation helps reduce potential swelling, varicose veins in your legs and hemorrhoids.”

Sleeping on the side can be hard for back or stomach sleepers to comfortably achieve without support pillows.

After the birth, losing weight right away can help relieve lingering back pain and help support the mom’s overall health.

“Start exercising once your doctor or midwife says you can,” Thornburg said. “Your abdominal muscles get all stretched out so get back on a regimen.”

While the belly may reduce, the breasts enlarge after birthing. To help compensate, Thornburg said that supportive nursing bra “is another must for the new mother.”

Ergonomics also matter while nursing. Thornburg advises bringing the baby to the breast instead of hunching over to reach the baby. A supportive nursing pillow can help position the baby more comfortably.

dysfunction as a significant issue for women as they age: pelvic floor prolapses of the bladder, rectum or uterus. A few generations ago, people didn’t talk about it publicly or even with a healthcare provider. There are treatments that can lead to significant quality of life improvements as a woman gets older. Those problems are super common. We see them a lot. There are nonsurgical answers like muscular training or a pessary device. Surgery is also an option.

They can see bladder, bowel and sexual function improve.

• “We’ve made strides with birth control over the past generation. Teen pregnancy rates are at an all-time low. We need to continue to encourage lowering that number. Pediatricians are doing a great job at encouraging HPV vaccination. That reduces cervical cancer.

• “I encourage people to establish care with an OB-GYN to be seen for regular care and talk about preventative health issues and not get preoccupied with COVID.”

If you’re working out more, you need more intake of calories.”

From Conner Lorenzo, athletic performance coordinator for the Fitness Science program, certified strength and conditioning specialist with Sport and Spine Rehabilitation Center in Penfield: • “I train people from youth to everyday adults. Young women specifically really buy in and are passionate about working out and training, even more so than men. We have three things we emphasize: mindset, sports nutrition and training. The nutrition is often overlooked. Everything we do needs proper nutrition to get those adaptations we’re looking for. It’s typical that young women are not eating enough or fueling the right way before and after workouts.

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

From Loralei Thornburg, OB-GYN and maternal fetal medicine specialist with University of Rochester Medical Center: • “We need to get everyone caught up on major screenings delayed by COVID. Get your mammogram, pap smear, and HPV vaccination, for which you are eligible until age 45 for those with continued potential for exposure. It’s a series of three shots.

• “Women make up more of the frontline workers than men do.

That has meant a lot to have struggled with childcare, the ability to balance everything in the pandemic, post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety. Mental health issues are a real struggle for women right now.

Access to care can be challenging.

• “In high-risk obstetrics, a lot of what we do is talk about issues like diabetes and hypertension and telehealth has allowed us to get those services in more rural areas. Women don’t have to take off a day of work to drive to the doctor’s office.

• “Many of our minority patients and rural patients live in areas without good Wi-Fi or cell services which make access to telehealth. We have to think about disparities that have become apparent in the pandemic that have hit women and frontline people of color disproportionately.

• “In general, this is a time where women have delayed access to care. They should get back with their primary and OB-GYN for access to contraception.

• “Access to childcare and the school system being so different has been so difficult to women. These responsibilities have fallen disproportionately to this group.”

OMEN'S HEALTH Embrace Your Sisters Offers Breast Cancer Support Group provides emergency financial grants to area women diagnosed with breast cancer

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

F

or Bridget Viens, leading Embrace Your Sisters is all about supporting people affected by breast cancer.

The Canandaigua-based nonprofit provides short-term emergency financial grants to area women diagnosed with breast cancer and offers a list of local and national cancer resources on its website.

Viens, a Canandaigua resident, has had some friends diagnosed with the illness, including one of her best friends, who had a young child.

“I saw the financial struggle she had to maintain a typical life for her 6-year-old,” Viens said. “There are people in need. While you can get assistance for medical expenses, there are limited places for daily living expenses.”

Of course, medical insurance covers many of the otherwise budget-blowing expenses of treating cancer. However, some treatments are not covered. Plus, patients normally pay copays for each visit to care providers, each time lab work is done and each admission.

Travel expenses—including hotel stays, gas, vehicle maintenance and parking, meals out and extra help such as additional childcare and cleaning services are not covered by insurance.

While receiving treatments or recovering from surgery, most people do not feel well enough to work.

The organization was co-founded in 2006 by Chrisann Philipson, who was diagnosed with breast cancer,

along with Lisa DiStefano-Cessna, Alisha Cessna, Judith Raffard and Daisie Nichols-Stanley, all from the Canandaigua area. Philipson struggled financially with the cost of treatments so the women held a chicken barbecue. Their efforts proved so successful that they decided to found Embrace Your Sisters to help more people.

“Since then, we’ve been going strong,” Viens said. “Financial stresses can mount up and hinder someone’s ability to focus on their health because they’re so stressed out. They may have young children. You don’t want to change your child’s life or worry about groceries.”

The organization requires a simple application process. A confidential application committee reviews applications and approves those who meet their specifications. The applications are not viewed by the entire 11-person board.

Because all of the organization’s staff is all-volunteer and local, Viens believes that Embrace Your Sisters can dedicate more funding to directly helping people.

About 70% goes to those who have applied for assistance and the rest goes to the organization’s overhead, including its two annual fundraisers.

As with many organizations, COVID-19 has curtailed Embrace Your Sister’s fundraising efforts.

Although Embrace Your Sisters sells merchandise from its website, its fundraising events bring in most of

Positively Pink is one of the major fundraisers for Embrace Your Sisters. It was canceled last year, but organizers hope to make it happen this September. its funding. In 2020, both its main events were canceled: the spring fashion show and Positively Pink walk event in September. Viens said a few local donations from local people helped despite the events’ cancellation.

Other COVID-19 changes include a reduced number of applications from patients, which Viens attributes to cancer patients trying to limit contact with other people such as social workers.

“We started a large outreach program this year,” Viens said. “We put together a packet for outreach that has gone to medical establishments to make sure the social workers will make referrals. Hopefully, things are getting back on track. We decided in May not to hold our fashion show

in person. We pushed it back to July to hold it virtually. Some of the local stores will put together some videos on fashion that will be part of our virtual event.”

Embrace Your Sister distributed $320,000 between 2011 and 2021.

Viens remains hopeful that the organization can host Positively Pink fundraiser walk in person in September.

Embrace Your Sisters provides short-term emergency financial assistance to residents of Allegany, Cayuga, Chemung, Livingston, Monroe, Ontario, Schuyler, Seneca, Steuben, Tioga, Tompkins, Wayne and Yates counties.

More information can be found at www.embraceyoursisters.org.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

•

Page 15

OMEN'S HEALTH

Powerlifting Becoming Trendy Among Women The number of women competing in powerlifting events has doubled since 2015

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

G

uys are not the only ones to enjoy heavy lifting. Women have infiltrated the previously male-dominated sport of powerlifting.

According to Powerlifting Watch, a nationwide organization dedicated to the sport, the number of women competing in powerlifting competitions has doubled since 2015.

Not included in those numbers are women who participate without competing. Many women begin powerlifting after participating in workout regimens that involve moving heavy objects, such as CrossFit. But is powerlifting safe for women? The question is not as sexist as one might initially think.

“In general, the technique is the same for men and women, but you

see women fall into different habits early on, especially if they are a novice in strength training,” said Conner Lorenzo, athletic performance coordinator for the Fitness Science program, and certified strength and conditioning specialist with Sport and Spine Rehabilitation Center in Penfield.

That may be because those advising them—typically men—lack understanding of how anatomy affects powerlifting.

“Women’s knees are going towards each other,” Lorenzo said.

“Women have wider hips and the angle from the hips to knees forms what we call the ‘q-angle.’ Women have a wider q-angle.”

Short for the “quadriceps angle,” the q-angle is formed by two invisi-

ble lines. One goes from the anterior superior iliac spine—the area on the outer edge of the pelvis—to the center of the patella, or kneecap. The other line of the angle goes from the tibial tubercle, a protrusion on the lower leg, through the center of the patella. The angle formed by the intersected lines is the q-angle. Men’s q-angle is narrower, usually around 13 degrees, compared with women’s q-angle, which is usually 18 degrees.

The force of lifting weights—and many other activities—places more lateral force on the patella of women.

“That needs to be addressed for squatting early on,” Lorenzo said.

“A lot of it is technique. For some, it helps having wider hips as it gives them the ability to get to depth easier.

It’s about training the pattern of the

knee dominant squat. In general, there are safe positions for each joint position. If they can maintain stability, that’s what you’re looking for.”

For deadlifting and bench pressing, men and women are similar.

The process of building strength is also the same, based upon sets and repetition ratios.

To find a good instructor, Lorenzo recommends looking for a certified strength and conditioning specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association or someone certified with USA Weightlifting.

“Some are better than others, but anything you can go to a weekend course and learn is not good,” Lorenzo said.

While some short courses are designed to offer additional training for people who are already certified, those that promise to make a weightlifting coach out of someone over a long weekend are dubious. They do not consider variations among people—even by gender—and can allow those training to become injured unnecessarily.

“I can’t tell you how many people got into something like powerlifting who have pains and couldn’t get through it,” Lorenzo said. “There’s not much modification or progression. We see that all the time and we have to correct poor habit.”

Women who are pregnant also bring additional considerations to the gym. Right from the start, her body begins preparing for birth, including a release of hormones that loosen connective tissues to aid in delivery.

William “Bill” Fletcher, an OBGYN with Unity Hospital, likes to see any of his patients exercise, as it lowers the risk of pregnancy complications and helps moms recover from pregnancy faster and easier. But exercise during pregnancy depends upon a few factors, such as pre-pregnancy fitness.

“I’ve had patients do powerlifting and it comes down to pre-conditioning and good body mechanics,” he said. “I get more concerned about risk of falls.”

Powerlifters should also be careful to ensure they have the proper spotters as needed to keep weights under control if they cannot complete the lift.

“There are psychological benefits and strength and flexibility benefits to exercise during pregnancy,” Fletcher said. “There are tons of benefits to doing it and there’s little risk to most women. I do recommend people pay extra attention to hydration. If you get dehydrated, your uterus is going to cramp.”

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585-394-2020 Page 16

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

5

OMEN'S HEALTH

Things You Need to Know About Diseases That Affect Women

By Ernst Lamothe Jr.

J

ust like every individual has circumstances that affect their health, from family history to environment, women have various ailments that affect them in different ways.

With that in mind, medical experts believe there are conditions women should heed to ensure good health.

“Scheduling regular screenings is essential, whether that is mammograms and pap smears to cardiovascular and colonoscopy appointments,” said Charles Katz, obstetrics and gynecology physician at Rochester Regional Health. “When you make these regularly scheduled appointments with your physician, it gives us an opportunity to touch base with you and make sure that we are able to detect any health issues as soon as possible.”

Here are five main issues to which women should pay attention:

1.

Pregnancy and COVID-19

Some women have health problems that arise during pregnancy. Other women have health problems before they become pregnant that could lead to complications.

“Through pregnancy, we are focused on various aspects of a mother’s health. There are women who want midwives present, want natural childbirth or alternative birthing positions and we look to accommodate their needs,” said Katz, medical director of the eastern region of Rochester Regional and the Women’s Center in the Finger Lakes. “You have to feel comfortable before and after during the healing process.”

In addition, the Centers for Disease and Prevention has recommended that pregnant women and

breastfeeding mothers can receive the COVID-19 vaccination.

“Receiving the vaccination is a very personal decision and you should talk with your physician to make sure you are comfortable,” said Katz. “We don’t have long-term data on how it affects children or whether there are any red flags. We would recommend that pregnant women wait until the end of the first trimester is over to receive the vaccine if they choose.”

2.Well-woman exams

A well-woman exam is one of the most important steps that women of all ages can take to protect their health. This is an annual preventive screening of breast and gynecological diseases. During the visit, your doctor will discuss your health and lifestyle behaviors and will perform a physical exam of your breast and pelvis.

“This is an excellent opportunity to maintain a healthy lifestyle and learn to minimize health risk,” said Katz. “We can screen anything from blood pressure and lipids to diabetes, thyroids and heart disease risk.

3.Cancer

The American Cancer Society estimates that about 14,480 new cases of invasive cervical cancer will be diagnosed and 4,290 women will die from the disease this year. All women are at risk for cervical cancer.

It occurs most often in women older than 30. Long-lasting infection with certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV) is the main cause of cervical cancer. HPV is a common virus that is passed from one person to another during sex.

Think You Can Skip That Annual Physical? Think Again

D

espite calls from some leading health experts to scrap annual physicals because they are a waste of time and money, a new study finds advantages to routine screenings.

“While it is disappointing that I can’t tell my patients a visit with me or my colleagues will help them live longer, it is good to know there are proven, measurable benefits,” said senior study author, physician Jeffrey Linder. He is chief of the division of general internal medicine and geriatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, in Chicago.

To come to that conclusion, the Northwestern team reviewed 32

studies conducted between 1963 and 2021.

There is no solid evidence that regular check-ups help adults live longer or prevent major cardiovascular problems like heart attacks or strokes, but they do provide many health benefits — especially for at-risk people — and should continue, the researchers concluded.

At-risk people include: ethnic and racial minorities; those overdue for preventive services who have uncontrolled risk factors; low self-rated health; those who don’t have a single source of trusted care; or those who live in regions with poor access to primary care providers.

Routine check-ups — not necesJuly 2021 •

“We have gotten the rate of cervical cancer down because of routine screenings. If you are younger than 30, we recommend pap smears every three years and then after that every five years,” said Katz.

In addition, breast cancer is still prevalent and should not be ignored even though statistics are going down. Breast cancer is the second most common cancer among women in the United States. Black women and white women get breast cancer at about the same rate, but Black women die from breast cancer at a higher rate than white women.

“Breast cancer awareness has become mainstream every October and while numbers are decreasing, there are still a substantial amount of women who suffer and die from the disease so we can’t take our focus away from improving those numbers,” Katz added.

4.Contraception

Long-acting reversible contraception, or LARC, is reversible birth control that provides long-lasting pregnancy prevention. The LARC methods include intrauterine devices (IUDs) and implants. Research has shown that these highly reliable options are 20 times more effective than birth control pills, the patch, or the vaginal ring. Katz said one important reason why the LARC removes the user error factor that can make other methods less effective such as remembering to take a pill daily or have a diaphragm on hand ready to go.

“Factors such as being a patient who has painful menstrual cycles or not being a good candidate for birth control pills would make me recommend LARC to a patient,” said Katz. sarily every year — can lead to better detection and treatment of chronic illnesses such as depression and high blood pressure, an increase in vaccinations and screenings for diseases like cancer, and improvement in how patients actually feel after a visit, according to the study published June 8 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

“I was surprised at how many benefits we found when we dug into the data, given the negative messaging around these exams,” said study first author David Liss, research associate professor of medicine (general internal medicine and geriatrics) at Northwestern.

“Especially when it relates to patient-reported outcomes. If you walk away feeling healthy, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy,” Liss added in a Northwestern news release.

“I think a lot of the critics meant to say ‘Don’t do these annual exams for low-risk patients,’ but the message came out to not do these exams at all, which is problematic,” Liss noted.

Charles Katz, obstetrics and gynecology physician at Rochester Regional Health. “[Well women exam] is an excellent opportunity to maintain a healthy lifestyle and learn to minimize health risk,” he says.

5.Menopause

Menopause is the time that marks the end of a woman’s menstrual cycles. It will affect their lives for nearly two decades. As a woman ages, her hormones and fertility decrease. It’s typically diagnosed after you’ve gone 12 months without a menstrual period. Katz said the average of menopause is 51 and some of the symptoms include hot flashes, night sweats and mood swings. He believes there are many herbal products that can help with estrogen including soy, black cohosh, St. John’s wort, wild yam, dong quai, evening primrose, valerian root, ginseng and chasteberry.

“You should, of course, always mention herbal products when you are talking to your doctor. But it is well-known that there are supplements and herbs that you can take naturally that are over-the-counter if you don’t want to take medication,” added Katz.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 17

Gina Donnelly (top) and Kathy Jacobs own Entrusted Care.

Managing Life Issues to Help Others Age in Place

By John Addyman

S

ome of us know all about this.

Others may find out soon enough.

The father who taught you to throw a curveball has suffered a stroke. And he has come home from the hospital. Your mom suddenly has a 190-pound man on her hands who must have almost everything done for him.

And you, the only child, live 400 miles away with a family of young kids and a job you can’t leave.

The guilt and frustration are crushing you. When you see your mom, the weight of her taking care of your dad is obviously crushing her.

When the two of you sit down at the kitchen table, your first words are, “We need help.”

Your mom needs relief and guidance. You need the comfort of a solid plan for your dad, knowing your mom is being taken care of, too.

Where does that come from?

From a care manager.

In Monroe County, care managers aren’t difficult to locate. In Ontario, Yates, Seneca and Wayne counties, care managers aren’t nearly as common.

To fill part of that gap, two Newark women, Gina Donnelly and sister-in-law Kathy Jacobs, left their long-term jobs and started Entrusted Care, a two-woman operation that helps people facing a family care crisis to plan and manage issues and to live in place as long as possible, as independently as possible.

Donnelly has a Bachelor of Social Work degree and worked as a discharge planner at Clifton Springs Hospital, in Wayne County Social Services, and at Wayne County Nursing Home in admissions. Jacobs has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and an MBA from the Simon School of Business at UofR. She owned her own executive services business until

she left it to take care of her mother, a bit more than two years ago.

“A long time ago, I said there needed to be community care managers in our area,” Donnelly said. “I had loved ones in my own home I was seeing through their illnesses or seeing them through to the end and I would watch a barrage of people coming through my home. Even with my expertise and my knowledge of the system, I had very little control or very little communication from the multitude of agencies that were involved. That needed to be reined in. That needed to be coordinated by someone.”

Donnelly’s mother-in-law, Jacobs’ mother, spent the last two years of her life in the Donnelly home. What the family experienced changed the lives of everyone involved.

“I had a business plan I really wanted to do after retirement, but after my mother-in-law passed away, I talked to Kathy about that business plan. I told her, ‘You have the business expertise, also have an undergrad in psych and you’ve lived this now with your mom. Life just offered the opportunity for me to go ahead and do this and execute it now.’ We launched almost three years ago.”

When the business opened, Entrusted Care had three clients almost instantly.

The process starts with a phone call and a consultation.

“For some people, we have the consult meeting and they’re done,” said Jacobs. “After pointing family members in the right direction, we leave them with enough information to move forward without us. People who come to us with a crisis or a specific situation (for example, a spouse needs placement), that relationship normally lasts one to three months.

We have customers who are ongoing (adult children living out of state with oversight of one or two parents who live here). We have some relationships we started in the beginning and still have them. It can continue for years. Also, we may see people for one to three months, everything is good. Then things change and they call us again; maybe we established home care but it got to the point where that wasn’t working anymore.

So placement was required. We come

in and are another part of the process for them.”

That process is very personal. Entrusted Care will interview potential caregivers for clients, do full assessments of patients before placement, work through the myriad forms for admissions, interview all siblings and involved family, and may end up seeing a client once a month or once every day for as long as is needed.

Most of the work done is with adult children who have a parent in need of care or with a spouse who needs help caring for a husband or wife.

“Adult children have family and responsibilities and can be overwhelmed trying to take care of a parent,” Donnelly said. “There are adult children for whom we are their eyes and ears and can be available quickly if needed. We have one client where we are the emergency contact because the family lives on the other side of Canada.”

She and Jacobs work with siblings to help everyone contribute “so they don’t have to feel like one sibling is doing all the work and the others are not so involved.”

Entrusted Care has built up a resource file of agencies they’ve vested to recommend to clients. Donnelly and Jacobs do in-person assessments starting at the curb when checking out how a lone parent or elderly couple are doing.

“We look for mail piling up, differences in hygiene, differences in the way the house is kept, cars that haven’t moved, lawn that doesn’t get mowed, if nobody’s checking on that person, that’s a problem. They might be all alone,” said Jacobs.

Donnelly added, “We’re not going to run your life, just help you manage it a little bit and keep track of it. You stay in control, rather than having situations control you.”

“A hospital realizes that what they do in care management post-admission isn’t enough to keep people on a care plan outside the hospital,” Jacobs said. “That is a great opportunity for us. We can keep their clients healthier, which helps the hospitals do their job better, too.”

For more information, visit www. entrustedcareny.com of call 315-5739497.

Medication Drop Box Locations BRISTOL

Town Hall (585.229.4523)

Only YOU can secure your meds.

Monitor

Count your medications regularly.

Secure

Lock up any medications you don’t want anyone to access.

Dispose

Dispose of medications you are no longer using.

CANANDAIGUA

DMV Office (585.396.4210) FLCC, near gym (585.785.1000) Police Department (585.394.3311) The Medicine Shoppe (585.337-4300) Thompson Hospital, lobby (585.396.6000)

GENEVA

Police Department (315.828.6771) North Street Pharmacy (315.787.5388)

HOPEWELL

Ontario County Mental Health Clinic (585.396.4363)

NAPLES

Village Hall (585.374.2111)

PHELPS

Community Center (315.548.8484)

CLIFTON SPRINGS

RICHMOND

EAST BLOOMFIELD

RUSHVILLE

Hospital & Clinic, lobby (315.462.9561) Town Hall (585.657.6515)

FARMINGTON

State Trooper Barracks (585.398.4100)

Town Hall (585.229.5757) CVS Pharmacy (585.229.2285) Village Hall (585.554.3415)

SHORTSVILLE

Red Jacket Pharmacy (585.289.3002)

VICTOR

Mead Square Pharmacy (585.924.7970)

Questions?

Call us at (585)

396-4554 Page 18

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

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Coping with COVIDExacerbated Tinnitus Dear Savvy Senior, I’ve had mild tinnitus — ringing in my ears — for years, but when I got COVID-19 in January it got worse. Are there any treatments you know of or can recommend that can help?

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Dear Almost, Unfortunately, new research indicates that tinnitus, a common hearing problem that affects around 50 million Americans, may be worsened by COVID-19 or possibly even triggered by it. Here’s what you should know along with some tips and treatments that may help.

What is Tinnitus?

Tinnitus (pronounced tinNIGHT-us or TIN-a-tus) is the sensation of hearing a ringing, buzzing, roaring, hissing or whistling sound in one or both ears when no external sound is present.

The sounds, which can vary in pitch and loudness, are usually worse when background noise is low, so you may be more aware of it at night when you’re trying to fall asleep in a quiet room. For most people tinnitus is merely annoying, but for many others it can be extremely disturbing.

Tinnitus itself is not a disease, but rather a symptom of some other underlying health condition. The best way to find out what’s causing your tinnitus is to see an audiologist, or an otolaryngologist — a doctor who specializes in ear, nose and throat diseases (commonly called an ENT).

The various things that can cause tinnitus are: • Hearing loss, which is the most common cause.

• Middle ear obstructions usually caused by a build-up of earwax deep in the ear canal.

• The side effects of many different prescription and nonprescription medicines like aspirin, ibuprofen, certain blood pressure medicines and diuretics, some antidepressants, cancer medicines and antibiotics.

• Various medical conditions such as high blood pressure, vascular disease, diabetes, allergies, thyroid problems, ear or sinus infections, Meniere’s disease, Lyme disease, fibromyalgia, otosclerosis, temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorder, a tumor, an injury to the head or neck, traumatic brain injury, depression,

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Treatments

While there’s no cure for tinnitus there are many ways to treat it depending on the cause.

For example, if your tinnitus is caused by a wax build-up in your ears or a medical condition like high blood pressure or a thyroid problem, treating the problem may reduce or eliminate the noise. Or, if you think a medication you’re taking may be causing the problem, switching to a different drug or lowering the dosage may provide some relief. Or if you have hearing loss, getting a hearing aid can help mask your tinnitus by improving your ability to hear actual sounds.

Another good treatment option for tinnitus that can help suppress or mask the sound so it’s less bothersome are “sound therapies.” These can be as simple as a fan or a white noise machine, listening to music or podcasts, or leaving the television on.

There are also apps created by hearing aid companies, like ReSound Relief (ReSound.com) or Relax by Starkey (Starkey.com), which allow you to stream customize sounds directly to your hearing aids, or (if you don’t use hearing aids) through Bluetooth audio devices like headphones or speakers to help you manage your symptoms.

Cognitive behavioral therapy and psychological counseling can also be helpful. Your audiologist or ENT can help you figure out the best treatment options.

There are also certain medications that may help. While currently there’s no FDA approved drugs specifically designed to treat tinnitus, some antianxiety drugs and antidepressants have been effective in relieving symptoms.

Other things you can do to help quiet the noise is to avoid things that can aggravate the problem like salt, artificial sweeteners, sugar, alcohol, tonic water, tobacco and caffeine.

And protect yourself from loud noises by wearing earplugs.

For more information on tinnitus treatments, visit the American Tinnitus Association at ATA.org.

Send your senior questions to: Savvy Senior, P.O. Box 5443, Norman, OK 73070, or visit SavvySenior. org. Jim Miller is a contributor to the NBC Today show and author of “The Savvy Senior” book.

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Page 19

Ask St. Annʼs

Why is Exercise Important for Seniors?

T

ending to your body, mind and spirit as you age helps you to feel younger. Just 30 minutes of exercise three to four times a week is the best way for seniors to maintain their health and independence as long as possible.

Aerobic activities will increase your breathing and heart rate.

Strength exercises will make your muscles stronger. Together they can help you stay in shape and: • Reduce your risk of heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes • Build up your immune function • Boost your memory and help prevent dementia • Improve your balance and prevent falls • Lift your spirits

Strike the right balance To find exercises to match your fitness goals, meet with a wellness professional at your local Y or senior center, which offer a variety of senior-friendly programs including: •Water classes like AquaFit and open swim allow seniors with arthritis and joint problems to bypass physical limitations and pain to build up their aerobic and cardio endurance.

• Flexible or gentle chair yoga with a certified instructor promotes deeper breathing and mindfulness as well as improved range of motion and flexibility.

• Resistance exercises with weights; weight balls, stretch bands, ergonomic machines, and treadmills build arm and leg strength and endurance, especially for rehab patients.

Put your safety first Be sure to choose activities you enjoy that are also appropriate for your physical condition. To ensure you have a positive experience during your workout: • Listen to your body: Don’t hurt yourself by pushing yourself

too hard. Start slowly and gradually increase the length and intensity of your workout.

• Modify your movements: Many instructors offer seated and standing modifications for exercises so everyone can participate, even those with mobility equipment.

• Nourish yourself: 30-60 minutes before and after exercise, drink water and eat protein to keep up your energy and ward off dizziness, light-headedness, and muscle cramping.

• Breathe: Don’t hold your breath; take deep breaths instead to help to prevent injury and bring oxygen to all your cells.

• Dress comfortably: Wear layers of loose-fitting, lightweight clothing to maintain a comfortable body temperature. Your sneakers should fit properly, provide excellent support, and be tied at all times. Wear water shoes around the pool.

Make exercising a life-long endeavor If moving to senior living is in your future, look for a community that offers multiple levels of lifestyle and care options, a robust activities calendar and support staff to determine if your new home will help you maintain an active and independent lifestyle.

Now is the time to take the first step toward a healthier you. Start with a walk and see where it takes you!

Mackenzie Park is resident services lead at Chapel Oaks in Irondequoit, a Retirement Community that’s part of the continuum of care offered at St. Ann’s Community. Contact her at 585-697-6607 or mpark@ mystanns.com or visit www. stannscommunity.com.

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Eligibility For Spouse’s Benefits

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ocial Security helps you secure today and tomorrow with financial benefits, information and tools that support you throughout life’s journey. If you don’t have enough Social Security credits to qualify for benefits on your own record, you may be able to receive benefits on your spouse’s record.

To qualify for spouse’s benefits, you must be one of the following: • 62 years of age or older.

• Any age and have in your care a child who is younger than age 16 or who is disabled and entitled to receive benefits on your spouse’s record.

Your full spouse’s benefit could be up to one-half the amount your spouse is entitled to receive at their full retirement age. If you choose to receive your spouse’s benefits before you reach full retirement age, you will get a permanently reduced benefit.

If you wait until you reach full retirement age to receive benefits, you’ll receive your full spouse’s benefit amount, which is up to half the amount your spouse can receive.

You’ll also get your full spouse’s benefit if you are under full retirement

Q&A Q: I applied for a Social Security card for my child at the hospital and the card came back with the first name misspelled. What should I do?

A: Contact your local Social Security office to ask for a corrected card.

We need to see at least two original documents proving your child’s: • U.S. citizenship.

• Identity.

We also must see proof of your identity, as the parent.

The documents you show us must be either originals or copies certified by the issuing agency. We cannot accept photocopies or notarized copies. To find out more, go to www.ssa.gov/ ssnumber. There, you can learn what documents you need to fill out and print, and then bring or mail the information to us. You may also want to read the publication, Social Security Numbers For Children, available at www.ssa.gov/pubs.

Q: I am nearing my full retirement age, but I plan to keep working after I apply for Social Security benefits. Will my benefits be reduced because of my income?

A: No. If you start receiving benefits after you’ve reached your full retirement age, you can work while you receive Social Security and your current benefit will not be reduced because of the earned income. If you

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

age, but care for a child and one of the following applies: • The child is younger than age 16.

• The child has a disability and is entitled to receive benefits on your spouse’s record.

If you’re eligible to receive retirement benefits on your own record, we will pay that amount first. If your benefits as a spouse are higher than your own retirement benefits, you will get a combination of benefits that equal the higher spouse benefit.

For example, Sandy qualifies for a retirement benefit of $1,000 and a spouse’s benefit of $1,250. At her full retirement age, she will receive her own $1,000 retirement benefit.

We will add $250 from her spouse’s benefit, for a total of $1,250.

Want to apply for either your or your spouse’s benefits? Are you at least 61 years and nine months old? If you answered yes to both, visit www. ssa.gov/benefits/retirement to get started today.

Are you divorced from a marriage that lasted at least 10 years?

You may be able to get benefits on your former spouse’s record. You can find out more by visiting www.ssa. gov/planners/retire/divspouse.html for more information.

keep working, it could mean a higher benefit for you in the future. Higher benefits can be important to you later in life and increase the future benefit amounts your survivors could receive. If you begin receiving benefits before your full retirement age, your earnings could reduce your monthly benefit amount. After you reach full retirement age, we recalculate your benefit amount to leave out the months when we reduced or withheld benefits due to your excess earnings. Learn more about Social Security reading our publication, How Work Affects Your Benefits, at www. ssa.gov/pubs/10069.html.

Q: Will my eligibility for the Extra Help with Medicare prescription drug plan costs be reviewed and, if so, how often?

A: If you get the Extra Help, Social Security may contact you to review your status. This reassessment will ensure you remain eligible for Extra Help and receive all the benefits you deserve. Annually, usually at the end of August, we may send you a form to complete: Social Security Administration Review of Your Eligibility for Extra Help. You will have 30 days to complete and return this form. Any necessary adjustments to the Extra Help will be effective in January of the following year. Go to www.ssa.gov/prescriptionhelp for more information.

Health News MCMS Announces Edward Mott Moore Recipients The Monroe County Medical Society has recently honored two area professionals with Edward Mott Moore Physician and Layperson awards, which recognize individuals whose dedication to the community goes above and beyond the usual call of duty.

The recipients are: • Physician Michael Mendoza, who received the 2021 Edward Mott Moore Physician Award.

Mendoza is the ninth commissioner of public health for Monroe County.

He is also an associate professor at the Michael Mendoza University of Rochester in the departments of family medicine, public health sciences and nursing. As commissioner of public health, Mendoza’s

Eye Care Center announces promotions Shana Bradford and Stacy Mahaney of the Canandaigua-based The Eye Care Center have received recognition.

Bradford was named premium services supervisor. Since 2014, her work as a member of the team at The Eye Care Center has enabled her to collaborate on building the practice.

Bradford has held numerous positions, Shana Bradford including working as the marketing coordinator, cosmetic coordinator, patient educator/certified technician and the premium services coordinator.

Through her work, Bradford has directly educated patients on premium intraocular lens and surgery options available. Her experience includes cross-training other medical staff to ensure strong patient rapport. Bradford has earned numerous designations, including certified ophthalmic assistant, ultherapist, Venus Versa technician, peel technician, Wavescan technician and VISX Laser technician. Outside of work, she enjoys spending time with her kids and camping, running, biking and traveling.

Mahaney was named operations manager. For nearly 20 years, she has worked for The Eye Care Center in numerous roles in clinical operations.

In 2008, she was named clinical team leader and in 2011, she was made the clinical supervisor.

Mahaney will be shifting from day-to-day oversight of the clinicians. Her new role will be taking a wider view of overall operations, quality control and practice perfor-

vision is to improve population health by strengthening the collaboration between clinical medicine and public health in the community. He has a particular focus in addressing the disparities in health and health care here in Monroe County.

Mendoza joined the health department in 2016, where he oversees the health department’s $61 million budget and over 250 employees and staff whose responsibilities span a diverse array of services designed to preserve and improve public health in Monroe County.

Prior to 2016, Mendoza served as medical director for Highland Family Medicine. During his seven years in this role, he oversaw the adoption of the Epic EMR, meaningful use certification as a level 3 patient-centered medical home, and helped to lay the foundation for expanded team-based care, the current expansion of HFM, and the newly certified nurse practitioner residency program.

Board certified in family medicine, Mendoza continues to see patients as a primary care physician at Highland Family Medicine, and he continues to serve as a teaching physician on the inpatient service at

Highland Hospital. He received his medical and undergraduate degrees from the University of Chicago, his Master of Public Health from the University of Illinois, and his Master of Business Administration from the Simon Business School at the University of Rochester.

• Phyllis Jackson of Common Ground Health, who received the 2021 Edward Mott Moore Layperson Award. As a community wellness project manager, Jackson works closely with the faith community, other Phyllis Jackson organizations and community influencers to promote health, wellness and selfcare management. She focuses on alleviating health care disparities through a variety of outreach efforts, including health screenings and counseling at health fairs and community events. Jackson oversees the recruitment and training of more

than 100 volunteer health advocates.

Deeply involved in the Rochester community, Jackson volunteers for the National Kidney Foundation, American Red Cross, WXXI, the Black Leadership Commission on AIDS, and the Rochester Faith Collaborative. She is the founder of the Interdenominational Health Ministry Coalition and leads “Renewing of the Mind,” a mental health education-training program.

A native of Geneva, New York, Jackson earned a registered nursing degree from Los Angeles Valley College and a Bachelor of Science degree in organizational management from Roberts Wesleyan College. She also holds a certificate of gerontology from St. John Fisher College and is a certified HIV educator and counselor for the New York State Department of Health.

Prior to joining Common Ground Health, Jackson held nursing management positions at Visiting Nurse Service of Rochester and Monroe County, and HCR Homecare Agency. Most recently, she was the CEO and executive director of His Hands Free Community Nursing Center in Rochester.

mance improvements. In addition, she will continue as the research coordinator for the practice.

She graduated from Canandaigua Academy and has completed concentrations at the Practice Management Stacy Mahaney Institute and the International Joint Commission on allied health personnel in ophthalmology. When out of the office, Mahaney spends time with her family and friends, where they enjoy all season outdoor activities. Personally, she likes exploring fitness and nutrition, conducting research, and continuing education.

“These team members have been promoted at a time that is significant,” said Practice Administrator Terry Parsons. “Their combined knowledge, expertise and commitment to ensuring excellent eye care services for our patients will play a vital part in the continuing growth of The Eye Care Center.”

provides wholesale and retail automotive collision paint and related supplies throughout New York, Pennsylvania and adjacent states.

A former president of the Rochester Rotary and an advocate for the Rochester Rotary owned Sunshine Camp, Sarratori currently serves as treasurer on the executive board of the IAMG, an industry-marketing group, and was previously active in the LPGA tournament as concessions and distribution chair.

• James Bello will serve as treasurer. He is a retired senior research technician with a 40-year career at the Eastman Kodak Company. His tenure with EKC included 23 U.S. issued patents. In addition to the Jordan Health Foundation, Bello is active in a number of community organizations including Digital Literacy and as volunteer AARP tax preparer through the Town of Irondequoit.

Timothy List continues in his term as secretary.

“There is no doubt, we have all felt the impact of COVID 19.

But, for many of our neighbors, the consequences have been profound, shinning a bright light on the racial and ethnic health disparities that, for years, have been so prevalent in our nation’s health care system,” said Hall. “With the help of my colleagues on the board, we will assure that Jordan Health can continue its mission to be a safety net for the Rochester region’s most vulnerable citizens.”

the National American Spirit Senior Award.

“We are so proud to have one of our beloved volunteers and civic organizations recognized nationally for their outstanding volunteer contributions to veterans in the Greater Rochester area,” said Bruce Tucker, director, VA Finger Lakes Healthcare System.

• Gabe Cinquegrana, of the Sons of the American Legion, was selected as National Male Volunteer of the Year Award for his extraordinary service to veterans. That’s the highest honor in voluntary service given by the VA. He has volunteered for nine years and accumulated over 9,000 volunteer hours. He assists in a variety of areas in the medical center, including the CDCE office, hospice, chaplain, homeless program and recreation therapy. His duties range from administrative and technical support to singing and playing guitar (face-to-face and virtual) for veterans. He volunteers in memory of his father, Michael Gabriel Cinquegrana, who served as a Navy cook on the U.S.S. Brookings from 1943-1947.

• The Naples Activity Center (NAC), a ministry of the Naples Council of Churches, was presented with the National American Spirit Senior Award. This award recognizes NAC for its 30-plus years of service to Veterans. Over the course of that time span, nearly 50 NAC volunteers gave over 41,000 volunteer hours, providing meals, activities, entertainment, and companionship to a weekly busload of veterans from the Canandaigua VA Medical Center.

Veterans looked forward to the scenic and therapeutic drive from Canandaigua to Naples and the welcoming group of volunteers.

“These big-hearted volunteers were dedicated to making sure we had a pleasant day,” said Bob Barnes, an 87-year-year old Korean War veteran.

Jordan Health Foundation elects new officers The Jordan Health Foundation recently selected a new slate of officers. Named to terms beginning July 2021 include: • William Hall, Sr., who will serve as the group’s chairman. He is president of Dedwen Financial and formerly held positions with CONEA, MassMutual and NYLife Securities. A graduate of St. John Fisher College, he is currently pursuing an MBA from Indiana Wesleyan University.

• Peter Sarratori will serve as vice chairman. He is president of Rochester Lead Works, which July 2021 •

VA Finger Lakes receives national awards VA Finger Lakes Healthcare System in Canandaigua has received two national awards at the annual development and civic engagement (formerly voluntary service) national advisory annual meeting and conference, which took place May 28.

It received the National Male Volunteer of the Year Award and

Continued on pg. 26

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Page 21

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LIFE CHANGING MEDICINE, MOVING MEDICINE FORWARD

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021

Health News continued from pg. 25

Jewish Senior Life’s The Summit at Brighton Opens New Patio

T

he Summit at Brighton recently unveiled a new patio with a ribbon-cutting ceremony. The new addition to Jewish Senior Life’s independent living community includes an outdoor space where residents can relax, dine, and enjoy nature.

“The new Summit Patio will provide our residents an outdoor space for them to connect with nature, socialize, dine and just relax and enjoy the environment, said Susan Bussey, senior vice president of housing at Jewish Senior Life. “We have many residents who are avid gardeners, fitness focused, and very in tune to the environment that will be taking advantage of this new space.“ The patio features enhanced landscaping with rocks, greenery and a grassy area that will be used for fitness activities like yoga and meditation, happy hours and, eventually, live entertainment. Additionally, there is an herb garden next to the new patio with larger garden boxes a few feet away. Ten large garden boxes are already fully in use by residents who are members of the garden club.

At the heart of the new offering is a wood-fired pizza oven, as well as Kosher and non-Kosher grills.

You don’t have to face hearing loss alone.

The Rochester Chapter of the Hearing Loss Association of America (HLAA) invites everyone in Upstate and Western New York to use its resources in support of people affected by hearing loss.

Youprograms don’t have to Our areto virtual You don’t have face hearing loss alone. and open to all! face hearing loss alone.

The other Rochester Chapter of the Meet people with hearing Theand Rochester Chapter of the Hearing Loss Association of loss learn from professionals Hearing Loss Association of that treat it.

America (HLAA) unites people America (HLAA) unites people with all degrees of hearing loss. with all degrees of hearing loss.

Programs are Come to one of ourcaptioned monthly Come to one of our monthly chapter meetingson to meet and archived YouTube chapter meetings to meet others with hearing loss and others with hearing loss and learn from the professionals For details, schedules, and learn from the professionalslinks towho our treat resources, please visit: who treat it. it.

An overview of the new patio that was recently opened at The Summit at Brighton.

The outdoor space will also feature a large fire pit for socializing, ambient lighting, and outdoor space heaters for cooler weather. Tables with umbrellas and a shaded dining area will shield residents from the sun on warmer days. The dining area can host about 40 people and overlooks a koi pond.

Serving people of all faiths and

NOT JUST COVERAGE.

ethnic backgrounds, Jewish Senior Life is a continuing care retirement community (CCRC) guided by the values of honoring family and aging in place. Jewish Senior Life offers all levels of care on a single campus, from independent living to skilled nursing care, along with a variety of programs and services for people living outside its campus.

HearingLossRochester.org Visit our website for details: Visit our website for details:

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July 2021 •

IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper

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Page 23

But nobody wants to get old. So tell me, how does that work? At St. Ann’s Community, we believe that the key to staying young is feeling young. That’s why we provide a full range of senior living options and services to keep you healthy, active and enjoying all that life has to offer - no matter what your birth certificate says.

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IN GOOD HEALTH – Rochester / Genesee Valley Healthcare Newspaper • July 2021