Get Healthy

Freddy Ortega, a Clark High School junior, wears the T-shirt he designed to support breast cancer awareness. (Photograph courtesy of Michelle Kominsky.)

The National Football League’s decision to designate October’s games as American Breast Cancer Awareness games scored big with Freddy Ortega, 16.

Ortega has two aunts who are breast cancer survivors and always wears a pink wristband to show his support for them. He liked how the NFL and its teams promoted breast cancer awareness messages with pre-game and in-stadium initiatives and by having coaches and staff personnel and players wear pink ribbons and pink uniform gear.

So after the game, the George Rogers Clark High School student headed to town. He went into The Junk Yard to see if there was something there in line with the cause. Within a few moments, he decided to customize a shirt. He chose a royal blue T-shirt—Clark’s color—and had the initials of his school, ‘GRS’, printed on the upper right collar. Below the letters he added ‘class of 2011.’ In the center, he had the word ‘Supports’ printed next to a pink ribbon twisted in the shape of a heart.
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While the general rule at one time was “once a cesarean, always a cesarean,” that way of thinking isn’t true anymore. With the option of Vaginal Birth after Cesarean (VBAC), women who have had a c-section aren’t destined to have another. However, VBACs have been on the decline in recent years.

“It’s been more discussed in the last 25 years, but the number has gone down,” said Dr. Karl Schwartz, a Munster Obstetrician/Gynecologist. “It’s not as commonly seen as it was 10 years ago and 15 years ago.” It’s a change he said has resulted from the liability involved. While uterine rupture is rare, it is a risk that comes with the procedure that can involve fetal brain damage and even death.

Those woman who have a successful VBAC have the advantage of a quicker recovery, less bleeding and a faster return to normal activities, said Schwartz.
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Nadia Czekajewski got braces on her teeth when she was 8. Now she’s in third grade, turning 9, and “she’ll be done before she begins fourth grade,” said her father, Tomasz Czekajewski.

“It was a wise decision to start young,” said Czekajewski, whose family lives in the Lakeview section of Chicago. “Kids are not as self-conscious at this age.”

Braces used to be another miserable part of being a teenager, but now some kids, like Nadia, start and finish orthodontic treatment long before adolescence.
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It doesn’t get easier as you age

Changing physicians can be wrenching for older patients. My mother never got over it when her longtime doctor retired. The “new” doctor took care of Mom for more than 15 years, but she would still tell him what she thought he wanted to hear. Ironically, the frailer Mom grew, the less forthright she became.

Now, my 70-something aunt, who has diabetes and Parkinson’s disease, is going through a similar change. Her longtime physician is shifting to an endocrinology-only practice and has asked patients to find another primary care doctor.

As is widely recommended, she brought to her first appointment a list of all the medications she’s taking. But she also brought a sheet of paper on which she briefly described her youth, marriage, motherhood and other seminal life events, things essential to her personhood that she wanted her new physician to know.
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By taking control of the amount of sodium and oil, a home-made Chinese dinner will give you the enjoyment of take-out with a healthier twist. (Photograph by Larry Crowe/The Associated Press.)

Chinese takeout is always a treat, but it can be hard to sort out whether it’s a healthy one.

Of course, with egg rolls, spareribs and fried rice, there’s not much guessing. But when it comes to the vegetable stir-fries and noodle dishes, the answer isn’t as obvious as we’d like.

In principle, most Chinese stir-fries and noodle or rice dishes should be nutritionally sound. Lots of vegetables and carbohydrates and smaller amounts saturated fat from meat. But those ingredients usually are accompanied by plenty of oil and sodium in the wok.
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I grew up during the 1950s and ’60s in Madison, Wis., in a family that lived and breathed sports—and I don’t mean watching sports. We played sports, outdoors: hockey, cycling, tennis, hiking, golf. My grandparents lived on a lake so we were always outside swimming and skating. We even had our own personal physician in the off chance any injuries occurred—my dad, Dr. Jack Heiden, an orthopedic surgeon.

I remember when I was 12, I broke my wrist speed skating the same day I’d gotten the cast off from breaking my wrist cycling. And that was the second time I’d broken my wrist speed skating!

Did Dad rush in and advise me to take it easy or give up the sport? No way. My family never pressured us, but they really made activity a priority. My sister, Beth, and I didn’t begin training seriously as speed skaters until 1972, but because we’d always been so active, only eight years later we both medaled at the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, N.Y.
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Bears mascot challenges youngsters to score a healthy life

Staley, the official mascot of the Chicago Bears, questions students about healthy choices during his visit to Protsman Elementary School. He offered the students ”Staley’s 6 Week Fitness Challenge” program. (Photograph provided by Protsman Elementary School.)

In an effort to encourage children into making healthy choices, the Chicago Bears and Staley Da Bear, the official mascot of the Bears, visited Protsman Elementary School recently.

“Staley’s 6 Week Fitness Challenge” is an informative, hands-on, educational school health show presented throughout Chicagoland. The students were introduced to the four elements, or “downs,” of this health/fitness program during an assembly entitled “First & Goal: How to Score a Touchdown for a Healthy Life.”

The students each took home a chart to monitor his/her progress daily during the six weeks following the assembly. Points are assigned for each “down” on a daily basis.
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If there’s one thing that spreads faster than the flu, it’s unfounded rumors. We asked Dr. Dean Blumberg, pediatric infectious disease specialist at University of California Davis Medical Center, to debunk a few common myths about the H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine.

MYTH: The vaccine isn’t safe.

The vaccine is functionally identical to the regular seasonal flu vaccine and has gone through the same testing, Blumberg said. While getting the H1N1 vaccine does carry the same risk as the seasonal flu vaccine, the chances of dying from the vaccine are much smaller than from H1N1 disease, he said.

MYTH: You can get sick from the vaccine.

That won’t happen, Blumberg said. The flu virus is inactivated in the shot version of the vaccine, so it can’t make you sick. The virus is alive in the nasal spray version, but it’s so weak that the most you could get would be a very mild runny nose or scratchy throat.
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Community Hospital is among only 121 hospitals nationwide to receive the American College of Cardiology Foundation’s 2009 Gold Performance Achievement Award for the outstanding treatment of heart attack patients, according to a news release from the hospital.

The outcomes-based quality improvement award, presented by the National Cardiovascular Data Registry ACTION Registry and the American Heart Association Get With The Guidelines-CAD programs, acknowledges Community Hospital’s commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of care for heart attack patients. It also signifies that the hospital has reached an aggressive goal of treating coronary artery disease patients with 85 percent compliance to core standard levels of care, as outlined by the American College of Cardiology/AHA clinical guidelines and recommendations.

“Our focus has always been to bring the best health care to our community,” said Don Fesko, CEO of Community Hospital. “This award serves as a confirmation of that commitment to provide outstanding cardiovascular care through implementation of the latest evidence-based practices, such as ACTION Registry-GWTG, which is known to improve patient outcomes.”