Lake Health

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Library — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 17:15:06 +0000

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month is an opportunity to promote screening and early detection of breast cancer.

Roughly 1 in 8 women in the United States will get breast cancer. Next to skin cancer, breast cancer is the most common kind of cancer in women.

Symptoms of breast cancer may include:

A lump in the breast
A change in size, shape, or feel of the breast
Fluid (called “discharge”) from a nipple

You have a better chance of surviving breast cancer if it’s found early. Talk to a doctor about your risk for breast cancer, especially if breast or ovarian cancer runs in your family. Your doctor can help you decide when and how often to get a mammogram.

Lake Health Urges Women to Schedule Their Yearly Mammogram

Quick Guide to Healthy Living

Personal Health Tools

More Information (Health A-Z)

Resources

Source: Healthfinder.gov

The Lake Health Resource Center hours vary Monday-Friday between TriPoint Medical Center and West Medical Center. Voicemail and e-mail are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Please call before visiting to ensure staff availability.

E-mail: library@lakehealth.org
Telephone with voicemail: 440-639-4387
FAX: 440-354-1916 or 440-953-6297

If your request is urgent, call the Lake Health Resource Center to ensure staff availability!

TriPoint Medical Center - Physician Pavilion
7590 Auburn Rd.
Concord Twp, Ohio 44077

West Medical Center
36000 Euclid Avenue
Willoughby, Ohio 44094

Laptop Lending Pilot Project @ Lake West Resource Center

Library — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 22:07:12 +0000

The Lake Health Resource Center/Library is proud to announce the start of the Laptop Lending program! The pilot project began at West Medical Center on Monday, September 12, 2011. Lake Health patients, families and visitors (18 years or older) may borrow a laptop for up to 4 hours while at West Medical Center from the Resource Center.

Patients and family members call the Resource Center at ext.33123 to request a laptop. If Resource Center Staff is unavailable, patients are directed to ask their nurse to contact a Nursing Supervisor to obtain a laptop. Four laptops are available for the pilot project. If the pilot project is successful, additional laptops will be purchased and the program will be implemented at TriPoint Medical Center.

The purpose of the program is to help our patients stay in touch with family and friends by email, Facebook, Skype, etc., keep up with work or school, watch DVDs or listen to CDs or play games, or search the Internet for good health information.

E-mail: library@lakehealth.org

Telephone with voicemail: 440-639-4387

FAX: 440-354-1916 or 440-953-6297

If your request is urgent, call the Lake Health Resource Center to ensure staff availability!

TriPoint Medical Center - Physician Pavilion
7590 Auburn Rd.
Concord Twp, Ohio 44077

West Medical Center
36000 Euclid Avenue
Willoughby, Ohio 44094

Fruit and Veggies – More Matters Month

Library — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 21:06:51 +0000

Every September, Fruit and Veggies – More Matters Month promotes the health benefits of eating fruit and vegetables.

Fruit and vegetables are an important part of a healthy diet that can help protect you from:

Heart disease
Bone loss
Type 2 diabetes
High blood pressure
Some cancers, such as colorectal cancer

Quick Guide to Healthy Living

Personal Health Tools

More Information (Health A-Z)

Resources

E-mail: library@lakehealth.org

Telephone with voicemail: 440-639-4387

FAX: 440-354-1916 or 440-953-6297

If your request is urgent, call the Lake Health Resource Center to ensure staff availability!

TriPoint Medical Center - Physician Pavilion
7590 Auburn Rd.
Concord Twp, Ohio 44077

West Medical Center
36000 Euclid Avenue
Willoughby, Ohio 44094

Source: Healthfinder.gov

The Tag-a-Long Phenomenon: A Healthy Contagion

ALLISON.STOCKDALE — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:11:32 +0000

You may have read the headlines awhile back in your local newspaper. Obesity is contagious.

Based on data emerging from several large scale clinical studies, researchers announced that those of us who socialize with, or live with those who are obese have the tendency to "catch" it, making obesity into a sort of fatty measles.

This news made all the major papers and media outlets and of course led to the obvious and unfortunate conclusion that obese people were to be avoided just as we might give those with strep throat a wide berth. As with many pieces of research that are trumpeted with great fanfare, this one is now being called into question. Unfortunately, the media spotlight rarely catches up with the reviews and criticisms that occur after an announcement is made.

A recent article in the New York Times pointed out the shortcomings of this research. Basically, it's extremely difficult to separate contagion from other phenomena. Perhaps overweight people tend to cluster together because they choose friends who have similar lifestyles or because watching the behaviors of close friends and family tends to normalize those behaviors in their minds, making them more acceptable.

The jury is out.

However, I think that this controversy gives me the perfect opening to discuss one of my favorite related phenomena: the fact that those who develop new, healthy, lifestyles seem to have a strong influence on those around them. In fact, a large percentage of my successful patients report that someone in their life, a spouse, friend, or child, will have lost significant weight and changed behaviors as a result of watching their progress.

I call this the Tag-a-Long Phenomenon and I believe it demonstrates the same principles documented by the researchers on obesity contagion: but in reverse.

A friend of mine developed an autoimmune disease and was overweight. As a result of knowing and observing me, she adopted a grain-free diet and became a 90% Primarian. She lost all of her excess weight and had a marked decrease in the symptoms of her disorder (which had reached the point where she was about to begin steroid treatment). About a year later, her overweight son adopted the same diet and normalized his weight. Sometime after that, her husband, who had been highly skeptical of dietary change, began to eat the same way.

Our practice treated a man who had been told he needed gastric bypass to control a new case of diabetes. After losing all of his weight and becoming a Primarian eater, his wife came to us for similar treatment. We then treated their children. Friends who knew the family turned out to have been influenced by their results. Some came to us and some adopted similar eating principles on their own. This single man's food conversion has now effected upwards of a dozen people.

We work with the president of a major company. After losing significantly and becoming a runner and primarily Primarian eater, our patient noticed that members of his management team began to show similar inclinations. One became a marathoner and others lost and maintained weight. The change in their lives has led to an interest in new programs and healthy initiatives throughout the company.

What is contagion? In my view, its definition is clinically unimportant when it comes to behaviors. Whether we call it contagion, influence, or modeling, it is obvious is that human beings closely observe one another and learn from what they see. If eating too much is the norm in your circle, it will be harder to avoid it. However, if you make the effort to be someone who changes and has a true shift in belief and behavior, there will be many people around you who will watch and perhaps mimic your efforts.

Because behaviors get into the cultural atmosphere and have the ability to spread "virally", it is important to create an environment that values health more and relies on medicines less. We all have a bit of the lemming in us. But given the chance, it's as easy to follow the one who's ascending to the mountaintop as it is to pursue the one who's headed off the cliff.

Release the Death Grip, Restore the Humor

Weight Management — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 19:40:01 +0000

Transformative Principle #4: Release the Death Grip, Restore the Humor

These Transformative Principles are part of a series on achieving permanent health change that began on March 21. The "principles" are not meant to be gospel. They are simply thoughts of mine that are based on observation of successful maintainers, personal experience and--to some degree-- my own conjecture. I hope they provide some food for thought as you continue your own quest for health transformation.

It seems to me that many people who are trying to transform have the feeling that they are holding on for dear life. It's not uncommon for maintainers to write about their "white-knuckled grip" on new behaviors. Constant vigilance, which is necessary

What strange beings we are. Here we are trying to accomplish something that must rank up there with one of the most difficult challenges in the world, yet we don't want to give ourselves any credit for the attempt. Only success will do. We find ourselves clawing at perfection and hating ourselves for failure.

Transformation is a process of shaping; of getting closer with each new try. I once had a friend whose child was having many difficulties. She told me that a psychologist had described her child's trajectory by comparing it to the course of an airplane. A plane doesn't actually fly in a straight line, the therapist had said. At any given moment, it veers off course a bit with the prevailing winds. It goes slightly too high, slightly too low, this way and that, and then corrects. The point is that it eventually gets to its intended landing spot.

Health transformation won't work if you allow each deviation to provide a reason to quit. If you give up because you get blown off the path, the journey stops there. But since deviations in the trajectory are normal to development, it does us no particular good to grip the process with clenched hands. Relax.
Remember to laugh.

In my book, I write about intensity. I talk about being a "warrior" and being "tough, not moderate" in your approach to transformation. I still believe in those principles and I will write about them later in this series. But let me add another analogy, this one from the tennis world. (I really like analogies!)

My tennis coach was recently teaching me how to hit a volley. The volley is a shot that's hit directly at you when you are standing up at the net. Because you are so far forward in the court, that shot comes at you fast. You must block the ball with your racquet quickly to avoid getting hit right in the nose. It's scary standing up there with someone on the other side gunning for you. As a beginner, your tendency is to hold onto the racquet for dear life. Your hands are clenched so tightly that they can hardly move. Your eyes look like saucers. Your jaw is tight. All the muscles in your body are tensed with anticipation. There's only one problem. As soon as you tighten up, you can't react to the ball. So my teacher taught me a technique. Keep everything loose and relaxed. Force yourself. As the ball approaches, THAT is the time to squeeze the racquet using a firm grip. Relax. React. Firm Up.

And when the ball hits you in the nose, shake your head and laugh at your imperfect game. Once, just a few years ago, you couldn't even contact the ball with your racquet.
You can be tough, determined, in fact a better warrior if you learn to relax. You're on a journey. It's strange, funny, human, and beautiful. Enjoy the ride.