Caregivers are often called the invisible patients. They carry a burden that can be isolating and stressful.
Advanced diseases and chronic illnesses such as Alzheimer’s, dementia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease can affect a patient for years. READ
As legal marijuana gets closer to becoming a reality in New York, state officials are asking the public: How can we get it right?
In September, the Department of Health launched a statewide listening tour bringing community organizers, physicians and pro-cannabis activists together to share their input as the state’s Regulated Marijuana Workgroup begins crafting language for an adult-use recreational marijuana law.
“We are not here to build consensus, but rather gather input,” from a variety of viewpoints, said Sandra Houston, a Department of Health official who moderated a session held in Ronkonkoma Tuesday evening. READ
I’m Lee Staebler. I’m a physical therapist working in Mattituck. I’ve been in this location for a little over 16 years now. I’ve been a therapist for over 30; hard to believe. I have all my degrees from Stony Brook University. I have a doctorate in physical therapy. READ
Residents across New York will have the opportunity to share their thoughts on a regulated marijuana program over the next two months. READ
One company, the Sackler family’s Purdue Pharma, has played a critical role in instigating an epidemic of opioid addiction in the United States that killed 72,000 Americans last year — more people than perished at the peak of the HIV epidemic or died in car wrecks or shootings last year.
Even now — as the failure to recognize opioid addiction as a chronic disease rather than a moral failing, and limits on insurance coverage keep people from long-term treatment — the painkiller industry is spending nine times more on lobbying to fight regulation than is spent by the powerful gun lobby. READ
Teenagers under the age of 18 will now have to rely on the sun to maintain their tan. Legislation signed last Thursday by Gov. Andrew Cuomo now bans them from using indoor tanning facilities. READ
Most know the game of “Telephone”: Children sit in a circle, one whispers a phrase into another’s ear, then that person whispers it to the next, and so on. The phrase travels around the circle, a hand cupped over one ear at a time.
Then the phrase returns to the first child, who usually disintegrates into giggles at the nonsense of a recycled sentence mangled by misinterpretation. READ
When Kirstin Elizabeth Zabel was born in December 1986, her parents, Donald and Claudia, brought her home to Cartwright Road on Shelter Island. Thirty-one years later she was buried in the cemetery at Shelter Island Presbyterian Church.
When friends and family describe how Kirstin lived, they speak of how she protected the people she loved, of her artistic flair and her enjoyment of classical music. She loved horses, dogs and cats, cooking, travel and Shelter Island. But Kirstin had only three decades to live a whole life, because in her teens she learned to love drugs as well. READ
An 11th hour agreement between Eastern Long Island Hospital management and a union representing health care professionals prevented a further standoff after union members picketed outside the Greenport hospital Thursday, July 12. READ
Standing in the street outside Eastern Long Island Hospital chanting through a megaphone, Sharin Thomson repeated “What do we want?”
Each time a chorus of voices responded “Contracts!” READ
