Ann Halstrom News Today

About Valley vs. the Virus Valley Versus the Virus offers a series of stories that will take readers behind the scenes of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Walla Walla Valley, with a primary focus on the work of the area’s largest hospital, Providence St. Mary Medical Center. Here we will go far deeper than daily case counts, test results and news of social and economic restrictions to talk about how Providence and its local health partners have risen to meet this un...

Ann Halstrom, director of Providence St. Mary Home Health, was already concerned for her brother-in-law, Jim Halstrom. He had been a lobbyist for Washington’s state government his entire career. And although he was 78, he had worked up until nine months earlier, when rapid-onset dementia began robbing him of the ability to do so. Ann Halstrom, a longtime nurse who now works to help elderly and people with disabilities stay in their own homes in the Walla Walla area, knew what such a diagno...