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Scenes from Beneath The Surface: A Film About Living with MS Last December, it dawned on Marylou Kandur that it had been over nine months since the members of her Parkinson's disease support group had seen each other's faces. While many other groups had pivoted online after COVID hit back in March, her Rhinebeck Parkinson's Support Group—most of them senior citizens lacking in digital fluency—lagged behind. "Let me see if I can get these people together," thought Kandur, a retired entrepreneur in Red Hook who has had a manageable form of Parkinson's for 22 years. "But what will I say to them?"
Governor Cuomo keeps telling us: Follow the data. Follow the science. Follow the metrics. But both vaccines and vaccine data continue to be in short supply. When will the state level with us and provide public access to vaccine data?
The most evolved diet for a peaceful, balanced Earth? For Sharon Gannon, the hands-down answer is veganism. Yoga luminary Sharon Gannon may mince a lot of vegetables, but she doesn't mince words when she talks about vegan diets. Since well before she and her partner David Life created the Jivamukti Yoga method in 1984, Gannon has been standing up for animal rights and espousing the virtues of a vegan diet in clear, forthright words. These days, she has more of an audience than ever for that message, as plant-based (aka vegan) diets are moving from fringe to fashionable at a steady clip. In the '70s, yoga was that weird thing from India that Western hippies did, and now it's everywhere. Veganism isn't so far behind. Whether you chalk it up to the realities of our disease-causing and pandemic-spawning standard American diet (SAD), or to a deepening understanding of the fragility of our environment, the vegan wave is gathering strength.
click to enlarge Dr. Hank Bacon
As the region’s only comprehensive primary and specialty care health system, Columbia Memorial Health (CMH) serves a vital role in keeping our communities in good health. An affiliate of the Albany Med Health System, CMH’s team of expert providers is conveniently located in care centers across Columbia, Greene and Dutchess counties.
One of those providers is Dr. Hank Bacon, who joined the primary care team at CMH in July of 2020. He practices at the Columbia Memorial Family Care office in Hudson, where he sees patients from early childhood through adulthood. Get to know Dr. Bacon in our Q&A below.
It was hard—and it was something I just knew right away," remembers Jenn Chalifoux. She was 18 and on leave from college, at home in Long Island to receive treatment for anorexia, when she realized she was pregnant. Since a common side effect of anorexia is amenorrhea (a cessation of the menstrual cycle), missed periods didn't sound the alarm bell. She was surrounded by doctors, having blood work frequently, and on birth control. "It didn't even occur to me that I might [be pregnant]," she recalls. "My medical team thought my menstrual cycle would return as I progressed in my recovery." When it didn't, months into her treatment, Chalifoux took a pregnancy test at a friend's house. It came back positive and a follow-up appointment with her doctor revealed that she was well into her second trimester. It was a shock.
Photo by Fernando Zhiminaicela I’m a science writer by training and a local disaster reporter by choice. Since March, I’ve been covering the pandemic’s impacts on the Hudson Valley and Catskills for
The River,
Chronogram’s more news-oriented online sibling, with thrice-weekly updates on local and state numbers, news, and public policy. It’s fast-paced work, and it has been accelerating as New York’s second wave has picked up in earnest. This month, we’re trying something new: Taking a moment to slow down to the pace of print, look at where we are as a region, and think about what might lie ahead.
Last Updated: 02/17/2021 12:34 pm After three years of wading through red tape, Donna Norman finally opened the doors of Calyx Berkshire Dispensary in Great Barrington this November. As a small business owner entering the recreational cannabis space without outside investors or an existing medical license, she had been caught unexpectedly in an endless bureaucratic loop with Massachusetts's Cannabis Control Commission (CCC). Since Calyx is a woman-owned business, Norman's path to a recreational license was supposed to be expedited. To prove to the CCC that Calyx was woman-owned however, it had to be third-party certified through an on-site visit to the store—made impossible without the license to open from the CCC. Norman eventually brought the unrealistic hurdle to CCC Commissioner Shaleen Title, which prompted the CCC to change its requirements. "For three years, I've had paper on my windows, and I honestly couldn't blame the people who doubted that we'd ever open," Norman says.