Health & Wellness

Raising awareness about Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and HIV/AIDS are the goals of two guest speakers lined up for later this month at Couchiching First Nation.

The local Voyageur Lions Club held the first-ever “Healthy Futures Fair” at Fort Frances High School last Thursday, with the focus being on prevention and early detection of disease.

“It’s important for students to learn about what to watch out for and how to stay healthy,” stressed Carol Ewacha, a club member and retired nurse who spearheaded the event.

Every March, The Kidney Foundation of Canada goes door to door, raising funds for research, education, organ donation awareness, and programs to assist those living with kidney disease.

We need your help to make a difference.

Providing yet another means to increase public access to health care services, the Fort Frances Family Health Team (FHT) started offering an advanced foot care program in recent months.

In order to minimize wait times for hip and knee replacement surgery at hospitals in Dryden, Kenora, and Fort Frances, the North West Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) board has approved $275,280 in additional one-time funding for the regional joint replacement program.

“Lead the Way!”—a workshop to encourage women aged 55-70 to be more physically active—will be held Tuesday, Feb. 22 at the Fort Frances Public Library Technology Centre.

“Beyond the Pill” is this year’s theme for the ninth-annual Sexual and Reproductive Health Day, taking place on Feb. 12 this year.

Public health nurses from the Northwestern Health Unit will be targeting high school-aged youth throughout the region during the weeks of Feb. 7 and 14.

Influenza, or the ’flu, is a disease caused by a virus. Symptoms include fever, body aches, severe fatigue, and cough.

Symptoms generally last up to a week, but it may be two or more weeks before a person feels well again.

Some people with the ’flu may experience vomiting or diarrhea, but if these are the only symptoms, a person likely has some other type of infection.

FORT FRANCES—Carrying on with its strategic plan implemented last year, the Northwestern Health Unit will continue to focus on accountability, fiscal responsibility, partnerships, and measurable goals in 2011.

Some good news for district municipalities is that there will be no health unit levy increase this year.

Some 168 physicians and nurse practitioners are now receiving patient reports electronically from 12 hospitals in the North West Local Health Integration Network (NW LHIN) through the Physician Office Integration (POI) program.