Health & Fitness News & Notes
Ground breaks for new Stow
Health & Wellness Center
Rendering of Akron General Medical
Center’s new Health & Wellness Center —
North
Rendering courtesy of Akron
General Medical Center
STOW — Akron General Medical Center has broken ground on its Health & Wellness Center — North, located near the intersection of state Route 8 and Steels Corners Road.
The 96,403-square-foot, $34.7 million facility will be modeled after Akron General’s Health & Wellness Center — West in Bath.
The new Health & Wellness Center — North will be home to the nationally recognized Akron General LifeStyles fitness center. Staff will include degreed athletic trainers, personal trainers and exercise physiologists, nutritionists and wellness experts. The new center also will offer users access to a unique Sports Enhancement Center with specialized training and equipment designed to help enhance an athlete’s performance in their specific sport.
In addition, the facility will house many of the same programs and special amenities of the original Health & Wellness Center — West, including diagnostic imaging, physical therapy, sports medicine and Mario’s Spa.
The new Health & Wellness Center — North will also have a 24-hour Emergency Department staffed with emergency medicine physicians to address any family medical emergency except trauma.
Construction is expected to start this spring, with completion in 2007.
Cooking up ‘soul food’
the healthy way
GREATER AKRON — The American Heart Association’s newest magazine cookbook, “Soul Food Recipes,” is now available.
“Soul Food Recipes” supports the American Heart Association’s (AHA) Power to End Stroke campaign, an education and awareness initiative that gives African Americans tools to help prevent stroke.
The 96-page paperback cookbook offers 43 easy-to-follow, healthful recipes that follow the AHA’s dietary recommendations. Dishes like spicy oven-fried chicken and other traditional soul foods are given heart-healthy makeovers.
Priced at $3.99, “Soul Food Recipes” is available for a limited time at major grocery stores and retailer checkout stands.
African Americans are almost twice as likely to have a stroke as Caucasians, and more than 100,000 African Americans will have a stroke this year, according to AHA officials. Low-cholesterol, low-fat meals are part of the solution, say AHA officials.
Besides recipes, “Soul Food Recipes” also explains the basic stroke risk factors, offering personal risk-assessment tools and recommending personal actions to help prevent stroke. The magazine includes complete nutritional information for each recipe.
For details, visit www.stroke association.org/power or call (888) 4-STROKE.
Experts envision mental health
system transformation
Dr. Michael Hogan shared his
vision for “A New Day” in the mental health
system with more than 60 professionals in the mental
health field.
Photo courtesy of the Margaret
Clark Morgan Foundation
AKRON — Experts from throughout Northeast Ohio gathered May 3 to create a road map for a transformed mental health system. The forum brought together more than 60 leaders of state, regional, local and community mental health organizations to discuss the direction of mental services in Northeast Ohio. The forum concluded with next steps to improve the region’s mental health systems.
“We’ve gathered experts to help identify the first steps in transforming the mental health system in Northeast Ohio,” said Suzanne Morgan, chairman of the Margaret Clark Morgan Foundation.”
The featured speakers were Dr. Michael Hogan, director of the Ohio Department of Mental Health, and Justice Evelyn Stratton, of the Ohio Supreme Court.
Hogan served as the chairman of President George W. Bush’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. He gave a presentation on the “A New Day” initiative for mental health in Ohio. The New Day initiative is a system of integrated services and collaboration across medical, social and mental health care disciplines, designed to make recovery and resiliency possible for those with mental illness.
“We’ve come so far in the last 25 years in providing treatment, motivation and support to consumers,” Hogan said. “Recovery and resiliency are now expected outcomes, but the system is still highly decentralized. We need to build bridges to cooperate and collaborate.”
Stratton described her experiences with the intersecting mental health and criminal justice systems. She has assembled a grassroots organization of more than 50 community members, working together to make a difference in the mental health system.
“I’ve been working in the criminal justice system for years and, unfortunately, I see the same scenario time after time,” she said. “Someone with an undiagnosed mental illness is sentenced to jail for committing a crime. While serving the sentence, the inmate is diagnosed as schizophrenic. Then years later, they’re released with $75 and two weeks’ worth of medication. My group is working to improve the resources they have access to so they won’t end up back in the criminal justice system.”
The Margaret Clark Morgan Foundation hosted the forum. The Foundation was founded in 2001 in Hudson as a private grant- making foundation serving mental health, education and arts causes in Northeast Ohio. For details, visit www.mcmor ganfoundation.org.
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