Laughter - the best medicine! For the ranchers living in an intergenerational household, laughter was an essential ingredient requiring frequent doses. For best results, we applied liberally! Mother and Dad both retained their sense of humor to their final days. The household was often filled with laughter - especially during [...]
Laughter at the ranch – it was a vital part of our mileau. When family sat around the table before a meal, Mother would do a reading – sometimes a humorous one she had found… During Dad’s 18-month hospice experience, they enjoyed jokes with the hospice chaplain who brought a [...]
Rev. Wintley Phipps was no stranger to us during ranch years. He was a frequent performer with the Gaithers, a Southern Gospel group whose DVD's were so abundant in our household that they had their own library. Today he perfomed at a special memorial service for John Lewis in the [...]
Big Pharma and the Constant Gardener - a timeline found in this e-magazine - begins with my 1998 return to my hometown. It covers a 20-year period leading up to news of far-reaching importance, contained in a newsletter from an internationally-recognized physician. Where Is the Media Regarding These Findings? In [...]
Guest Contributor and author, Carol J. Farran, PhD, RN, MSN, FAAN, has served as Professor, Researcher, and Principal Investigator at Rush University Alzheimer’s Disease Center. Based upon her contribution to Alzheimer’s Disease research, she is included as our first Influencer in ABeautifulVoice.org. As a personal friend, she had influenced my [...]
Home of my alma mater, many weekend reunions, and - at a later point in my life - my workplace: Northwest Indiana - just around the bend from downtown Chicago. Thus, I was well-acquainted with roadmaps to the Indiana University-Purdue University campuses throughout the state since their graduates became a [...]
"A number of factors can affect the sleep cycles. For example, if a person is not breathing well during sleep (snoring or sleep apnea), this will disturb the normal sequences and cause the individual to awaken feeling unrestored. Sleep quality can be diminished by the use of electronic devices, tobacco [...]
I was offered a “pass.” It was a routine appointment approximately one year following Mother’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s in late 1997. The physician quietly handed over to me a written order saying, “Admission to nursing home.” And then he waited silently for my response. Having toured the area nursing homes [...]
2002-2003 Those were the SARS years, but communications were so different in the early 2000’s! The internet was still quite new – and most hospitals did not yet have websites. Our regional television networks and newspapers reported on the threat of the SARS pandemic and we learned that older people [...]
"Some experts worry that a long-standing shortage of palliative care professionals ― who focus on the physical pain and mental and spiritual distress caused by serious illness — could leave many COVID-19 patients in distress... 'There is already a shortage, which will only worsen as demand goes up because of [...]