Sylvia - On Getting Help for Opioid Addiction During Pregnancy

PREFACE: The following story is based on an interview with a woman we’ll call “Sylvia” (not her real name). Sylvia gave birth on March 8, 2018 to a full-term baby girl at Catawba Valley Medical Center who weighed 8lbs, 4oz. “Baby Girl” spent six days in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) under observation for neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) before going home ...

In Occupational Therapy, The "Occupation" is Living

Nicole Coffey is an Occupational Therapists working at CVMC. She says patients frequently question the title on her hospital badge. “They politely tell me that they don’t work, they’re retired, or they don’t have an occupation,” says Nicole. “I tell them that doesn’t matter. It’s my job to help them with the occupation of LIVING.” She then ...

Distracted Driving - An Alarming Trend

Vehicles were made for transportation, serving as a way to get passengers safely from point A to point B. However, with our busy lives and over-full schedules we often treat them like a sort of mobile dining room/bathroom/office combo. Driving demands are full attention requiring the use of our visual, auditory, manual and cognitive skills. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety ...

Easy-to-Follow Foot Health Tips

April is National Foot Health Awareness Month and a time when the providers at the CVMC Center for Wound Healing & Hyperbarics suggest people take a moment to stand up for their feet. Right now, 6.7 million Americans are living with a chronic wound, and more than two million of those are suffering from a diabetic foot ulcer. Even more startling, about 60% of non-traumatic limb amputations are ...

My Story: The Changing Face of Women's Healthcare

Fibroids are benign (non-cancerous) tumors in the uterus that do not spread to other parts of the body. It is estimated that half of all women will suffer from fibroids by the age of 50. Angela Cheek is our nurse manager for heart and vascular services at Catawba Valley Medical Center. In her late 30’s, fibroids were making her extremely uncomfortable, unusually fatigued and they were ...

Gardening as Therapy

If you have been thinking about planting a garden, why not do it this spring? Spring is a great time to start a garden, and the health benefits can be as abundant as your harvest. Gardening is a rewarding experience that is also widely embraced as a therapeutic tool to help individuals of varying ability achieve a higher quality of life. Gardening therapy can be used as part of any comprehensive ...

A Dietitian's Review of Fad Diets from 2017

Looking for a way to “battle the bulge” after the holidays? Just do one Google search and you’ll find there’s a seemingly endless list of diets that will claim to help you lose weight, cure an illness, prevent a disease, etc. But with varying recommendations, how do we know which diets are worth following and if they even work? Here's a look at a few of the popular ...

PODCAST: When a Loved One Goes to the Hospital

As our parents or elderly loved ones begin to age, their conditions are more likely to result in a hospital visit, either at the emergency department or as an inpatient. Any level of admission can be extremely confusing and stressful for the patient and their families: What do they need to know? Who can help? What's the difference between being in the hospital for observation versus being ...

Mary Gets World's Smallest Pacemaker

Mary Mitchell is a woman of faith, family and a strong will. The 80-year-old Newton mother of nine knows a lot about healthcare not only from being her children’s caregiver, but also from caring for her father who lived to be 107 and then caring for her husband Charles who passed away in 2014 after 61 years of marriage. About six months later, Mary’s own health began to decline. She ...

DVT - Stop the Clot, Spread the Word

Deep vein thrombosis (DVT) is a blood clot that develops in the deep veins, usually in the legs. Adults over the age of 60 are at greatest risk for DVT – and not just during air travel. DVT is a concern for anyone who is stationary longer than four hours at a time, on prolonged bed rest or who has recently had an injury or surgery. Dr. Paige Parker with Catawba Valley Family ...

Knowing CPR Can Save a Life

Cardiac arrest can happen to anyone, anywhere. Are you prepared to save a life? According to the American Heart Association (AHA), Cardiac arrest is an electrical malfunction in the heart that causes an irregular heartbeat and disrupts the flow of blood to the brain, lungs and other organs. It’s a leading cause of death in the US. More than 350,000 cardiac arrests occur outside of the ...

Don't Fall Off Your Resolutions in February

According to a recent study, only 8% of the population will achieve the goals they have set for the year. “Resolutions are meant to push us out of our comfort zones and routines. This tends to cause an added stress or tension on our bodies and lifestyle, in which we naturally try to reject and avoid,” says Lupe Avalos, Health Promotion Specialist at CVMC’s Health First Center. ...