Prenatal help
PALs Help Moms-To-Be Ask Questions
Training for Jamaica Hospital’s prenatal care program set to begin Feb. 27. |
By Matt Hampton
This month, Jamaica Hospital is training a new class of volunteers to continue the second push of a new pre-natal care program in Jamaica. Over the coming days and weeks these volunteers will help mothers at Jamaica Hospital Medical Center – both new and experienced – confront the challenges of childbirth.
The volunteer training is part of a recently opened program, started in November 2006. The Pregnancy Prenatal Adult Literacy Support (PALS) program connects trained volunteers with mothers-to-be, helping them to understand their options, both for hospital care, and for caring for their child long after that original birthday. The PALS program has already been a huge success according to hospital spokeswoman Malika Granville, with more than 500 patients paired with trained volunteers.
“What we have developed is a training program for literacy,” said Program Director Melanie Sumersille. “Volunteers who sit in the waiting room—and will work one-on-one with pregnant women to make sure they understand their care, the tests that might be required – they help them to form questions for their provider.”
The program, which was made possible by a donation from the United Hospital Fund, requires volunteers to attend 20 hours of training, all in the interest of directing moms-to-be in those crucial first steps of motherhood. The training comes in the form of seven sessions, according to Sumersille, with an eighth graduation session. A new cycle of training will begin Feb. 27, and the volunteers currently in the program training will be ready to work with expectant mothers by the end of March or early April.
Volunteer training is based around the “Baby Basics Book and Planner,” a text developed by the What to Expect Foundation.
“It’s really been proven to be a very user-friendly and fairly accurate text,” said Sumersille. “It’s something that is being used around the country, particularly designed for low-literate women.” The text, which women get for free when receiving hospital care (thanks to donations from local neighborhood health providers), is written at a third grade level. According to Sumersille, this ensures that all women, regardless of educational background, have access to adequate informational resources.
“All women who receive their pre-natal care at the women’s health center will receive the book,” Sumersille said. “Everyone is reading from the same book and they have this material at home with them to look up and have as a resource.”
Sumersille said that the most important aspect of the course is to “help [expectant mothers] to formulate a question, because asking a question is something that is difficult for women that have minimal health literacy. That’s one of the big ones, how to ask the question and get an answer you can do something with.”
Teaching expectant mothers what questions to ask, and how to tailor the answers they get into their own medical care, is a big part of the training that volunteers go through at the hospital. Sumersille said that she is interested in expanding the course to include women who are thinking about pregnancy, and to other low-literacy women in the community, because everything is ultimately in the interest of developing “lifelong skills in navigating healthcare.”
“Pregnancy is definitely the moment to get [those skills]; they definitely want to do what’s best for their baby, and this is a program that helps them do that.”
Comfort Care
Schneider Helps Ease Kids’ Worries
By Lee Landor
Almost reminiscent of the Gesundheit Institute created in the 1970s by renowned goofy doctor Patch Adams, Schneider Children’s Hospital in New Hyde Park is colorful and festive, lifting the spirits of all those who walk through its doors in their times of need.
When entering the comprehensive pediatric hospital, one is greeted by multi-colored streamers, a low-playing piano, pictures made out of glued candy and images of birds and fish projected onto the walls.
Though the reality is that about 180,000 children – from the newly born to those of legal age and up to 21 – with diseases and health problems enter the hospital on an outpatient basis each year, the merry atmosphere is anything but somber.
“We try to provide as much comfort to the children as we can,” said Schneider Marketing Coordinator Laurie Locastro as she peeked into a waiting-room-turned-underwater-adventure, with fish and coral reefs painted on the walls. “We have the Child Life Program, where we have people who help ease the process.”
Sitting in a waiting room can be draining, especially for a bored, sick child. So, to remedy this, Schneider created a program that provides a service catered specifically to young children – something any adult sitting in a waiting room would envy. Hospital workers sit with the children in the waiting rooms, play with them, explain to them the procedures, comfort them and make the sometimes frightening experiences seem non-threatening, according to Locastro.
Very much in tune with the Gesundheit theme, the Child Life Program uses clowns, along with pets, art, music and horticulture, to cheer the children up. These types of therapies help to reassure and calm the patients, Locastro said.
Despite the jovial setting there are tough times at the hospital, and for those who’ve lost family members, grief counseling is offered at the Center for Hope (Healing, Opportunity, Perseverance, Enlightenment), one of the hospitals numerous programs, services and centers.
The hospital, which began as a small pediatric department at Long Island Jewish Hospital in 1956 and became a 154-bed hospital in 1983, is the only children’s hospital in Queens or on Long Island. With such stature comes responsibility, which is why Schneider offers more than 100 different programs in various fields that specifically accommodate children, such as the Eating Disorders Center and the Weight Management Center (for obesity).
Included in their services is a New York City Accredited school with certified teachers. This service is provided for those inpatients whose illnesses have kept them out of school for long periods of time and, much to some students’ dismay, the teachers can even arrange for the regents exams to be taken in the hospital.
Though the vibrant colors and paintings that decorate the hospital’s hallways and walls are comforting to worried parents and anxious children, the hospital experience – especially one that is prolonged – is nerve-racking and uncomfortable.
Schneider is working with the Ronald McDonald House of Long Island, just minutes away from the hospital, to create a home environment for the families of children receiving medical care. The Ronald McDonald House works somewhat like a hotel, providing bedrooms and facilities for $25 a night. This way, parents can be close by while their children stay at the hospital.
To generate a community feel, Schneider has different symposiums and presentations where speakers come to raise awareness and open dialogue on different issues. The next symposium, the 12th Annual Ricky Herman Symposium, will be April 21 at 1 p.m. and will feature Kevin Covias, a finalist in the 2006 season of American Idol, who will speak about living with diabetes.
For more information or a full listing of programs and services, visit schneiderchildrenshospital.org.
THOSE PEARLY WHITES
Give Kids Something To Smile About
By Matt Hampton
February, as the shortest month of the year, bears a heavy burden when it comes to representation.
February is Black History Month, Heart Disease Awareness Month, Cancer Prevention Month, Termite Awareness Month, Parent Leadership Month, Cherry Month (at least in Michigan), celebration of chocolate month (thanks to Valentine’s Day) Eating Disorder Awareness Month, and National Bird-Feeding Month.
According to easilyamused.org, February is also “National Awareness Month” Awareness Month.
With all that in mind, it’s understandable that some children and families might forget that February also bears the heady responsibility of being the nationwide Children’s Dental Health Month.
The people at the American Dental Association have not forgotten the importance of February, however, and are using all 28 days of it this year to promote healthy smiles for children of all ages. One day above all might be the most important for dental care in February, and it too, is burdened with more than one responsibility.
Feb. 2, while famous for its prognosticating meteorologist groundhog, was also the fifth annual Give Kids a Smile day nationwide.
Through the Give Kids a Smile Day, the American Dental Association is able to raise awareness of dental health issues, and the importance of keeping a healthy smile, to low-income families across the country.
On Feb. 2, children in school districts from Atlantic to Pacific, as well as here in Queens, got the benefit of free dental care and information to help them protect and promote their healthy smiles year round.
Nearly 40,000 dental health professionals donated time, and an estimated $72 million in dental services, including screenings and check-ups for children that may otherwise never see a dentist. Children also get valuable crash courses in how to brush and floss properly and treatment for pressing dental issues. Several schools in New York City got the check-up treatment, and even the doctors donating their time get the benefit of serving the community in a way that only they can.
Locally, the Queens County Dental Society provided 20 volunteers to visit PS 19 in Corona to help spread the dental gospel. The school was also graced by the presence of ADA President Kathy Roth, who took time out to see just what kind of care the children of PS 19 needed most.
“They got an education, they got to meet a community leader; so they saw that the community leaders come to them, and how important [dental health] is,” said Queens County Dental Society member and former president, Dr. Charlene Berkman. Berkman said PS 19 was chosen because “it’s a large school and an at-need population.” Notices were sent home before the event in multiple languages to the parents of PS 19’s more than 2,000 students.
Berkman said that while participation in the screenings and check-ups were not as high as the numbers they were hoping for, everyone got an education.
“The kids were very excited,” she said.
Students at the elementary school started check-ups shortly after the school day began, and the examinations continued throughout the day. Children were given toothbrushes and toothpaste, courtesy of Colgate, and dental volunteers explained in detail the intricacies of proper dental hygiene.
Ultimately, the QCDS hoped that Give Kids a Smile day would be just the beginning for many of the students at PS 19, as the organization is setting up further screenings at later dates and locations through out New York.
“We at Queens County Dental Society do health fairs in Queens, we do senior citizen programs and we do children’s school programs and we also go to Belmont Racetrack and screen for oral cancer,” Berkman said, highlighting the myriad of events where residents can find dental health services, no matter what their background.
“Queens is such an ethnically diverse county, and the American Dental Association has realized that dentists come in all varieties too—they’re outreaching to the diverse community of dentists.”
fighting aids
Managing The Disease For 21 Years
AIDS Center of Queens County Executive Director Philip Glotzer and a receptacle for used syringes. Glozter is quick to remind residents that the dangers of the disease threaten all sexual orientations. |
By Matt Hampton
Few afflictions define an era the way HIV and AIDS have for a generation of people around the world. The fight against AIDS, both in the third world and at home, has changed the face of medical care, with doctors and scientists across the globe channeling all of their respective efforts into finding a cure, or at least a common treatment for a constantly changing and growing disease.
Queens is home to a state-of-the-art facility, one that has helped countless individuals, through counseling and treatment, to deal with the heartbreaking realities that AIDS forces its victims to embrace.
Founded in 1986, the AIDS Center of Queens County has spent the last 21 years offering a variety of services, including support groups and HIV testing, to Queens residents in an hour of overwhelming need. The ACQC offers every amenity to someone looking for the best in quality of care. Families and children of victims are cared for; the ACQC even offers an AIDS support group for single parents.
“ACQC is the largest provider of HIV/AIDS services in the borough of Queens with 4,500 clients,” said Executive Director Philip Glotzer, “17,000 people every year if you include the families.”
The Rego Park central office of the ACQC represents an operational hub, a place where victims can be sheltered in part from a disease that is attacking even their ability to take care of themselves.
While the ACQC is a well-established center with several offices in the borough, it can sometimes be a challenge, working in several languages and establishing trust with a client base that doesn’t have much to give.
“That’s always a challenge, fortunately we’ve been around a while and we have a reputation of being a safe place,” Glotzer said.
With HIV testing and treatment provided by New York Hospital Queens, and food pantries that also include clothing donations, the Rego Park main office of the ACQC is a veritable one-stop shop for anyone in need of care.
There are seven additional ACQC offices, located in a variety of neighborhoods throughout Queens, each with a different specialty. The Harm Reduction Center helps substance-users who are infected with HIV, through counseling and relapse prevention, as well as a number of alternative wellness techniques, like acupuncture and massage therapy. The ACQC also offers syringe exchange programs in Long Island City, Corona, Far Rockaway and Jamaica. Glotzer said that the key to operating a needle exchange is establishing trust with the community, and letting clients make their own decisions.
“It’s been extremely affective in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS,” Glotzer said. “We know it’s been affective.”
The ACQC also offers housing assistance and life-skills programs, designed to help people learning to cope with the onset of AIDS, or infection with HIV. Many victims can’t afford both rent and treatment, as well as food and clothing, and programs like these take difficult decisions such as out of the equation.
“AIDS today is a disease of poverty and many of the clients we serve are homeless and therefore need basic living skills,” Glotzer said.
The ACQC also offers legal representation for its members, which often fight for victims in eviction or discrimination cases, and have since 1991. Thanks to such resources, victims of HIV/AIDS have a variety of options in Queens and are able to live with the disease, instead of living against it.
“Our goal is to coordinate all of our services so they can act in synergy,” Glotzer said.
More information is available through the ACQC Web site, at www.acqc.com.
Better mental health
Holliswood Offers Range Of Services
Holliswood’s CEO Dr. Jeffrey Borenstein |
By Lee Landor
Sitting on a quiet street in Holliswood, the 110-bed private psychiatric Holliswood Hospital provides a wide range of services for adolescents and adults with substance abuse, dependence and psychiatric disorders.
Working with a 200-member staff, the hospital has both inpatient and outpatient programs through which countless numbers of have passed during the hospital’s 20 years in existence.
“We see tremendous success here,” said Dr. Jeffrey Borenstein, the hospital’s CEO and medical director. “People have a fear and stigma about psychiatric conditions, that patients don’t do well, but here they do.”
Offering 24-hour admission, the hospital places patients into one of its five programs based on an initial evaluation of the patients’ age, situation and needs.
Adolescents ages 11 to 17 who experience emotional disturbances and display psychiatric symptoms that interfere with their ability to function in school or with family members enter the 24-hour “therapeutic milieu” known as the adolescent program. This program caters to 55 adolescents – one of the largest programs in the metro area – and includes diagnosis, evaluation, stabilization and treatment of the disorder, and provides educational services by the New York City Department of Education. Those in the program attend group and individual therapy sessions and family meetings. Medication management is provided if necessary.
The adult program at Holliswood Hospital is geared toward adults who have various psychiatric disorders. According to the hospital’s Web site, the program is designed to “stabilize the acute psychiatric crisis[,] help identify triggers or stressors leading to exacerbation of the illness [and] the development of a comprehensive aftercare plan.” Individuals in this program are housed with one of two other programs the hospital offers, based on the patient’s age and level of functioning.
The two other programs into which adults may be placed are the Dual Diagnosis Program and the Geriatric Psychiatry Program.
The Dual Diagnosis Program is a “comprehensive treatment program for patients diagnosed with psychiatric illness and addiction disorders.” It uses cognitive behavioral and 12-step approaches, according to the Web site, and includes family and individual therapy, as well as detoxification services and relapse prevention education. The focus of this program is to help patients learn the relationship between substance abuse and psychiatric symptoms, identify triggers that lead to relapse and develop coping strategies.
The Geri-psych program, which provides “comprehensive inpatient treatment for individuals 55 years of age and older who are experiencing acute psychiatric symptoms,” utilizes individual, group and family therapies to help patients return to best level of functioning, according to the hospital’s Web site.
Holliswood Hospital also offers partial hospitalization for adults as an alternative for those who can benefit from hospital supervision while living at home. Though this program is considered more structured than traditional outpatient services, it is as accessible and cost-effective as any other outpatient programs, according to Borenstein.
Since the war in Iraq began, the hospital formed a program for returning service men and women with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, Borenstein said, which uses talk therapy, both individual and in groups, and provides medication if necessary.
An essential goal for the hospital is to keep up with advancements in the psychiatry and medical fields, said Borenstein.
“We are always striving to be on the cutting edge of treatment, up-to-date treatment and medication,” Borenstein said. “We want the best that medical science has to offer.”
And, an important part of treatment is socialization, which is why patients have recreation time set aside during the day, as well as time to utilize the hospital’s exercise facility.
For more information about Holliswood Hospital, visit holliswoodhospital.com.
Cardiac Care
Queens Hospitals ‘Gotta Have Heart’
Pictured from left to right are, Neil Mandava, Damian Kurian, Agnes Czarnecki, Babak Sanei-Fard, Ferdinand Visco, Victor Politi, Subrahmanya Bhat, and Shuja Qadir. |
By Matt Hampton
A recent study, conducted by the borough president and PricewaterhouseCoopers, found severe gaps in the Queens Healthcare system. One of the most alarming of them was an extreme lack of cardiac care for residents of the borough, many of whom had to go deep into Nassau County or Manhattan for emergency cardiac care.
The study was filled with surprising numbers, but cardiac care was inevitably at the top of the most problematic. More than 16,000 patients left the borough for cardiac care in 2004, and nearly three-quarters of open heart surgery patients had their surgeries outside of the borough. There simply are not enough services in Queens to meet the demand of a wildly divergent population, one that is aging rapidly.
The lack of cardiac services in one of the most densely populated areas of the country is especially dangerous given the importance of heart health. Coronary heart disease is the number one cause of death for adult Americans.
One hospital that is pulling its weight in the heart department, however, is St. John’s in Elmhurst. The hospital recently dedicated a new Heart and Vascular Center, one that will greatly increase the number of patients who can stay within the borough for heart care treatment.
Opened in November 2006, the center offers a kind of augmented care for patients who already have a personal practitioner. It’s this kind of treatment that will allow Queens, which is already severely under-bedded, to minimize the number of patients that require overnight stays, intensive care and other laborious and involved methods of care.
“The heart failure center’s strategies of optimization of medical therapy, close patient monitoring and education improves the patients’ quality of life and reduces the need for hospitalization,” Nurse Practitioner Agnes Czarnecki said.
St. Johns/Mary Immaculate also specializes in pacemaker and arrhythmia services, including state of the art treatment techniques and technologies.
Mount Sinai Hospital of Queens is also working hard to keep the tickers of our borough pumping. It’s the only hospital in the confines of Community Board 1 and already bears a great deal of responsibility for serving Western Queens. Located in Long Island City, Mount Sinai of Queens cares for patients from Sunnyside, Maspeth, Woodside and Astoria, as well as the community surrounding its walls.
The Cardiac Care Unit at Mount Sinai offers a wide variety of distinct services, specializing in non-invasive cardiology. This includes preventative medicine and comprehensive care for heart emergencies and heart attacks. The cardiac care unit recently upgraded all of its equipment to fully up to date technology, including an echocardiogram, a tool that uses sound waves to diagram the heart, track heart rate and establish patients’ overall cardiac health.
Mount Sinai of Queens also underwent a major renovation in the Emergency Room, one that allows the staff to monitor patient heart rate from a central hub, without having to make constant checks of individual beds. This allows them to tailor specific patient care with relative ease.
“I would say what’s unique about us is the way we do it, the way we treat our patients. We have a major focus on providing the best service and making the patient feel safe while they’re in our care,” said Associate Chief Operating Officer of Mount Sinai Hospital Queens Judy Trilivas.
Heart care was crucial for Mount Sinai because of the elderly population that it serves, according to Trilivas. “It’s one of the top ten reasons people visit our facility. It’s important to be able to do a diagnostic work up,” she said. “This neighborhood has a lot of elderly and a lot of the people that come into the hospital—their cardiac status has to be evaluated and monitored.”
A Dignified Step
Where Retirement Meets Medical Care
Skyline Commons will be unique in Queens. |
By Theresa Juva
Herbert Cyrlin is 84 and has lived alone in Flushing since his wife died two years ago. He returned from a vacation in Florida last week only to discover that he couldn’t get into his house because a mound of ice and snow from a recent storm blocked his front door. Once he finally pried open the door, he found that his house was a teeth-chattering 39 degrees inside—his boiler was broken.
“After three weeks in Florida, I went to bed with layers of clothing. The sheet was ice cold,” Cyrlin said.
As Cyrlin gets older, maintaining a house becomes more difficult and is why the former accountant decided to reserve an apartment at Skyline Commons, the soon-to-be constructed continuing care retirement community on Parsons Boulevard in Jamaica.
Scheduled to open in 2008, the old Queens Hospital building will be converted into a 143-apartment facility with apartment prices ranging from $200,000 to $1 million, said Julia Bartholemew, Skyline’s marketing director.
In the initial stage, interested seniors must put down a $1,000 deposit for an apartment. The next step is paying 10 percent of the cost of the apartment, an entrance fee, which can only be accepted once the state permits this part of the process, Bartholemew said.
This slight hiccup happens only because the facility is just one of eight state-licensed continuing care retirement communities in New York – and the only one in the five boroughs – meaning that it is subject to state regulations, like approval on every facility worker, she said. Another benefit of state regulation is that monthly service fees—about $2,800—will not annually increase as dramatically as it would at a private facility, she noted.
Yet the biggest draw is a three-prong approach to planning for a senior’s future. The not-for-profit facility is sponsored by the Margaret Tietz Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Jamaica. Residents move to the facility and live independently, but with access to medical services, including 19 apartments for assisted living and 40 slots for long-term nursing when their health eventually deteriorates.
This was appealing to Cyrlin, who said his two children call him daily to make sure he is okay. He said Skyline takes the burden off a senior’s family.
“I’m aware of their concerns,” he said. “If I were to be ill, I would be disruptive to them.”
Cyrlin plans to sell his home and use the money to buy an apartment and said even though Skyline can be expensive for some people, “it’s a win-win situation,” because when a resident gets sick and is moved to assisted living or skilled nursing, they don’t lose their apartment. When the resident dies, the family receives 90 percent of their entrance fee back.
Another soon-be-resident, Donald Solar, plans to move to Skyline with his wife. Besides the medical accommodations, 77-year-old Solar said amenities like a fitness center, dining room and transportation to shopping are also appealing.
Solar, who grew up in Bayside and moved to a retirement community in Suffolk County, said this community is unique because of its location.
“The most attractive thing about Queens is the diversity,” he said. “That I like a lot.”
He said its close proximity to Queens cultural events and activities in Manhattan makes Skyline an ideal place to which he can retire.
There is also the chance to meet friends.
“The social aspect is good,” he said. “I like eating with different people every night. It’s nice to talk politics at the table…it’s great for bringing grandchildren.”
For Cyrlin, he said he looks forward to eventually moving in, but said at 84, his health is unpredictable.
He had quadruple bypass surgery 13 years ago, although it hasn’t slowed him down.
He said if he can make it two more years in good health, he expects to be a highly sought after commodity at Skyline. After all, Cyrlin still drives, an attractive quality to the ladies at Skyline, he said matter-of-factly.
the end is near
Hospice Provides Help In Final Days
Hospice Care eases end of life concerns. |
By Matt Hampton
End of life care is an often overlooked facet of the healthcare system, despite its importance, and the borough of Queens is home to a facility with resources and services to rival the finest care in the country.
The Hospice Care Network of Queens, the result of a 1996 merger of three separate Hospice Care entities, has been a boon for the residents of Queens County for the last 10 years. With services that range from emotional support and bereavement counseling to spiritual services, the Hospice Care Network really does represent the light at the end of the tunnel for many.
As a non-profit organization associated with the NorthShore-LIJ Health System, the Hospice Care Network aims to ease the pain of terminally ill patients entering the final phase of life by providing them with counseling and pain relief care. The program also offers ease of access for friends and loved ones, so that no one has to be alone during their time of need.
“The field has grown tremendously since it first started and it continues to grow,” said Ed Lally, Vice President of Development at Hospice Care Network . “I think that people are becoming more and more aware of hospice care and what it actually does.”
“We serve over 400 patients,” Lally said. “The vast majority of these patients are served at home.” It’s the ability of the Hospice Care Network to provide flexibility for their patients, Lally said, that makes the service so desirable. Lally said that often patients of the Hospice Care Network live with family members who can’t provide the level of care that they need to live a comfortable life, and that’s where Hospice Care Network excels.
One earmark of hospice care is “not just taking care of the patient but also the family during this traumatic time,” Lally admits.
“In essence everybody is going to need end of life care at some point in time,” said Maureen Hinkelman, the CEO of Hospice Care Network. “Hospice can really help to make the patients’ last days as comfortable and meaningful as they can be.”
Hinkelman said that hospice care is meaningful to more than just the person directly being served, as the death of a loved one can be a truly painful and traumatic experience for friends and family as well.
“The families very much want to do the right thing, so they need a great deal of support,” she said. “The importance of hospice is that it transcends all illnesses. There is no disease -in essence- when it reaches the end stages, which doesn’t need that support, and hospice provides that support.”
Hinkelman said that the Hospice Care Network offers a wide variety of counseling and bereavement services, tailored to help family members and friends over long periods of time. It also aims for specific periods, like sessions on coping with a loss during the holidays, and mailers that describe feelings of loss and depression as normal symptoms of bereavement.
Serving the Queens community, as well, has been a challenge of diversity for the Hospice Care Network, one that they’ve tried to meet by offering bilingual services and a day camp for children who have suffered a recent loss. Many Queens patients are also sent to facilities outside the borough if they require intense scrutiny, with the Hospice Inn in Huntington part of the Hospice Network of care. The Hospice is in a 17 bed 24-hour care facility that represents an intensive, thorough level of care for patients.
With hospital beds in the borough a constant issue, the Hospice Care Network understands its role in reducing the overburdened hospital beds in the borough best of all.
“Primarily the role of hospice is to help the patient to remain at home,” Hinkelman said. “We help to free up some of those hospital beds, by servicing the patient at home.”
To learn more, go to hospicecarenetwork.org.
12-step programs
Help Is Just Steps Away In Queens
By Matt Hampton
Addiction is a fact of life for many Queens residents. The difficult and sometimes harrowing experiences that face addicts, whether it’s alcohol, drugs, gambling or food addiction, are not something that anyone should have to go through alone.
Mercifully, there’s help for everyone, most of it available within Queens County.
What follows is a guide, by no means fully comprehensive, for people seeking help for themselves or loved ones. It offers a starting point for a sampling of organizations that have representation within the borough.
The list that follows is a collection of 12-step programs in Queens that offer assistance to anyone and everyone who walks through their doors.
Alcoholics Anonymous – www.queensaa.org. The most widely recognized self-help 12-step program in the country has a strong representation in Queens, with an interconnected group that holds meetings every night of the week, across the borough. Alcoholics Anonymous has open meetings that cater to addicts and community members as a way to foster community support for those in need of help.
There are also closed meetings, where addicts can feel free to share their experience in a comfortable, non-judgmental setting.
Ultimately, the goal of all of these meetings is to provide a forum where addicts can feel safe and comfortable, united in the fight against their own powerful addiction.
Narcotics Anonymous – www.na.org. The horrors of drug addiction can be seen in the lives of thousands of New Yorkers everyday. This 12-step program offers people help in coping with the addictions of themselves or of family members, with a wide network of resources in countries all over the world. There are also a wide variety of drug related sub-groups, like Pills Anonymous and Cocaine Anonymous that specialize in the difficulties that one specific drug creates in a person’s body and their life.
Nar-Anon – www.nar-anon.org. While not affiliated with NA, this alternative group offers a family perspective on the 12-step program, advocating the help of loved ones in creating a drug-free environment for addicts.
Crystal Meth Anonymous – www.nycma.org. This group specializes in helping addicts overcome the devastating, life-altering affects of addiction to methamphetamines, and crystal meth. Crystal meth has gotten a great deal of press coverage of late, as it becomes increasingly clear that its ease of use and overall cost-effective production, especially in rural areas, increases traffic of the drug nation-wide. In New York City, Crystal Meth has also been a drug of choice for the gay community, and the community has responded loudly. Meetings are held mostly in Manhattan, seven days a week.
Gamblers Anonymous – www.gamblersanonymous.org. With meetings held daily in locations all over Brooklyn and Queens, Gamblers Anonymous is an accessible and dependable resource for people who have let gambling take over their lives. Though casinos and bookies may not be legal inside of New York City, the numerous Off-Track Betting and racetracks within easy reach of New York makes Queens an easy place for temptation to take hold over even the most stalwart of residents.
Overeaters Anonymous – www.oa.org. Compulsive eating is an affliction that affects millions of people each year. It is a difficult proposition to diagnose overeating, both in you and in someone else, because of the varying natures of each individual. The most important facet of these meetings, according to Overeaters Anonymous, as the acceptance of the individual. Meetings are scheduled nightly for various areas in all of the five boroughs.
Marijuana Anonymous – www.ma-longisland.org. Often considered to be a harmless drug, addition to marijuana is as real and as destructive as alcohol or “hard” drugs. There is a meeting held every Sunday at Zion Episcopal Church in Douglaston, as well as meetings in Hicksville, East Meadow, Franklin Square and Melville.
The organizations listed above represent only a sampling of what is available. There are countless meetings and organizations hard at work every day and every night to help people who find themselves unable to cope with an addiction, or even a difficult realization in their own life. The most important thing that can be done is to speak out, either for yourself or for a loved one who desperately needs help.
Strength In Numbers
Support Groups Help Share The Burden
Debbie Tills (center) with women from Womenheart support group. |
By Jennifer Polland
On a mundane Tuesday 11 years ago, Debbie Tillis was watching TV with her husband when she began having a strange pain in her chest. While her husband called the doctor – when he probably should have called 911 – her arm went numb and she couldn’t breathe. By the time she got to the hospital, she was unconscious and had already suffered a traumatic heart attack. When she woke up in her hospital bed, she felt terrified and alone.
“When I had my heart attack, I was so isolated and I was so sick and it was so scary,” Tillis said. “You can live without an arm, you can live without a leg, but you can’t live without a heart. No woman should have to go through what I went through alone.”
Since that fateful day, Tillis has been admitted to the hospital 19 times with heart disease related problems. She said that she felt alone and frightened until she found a support network in Womenheart.
Tillis, 63, is a volunteer with Womenheart, a national organization that supports women with heart disease. Tillis runs the Womenheart monthly support group meetings at the Cardiac Health Center of New York Hospital Queens in Fresh Meadows.
The goal of Womenheart is to educate women about proper treatment and diagnosis of heart disease, and to provide emotional and physical support to women who are suffering from heart disease. According to womenshealth.gov, heart disease is the leading cause of death for women in the United States. Tillis emphasized that of the millions of women who are suffering from heart disease, very few know about or attend support groups.
“Around 8 million women in this country suffer from heart disease,” Tillis said. “It is unacceptable that there are almost no support groups. If we can educate people early enough in support group meetings, hopefully we can eliminate heart disease.”
At a typical Womenheart support group meeting, a small collection of women – heart disease survivors and family members – sit around in a circle and share their thoughts, concerns and fears, while they learn information about the disease.
“We want to get the word out to women that there are other people out there who are going through what they are going through,” Tillis said. “We want to teach them about the disease and let them know that they are not alone.”
While Womenheart emphasizes education as a preventative measure, other support groups emphasize hope for individuals who are already dealing with life-threatening diseases. North Shore Long Island Jewish Center, for example, hosts a Brain Tumor Support Group which meets once a month. New York Hospital Queens hosts Look Good, Feel Better, a support group that teaches women who are undergoing chemotherapy to cope with appearance-related side effects. Jamaica Hospital holds a Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease support group that meets once a month.
When Tillis said, “the disease doesn’t just affect me, it affects my family,” she articulated a crucial issue for any person grappling with a disease or illness. Family members can suffer just as much as their ill loved ones, and there are many support groups devoted to comforting family members.
The Atria Kew Gardens, an assisted living community for seniors, offers a variety of support groups for its residents and their family members, including one for caregivers and family members of Alzheimer patients.
“We’re very tuned into the physical and mental needs of our residents,” said Shira Brazil, a licensed Master Social Worker who oversees support groups at the Atria. “Our caregivers support group is a new group that is meant to assist families who are coping with the deterioration of their family members.”
There are support groups for almost everyone and everything. They can be a place to learn, share, grieve, laugh or cry. For some people, the group memories become a temporary stepping stone on the path to recovery. For others, the support group becomes a type of extended family.
For Tillis, who said that Womenheart helped her cope with some of the most difficult moments in her life, the support group gave rise to some deep-rooted friendships.
“This is a sisterhood,” Tillis said. “I have never met such caring, wonderful women in my life. I feel closer to some of these women than I do to women who I’ve known for 50 years.”
