Summer has come to an official end, and the beautiful season of autumn has come. Autumn brings with it a gorgeous change of colours, some great nights for campfires, dew-covered grass in the mornings, and a brisk cold air. With all this in mind, we must remember that is also a season for illness! Remember to protect yourself from the illnesses that arise in the fall season, and remember that although you may love the cold air, you won’t love catching a cold!

Gateway’s Chair of Rural Senior Wellness, Dr. Agnes Kluz has recently been featured in the August edition of Canadian Family Physician! Dr. Kluz shares her experiences in healthcare, specifically the impact of parenthood on her career, expressing that “Being a parent makes you a better doctor”. 

This article also outlines a very important change in employment direction that we’ve seen over the last 20 years regarding pregnancy and maternity leave.

Read or download the full article below!

Huron County, ON – The Huron County Health Unit is looking into whether there are higher than normal cancer rates in Ashfield-Colborne-Wawanosh township. 

To promote flu shots for the 2013-14 season we created this 3min video called "I’m Bat Doc". It discusses some of the myths surrounding the flu shot and encourages people to get immunized.

By CBC News, CBC News | Health 

The risk of stroke among pregnant women and those who have just given birth is growing at an alarming rate, say U.S. researchers.

The increase is due to women having increased risk factors for stroke before becoming pregnant, including high blood pressure and obesity, according to a study published Thursday in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

Researchers found that across the United States, pregnancy-related stroke hospitalizations increased 54 per cent, from 4,085 in 1994-95 to 6,293 in 2006-07.

Those numbers include both pregnant women and women who had given birth in the previous 12 weeks.
Given the increased number of pregnant women with pre-existing risk factors, the researchers said they were expecting to find more were being hospitalized for pregnancy-related strokes.

The magnitude of the increase, however, was a surprise, said Dr. Elena Kuklina, an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"When you're relatively healthy, your stroke risk is not that high," Kuklina, lead author of the study, said in a release.

"Now more and more women entering pregnancy already have some type of risk factor for stroke, such as obesity, chronic hypertension, diabetes or congenital heart disease. Since pregnancy by itself is a risk factor, if you have one of these other stroke risk factors, it doubles the risk."

The study also found that pregnant and post partum women aged 25 to 34 were hospitalized for stroke more often than those who were younger or older. The researchers did not suggest possible explanations.
Pregnant women are especially difficult to treat because they are usually excluded from clinical trials of medication because of concern drugs can harm the fetus.
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As a result, doctors don't have enough information about which medications are best for pregnant women who are at an increased risk for stroke.