Herald & Lantern 12 October '83

39

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by Dr Robert C. Beitman

United Way Drive Vitally Important

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County Library by Kathleen Duffy

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Heartburn is estimated to affect 10 percent of the U.S. population on a daily basis. To continue with our program of preventive medicine, we * need to discuss the nature of acute heartburn, and understand the implications * of ’chronic” heartburn. Chronic heartburn can be a symptom associated with many diagnoses, heart disease, hiatal hernia, cancer of the esophagus, lung trouble and just plain indigestion. Heartburn is usually described as a burning chest pain behind the breast bone. The patient may describe the sensation of food coming back into the mouth which tastes acid-like, bitter or metallic. The pain lasts from a few minutes up to as long as two hours and is generally worse when the person lies flat or bends over. It should not worsen with exercise. RESEARCH HAS shown that heartburn has one underlying cause in 50 percent of cases. To understand this cause, we must know how our esophagus (swalloing tube) works. Normally, whetf we swallow food, it is moved through the esophagus by a series of muscular contractions. When the food has travelled to the bottom of the esophagus, the band of muscles at the bottom of the esophagus relaxes and the food slips down into the stomach, where it will be digested. The lower band of muscles then tightens back up to seal the esophagus off from the stomach contents. In some people those important lower esophagus muscles (called the lower esophageal sphincter) will weaken and not close tightly. This means that food or partially digested stomach contents can slosh back up into the esophagus. The foods in the stomach have become coated and mixed with the digestive acid, so when the stomach contents slosh (reflex) into the esophagus, the acids burn and irritate its delicate lining. The irritation can be so bad as to create vomiting, pain behind the breast bone, nausea, bloating and difficulty in .swallowing Heartburn arises out of the

signals of irritation the esophagus sends to the brain. OCCASIONAL heartburn after meals can usually be corrected by avoidance of foods which bother you, a light dose of antacids, and staying upright. Chronic heartburn is another matter. If tests determine your heartburn is solely caused by sphincter weakness and reflux, then your physician can prescribe extra strong medications and some techniques to help you overcome the discomfort. ■In the worst cases of reflux, a special surgical implant to tighten the sphincter may be a consideration. However, chrome heartbum can signal much more than just indigestion, as was pointed out at the beginning of this article. If your heartburn worsens with exercise, then it may be a heart problem. Chronic heartburn needs to be medically evaluated to check for cancer of the esophagus, ulceration, hernia, scarring and a number of associated disorders. Next Week: Modern diagnosis of esophageal disorders and hiatal hernia. Health Watch is a project of the Public Education Committee of the American Cancer Society. Rotary Told Senior Care BURLEIGH - The MidJersey Cape Rotary Club met yesterday at , the Wildwood Golf and Country Club, with guest speaker Ruth Kozlek, social worker for the Cape May Care Center of Swainton. She discussed the Social Services programs available to senior citizens in Cape May County, which are ever-changing and expanding to meet the growing number of senior citizens in the area. She urged any senior citizens to keep in touch with representatives from the various programs so they may utilize any that would be of benefit to them. The next regularly scheduled Rotary meeting will be 12:15 p.m. Oct. 18 at the Wildgood Golf Club. Contact Gordon Nedwed at 465-7633 between 9 and 5 for further information.

ED. NOTE — This is one in a series of articles by First Call for Help, a division of the United Way of Cape May County, explaining human service' agencies. First Call, at 72S-2255. can refer persons to the appropriate agency. ■Perhaps you have been aware of the public service spots running on network ‘ television anticipating the United Way’s Fall campaign. This upcoming campaign in Cape May County is of vital importance — “now...more than ever” — not only because of our high unemployment rate during the off-season months, but because of the Federal cutbacks which are felt by all public service and human service agencies. Other than First Call for Help, the. County Information and Referral service,

Q. I just turned 18 and right now, I am getting Social Security benefits while I attend high school. I am thinking about working part time and going to school part time. Will I still be able to get Social Security benefits? A. No, you must be a full time student in order to get Social Security benefits after 18. Q. MY TWO children and I have been getting survivor’s benefits ever since my wife died. Will the

STONE HARBOR - The Seniors are starting to move ahead with plans for a very busy season. The male and female bowling leagues are underway. Anyone interested in joining the teams may do so by contacting any member of the bowling league 1 p.m. Tuesdays at the Wildwood Bowl. Permission has been granted to repaint the shuffle board courts in the school gym so that they may be used on regular fun nights. Members have volunteered to scrape the wax from the old courts and repaint them in the near future. RUTH FISHER has made arrangements for the group to go to the 76 House Restaurant and see the musical “Annie” following the dinner program Sunday, Oct. 16. Call Ruth for tickets, at 368-1421. A Baltimore trip to see the inner Harbor will be announced shortly. Scott Daniels is urging all members to turn into him the names of neighbors or newcomers in town that might care to join the Seniors. He will call on those whose names are submitted to acquaint them with the many activities the Seniors enjoy during

the other United Way agencies participating in the 1984 campaign are: Association for Retarded Citizens. ( Jersey Cape' Diagnostic, Training and Opportunity Center. Mental Health Services of Cape May County. Boy Scouts of America. Girl Scouts of America. Women's Abuse Center. Cape-Atlantic Legal Services. Contact (crisis intervention phone counseling >. Jersey Cape Visiting Homemakers. The Salvation Army. United Service Organizations (USO). You have read about all of these agencies in this column this year. So, in our next column, we will explain something about the United Way itself and how all of our community is part of it.

benefits continue if I remarry? A. Your remarriage would have no effect on the benefits being paid to your children. If you get benefits only because you are caring for the children, your benefits would end at the time of your remarriage unless you many someone who is receiving Social Security retirement, disability, -widow's, mother’s, parent's, or childhood disability benefits.

the year. The annual Halloween Party, which will be held Oct.' 31 at the American Legion Hall, is being directed by Mr. and Mrs. Russell Bailey. Two Share In Audubon Soc. Award CAPE MAY - Former Mayor Edward N. Fitzpatrick and Stiles Thomas of Allendale were jointly awarded the Conservationist of the Year award at the annual meeting of the New' Jersey Audubon Society, convened Sept. 30 at the Golden Eagle Inn. The award was presented in recognition of their joint efforts resulting in the preservation of the Allendale Celery Farm, a 78-acre marsh and Woodland area in northwestern Bergen County. A thriving farm between the two World Wars, the property has gradually reverted to its natural state since 1951, and now maintained by the Fyke Nature Association. New Jersey Audubon is the state's oldest private conservation organization and maintains nature centers in Franklin Lakes. Bemardsville, Mount Holly and Tennent, as well as the Cape May Bird Observatory, host of the annual meeting.

What is a Spoken Word record? Poetry read by the author, classics performed by great actors, science fiction either read or performed, great speeches, old timp radio broadcasts and a weajth of otjier materials “Why listen to records with a portion of a famous • book?" you ask. To hear a poet read on of his own works allows you to hear the tone and emphasis the writer had envisioned Listening to a segment of a book brings the story to life whether it is a dramatized reading by actors or a passage read by the author. Speeches, radio broadcasts and news casts bring both history and our social life and customs to an immediacy that even old movies lack The Cape May County Library has recently added several selections to its spoken word collection. Jonathan Livingston Seagull read by the author. Richard Bach, who reads with both joy and humor. “He isn't stuffy or solemn or pontifical. He seems to be having fun, and so it's fun to listen. And maybe because the subject is important, essentially he treats it lightly. Every time you listen you hear something you didn’t hear before. Like re-reading a book, but with another sense and therefore, another dimension. ” THE ACTOR Jose Fer rar reads from Thomas Mann's Death in Venice (abridged). A work gf intricate craft in which the story never falters as the hero spirals to degradation and eventually death as is revealed in this tale of engrossing fascination. Actress Claire Bloom reads from Virginia Woolf's A Room Of One f s Own which addresses the questions of women and fiction and the English actress Carole Shelley reads Paul’s Cases by Wil)a Gather about Paul's strug gle to escape the dullness of his existence in urban Pittsburgh. Two of John Cheever’s Pulitzer Prize winning short stores. The Swinner and The Death of Justine are read by the author himself. “John Cheever writes aloud when he writes, as though someone was actually listening Stories are meant to be heard" and this record is a pleasure to hear. One of the great Shakespearean actors, Sian Howard, lends his voice to W. Somerset Maughan’s short story The Lotus Eaters, which deals with the reaction of the white man to an alien land and the effect which contact with people of another race has upon him.' Actress Irene Worth reads an excerpt from Emile Zola s Nana and also Gustave Flaubert’s Madam Bovary. Claire Bloom reads "A Portrait of Becky Sharp” from William Thackeray's Vanity Fair, a Victorian entertairyfcient and moral instnlction. SAtL BELLOWS reads exceippts from Herzog - one of the most profoundly realized characters in modem American fiction. This is your chance to meet Herzog as the author envisioned — a failed husband, the inconsequential lover, the tender father, the rejected son, the charming

and sympathetic companion — a very human, emo tionaljnan. The absurdist play Hap py Days by Samuel Beckett its entirety, performed an award winning style by Irene Worth during its Broadway term, has also been added to our record collection. Poet Robert Lowell was recorded at the Poetry Center in New York City reading from his poetry and John G. Neihardt reads from his Cycle of the West. Actor E.G. Marshall reads Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: Decisions with Holmes himself reading his 90th birthday speech at the end of the record Holmes disliked cant and any showy display of erudition, his opinions were for the most part short and to the point in contrast to the lengthy opinions that were handed down by his associates and successors. "The material from.eight of Holmes' decisions have been assembled which consist of passages that ‘ought to be listened to in a darkened room, with a clear head and a sharp ear One is immediately aware of an elegant and graceful style, as well as an omniscience with which Holmes tackled the important legal and constitutional questions of his day. The words have a ring to them even now, when the present state of law has attenuated many of the doctrines that were once novel and unpopular "Holmes was a social philosopher and tempered his emotion with reason Pioneer Women: Selec tions from Their Journals is read by Sandy Dennis and Eileen Heckart The excerpts were taken from the recent book of that title and brings the settlement of the prairies to vivid life Letters, diaries and journals of the women settlers chronicling their daily lives .gives an insight not given in most history books The journals of Elenore Plaisted a pioneer daughter, the diary of Mary Richardson Walker, a missionary wife, the recollections of Martha Summerhayes; an army wife, and the letters- of Elinore Pruitt Stewart are included in the recordings Just Like Old Times; Ge nuine Original Recordings of Radio's Most Famous Funny Men includes routines by Bert Lahr. Ed Winn, Abbott and Costello. Fanny Brice, Edgar Bergen, Baron Munchausen, Bums and Allen and many others Science fiction fans will thrill to excerpts read from the Foundation Trilogy of Isaac Asimov. On one record the author himself reads a description of The Mule, or William Shatner of Star Trek fame reads a segment entitled "The Psychohistorians”. Poul Anderson reads Yonder, a short story from his noted Seven Tales of the Space Age, Theodore Sturgeon reads The Fabulous Idiot from his book More Than Human. C.L. Moore reads her short story Shambleau, and Ray Bradbury is recorded reading The Small Assassin in grisly short story. Listening to . one of these recordings -adds a new dimension to your reading.

Might Makes Right (From Page 38) ed by the student/lacky system of medical education, would be the last element of enterprise to convert. For a clue as to what I AM talking about, consider the U.S. constitution and government. It was set up with a system of checks and balances, with executive, legislative and judicial branches equally empowered. Then consider that Burdette, in having a medical staff, an administration, and a Board of Governors, could operate in a similar balanced fashion. I CONTEND that it does not now, nor has it ever, operated in any such balanced fashion, because there has always been one or more staff faction(s) with too much selfish, might-makes-right mentality to LET it happen. This role model, this patterning, is the problem, and not that one individual who now represents the leading edge of the third wave of its manifestation at Burdette (the three waves being 1. older, native bom surgeons, 2. younger osteopaths and their allies, and 3. recently arrived foreign bora staff) There are other questionable statements in the Mayer letter. The Burdette Board of Governors, as far as I know, didn't hire Nanavati or any other staff doctor. Nor does the presence of foreign-bom doctors on the staff constitute evidence for ofr against prejudice on the part of the board, the administration, or the staff, since the law provides that such prejudice cannot be acted upon without unacceptable legal risks. RUSSELL J. DOWN, M.D. Court House

Social Security QuesUons\and Answers

Busy Slate For Seniors