Keeping the Women we Love Healthy

What a year 2018 has been, and 2019 is just around the corner! The Board of Directors at the Howell Foundation is working on lining up great speakers, is reviewing amazing research topics from our scholars and continues to see the results of our CEI seed resarch grants!  We couldn't have done it without you!  Your continuous support was fundamental in making a difference in women's health research: 16 undergraduate research scholarships Two graduate nursing research scholarships Four educational luncheons Our evening “Health and Happiness” event Our pilot grant for assisting with the reproductive health of the East African women refugees in San Diego county and  Our newest initiative, assisting with enrollment of women research subjects in clinical trials (the first being the WISDOM Trial addressing diagnosis in breast cancer) With your support,  you have advanced research regionally at UCSD School of Medicine, USD Hahn School of nursing, SDSU...

In August 2107, our very own Dr. Andrea LaCroix presented the health benefits of sleep during the Howell Lecture Series I mproving the Snooze: Sleepi ng Better as we Age .  "Almost everything is related in some way to our ability to function as we grow older; and sleep is perhaps one of the most important functions,"  comments Dr. LaCroix.  She, along with Dr. Carole Banka, Dr. Meg Richman and Board Chair and Registered Nurse Abigail D'Agostino, are part of the Foundation's Speakers Service; a newly launched initiative focused on extending the organization's mission of "keeping the women we love healthy." The 5 takeaways of her presentation are: 1. Sleep is regulated by a process called homeostatic process.  It means that the body is set up to want to be in balance with other internal processes. Our sleep drive -- when we get tired and feel sleepy, that drive to sleep -- is balanced with the way we operate while awake.  There are many internal and...

In February, the Howell Foundation was honored to have Dr. Anthony De Maria present the latest advances in medical and surgical treatment of heart disease.  He is the Judith and Jack White Chair of Cardiology and Founding Director of the UCSD Sulpizio Cardiovascular Center Dr. Anthony DeMaria’s presentation talked about the most common heart afflictions, the risk factors and the new technology being developed to diagnose, treat and, most importantly, prevent heart disease. Today, 1.4 million people per year have a heart attack; 800,000 people have strokes.  As a matter of fact, he estimated that in the time it took us to eat lunch during his presentation (20 minutes), around 60 Americans had already lost their lives from heart disease.  The sad truth is that cardiovascular disease claims a victim in this country EVERY 30 SECONDS. Even though questions remain about the onset of heart disease, what we know very well are the predisposing causes and risk factors....

We think and talk a lot about how symptoms of heart attacks differ in women, and that is a crucially important topic. As cholesterol medications become more widely used, atherosclerosis is predicted to decrease leading to a decrease in heart attacks. Furthermore, rapid emergency treatment of heart attacks means fewer heart attacks are fatal or debilitating. On the other hand, we do not devote as much time to discussions of heart failure.  "Almost 6 million Americans are living with heart failure, a condition in which the heart is not able to pump enough blood to support the other organs of the body.  Heart failure appears to strike men to a greater extent than women, but it is still a serious consideration in women", comments Dr. Carole Banka, Associate Project Scientist in the Department of Medicine at UCSD School of Medicine Did you know that: More American women die of heart disease than of all forms of cancer combined?  Most women do not know that heart dis...

Jessica Zhang is a newly minted MD serving on our Board of Directors. It is amazing how many things she is able to do for the Howell Foundation, all while pursuing her residency in Emergency Medicine at San Francisco General Hospital/UCSF. The philosophy of life of this young doctor is, quite frankly, contagious.  Taking a preventive approach on the road to personalized medicine is, perhaps, the most important factor in achieving health.  But that is just my opinion!  Read the wise words of Dr. Zhang, who no doubt will become one of THE best doctors! "My hope is that my future career is filled with sudden and unpredictable accidents – this sounds terrible, but hear me out. There are two ways to approach medicine.  The first is to react to a problem that already exists; the second is to prevent the problem from occurring. Our health care system approaches health from the first perspective. With increasingly rare exception, health is only addressed after you a...

March is here.  'Spring cleaning' is in the air.  So, how are we doing on the 'cleaning-out-our- ( fill in the blank )' resolution? The Howell Foundation invited Dr. Saxena to speak to us about clutter vs. hoarding last January.  More than a behavior pattern, hoarding is now diagnosed as a stand alone disorder --vs. being diagnosed as a sub category of OCD.  You can read more about his research here . The many faces of clutter vs. hoarding. To better emphasize that hoarding is not a 'lazy' attitude, Dr. Saxeena explained that what seems normal for us, discarding items of little or no relevant value, is difficult for many.  It is estimated that between 12 and 19 million individuals suffer from a hoarding behavior in the US. The reason why Americans hoard varies; some have a percieved notion of needing the items (trying to fix an item for a later use or to sell it), others save an item because it may be used some day, and yet others save it beca...

Celebrating 70 years of educating, empowering and enabling women in our community socially and economically Second Bucket List Bash to focus on women in the military and their transition into civilian life If you haven’t heard about Soroptimist International of La Jolla, you are missing out on the wonderful work they do to educate, empower and enable women in our community.  We know that for a fact! After all, the organization was a key component in creating the Doris A. Howell Foundation for Women’s Health Research.  We have been partners now for almost 25 years! "The group of women that belongs to Soroptimist International of La Jolla is small in number but immense in dedication and imprint on the lives of women. Twenty two years ago SILJ was instrumental in founding the Doris A. Howell Foundation for Women's Health Research and their organization has been our greatest ally in the years that followed. We are proud to be one of the recipients of their generosity...

Have you considered honoring a loved one with a donation to the Howell Foundation? Why should you? Because we ARE different, genetically, anatomically and psychologically. So what leads many to believe that women and men should be diagnosed and treated the same when it comes to our health? The complexity of gender differences and the greater health incidences a women faces --especially in the latter years of her life-- make women’s health research even more necessary than ever.   And by gender differences I mean going beyond the various roles ascribed to us because of our boobs and vaginas.   As best described by Carol Vlassoff, “Gender refers to the array of socially constructed roles and relationships, personality traits, attitudes, behaviors, values, relative power and influence that society ascribes to the two sexes on a differential basis.” We do not have heart attacks the same way. We do not face stress the same way. We do not react to Ambien the same way...

FACT:  1 in 3 women will get cancer in her lifetime.   Whatever the statistics, the encouraging news is that cancer diagnosis in women is declining. According to this year's "Cancers Facts and Figures" published by the American Cancer Society, d eath rates have been declining in men and women since the early 1990s. From 1991 to 2011, the combined death rate dropped 22%. Over the past 5 years (2007 to 2011), the death rate for all cancers combined decreased by 1.8% per year in men and 1.4% per year in women (1) . But what are the most diagnosed cancers in men and women?  Recent news highlights the encouraging discoveries of cures for patients with cancer--  by women for women -- some  examples are listed below, but you can read all about it in the original source  here   (2) .  Kimberly Blackwell, M.D., director of the breast cancer program at the Duke Cancer Institute in Durham, North Carolina, is researching a targeted drug which d...

Dr. Dorothy Sears will be presenting "Simple Lifestyle Changes for Improving Women's Health"  on May 20th.  This interview provides an insight of our speaker.  Thank you Dr. Sears for joining us! ### About the Doris A. Howell Foundation: The Doris A. Howell Foundation for Women’s Health Research is committed to keeping the women we love healthy, advancing women’s health through research and educating women to be catalysts for improving family health in the community. The organization does so by funding scholarships to students researching issues affecting women’s health; providing a forum for medical experts, scientists, doctors, and researchers to convey timely information on topics relevant to women’s health and the health of their families through its Lecture and Evening Series, and by funding research initiatives that improve the health of under-served women and increase awareness and advocacy in the community. To learn more about the Foundatio...

Every year in May, the Office on Women's Health celebrates Women's Health Week. Let's face it: when we are in our 20's we think we are invincible! But the foundation of a healthy life starts as early as we can build it.  The 'musts' of women's health are divided into age group categories, from the 20's up to the 90's -- talk about simple lifestyle changes to improve our health! The top 5 actions we need to take for our health on a regular basis include eating healthy to maintain a healthy weight, getting active for at least 30 minutes most days of the week, checking our blood pressure, limiting alcohol use and making sure our vaccinations are up to date. Oh, and if you are a smoker, don't. Obviously, as our bodies age, our road to wellbeing changes. Being healthy is being happy! In your 20's and 30's, it's imperative that you talk to your doctor about choosing the right birth control and whether you are planning to ...

  ### About the Doris A. Howell Foundation: The Doris A. Howell Foundation for Women’s Health Research is committed to keeping the women we love healthy, advancing women’s health through research and educating women to be catalysts for improving family health in the community. The organization does so by funding scholarships to students researching issues affecting women’s health; providing a forum for medical experts, scientists, doctors, and researchers to convey timely information on topics relevant to women’s health and the health of their families through its Lecture and Evening Series, and by funding research initiatives that improve the health of under-served women and increase awareness and advocacy in the community. To learn more about the Foundation, visit  www.howellfoundation.org .      ###

The National Sleep Foundation paints a pretty clear picture on how lack of sleep affects women and their health, how they cope and a few recommendations on how to get a good night's sleep.  Led by a panel of experts, the study concludes that women are not sleeping well, affecting all aspects of their lives.  As a coping mechanism, women tend to sacrifice sleep in order to "do it all" without realizing that biological factors, in addition to lifestyles, have an impact on their sleep and as a result, on their health. As to why women need more sleep than men, researchers point out that women typically multi-task, using more of their brain and needing more sleep at the end of the day than men-- around 20 minutes more.  So the "5-more-minutes" actually might have some science to it! Ready to 'Spring Forward'?                                           ...