UPFRONT | Roundup LEADERSHIP Chiropractors give back at World Pond Hockey For the last 12 years, volun-teer chiropractors have been providing on site chiroprac-tic service for teams from around the world participat-ing at the World Pond Hockey Championships, an annual fundraising event benefitting the people of Tobique River Valley in New Brunswick. Six chiropractors partici-pated this year, including Dr. Susan DeWolfe, a chiro-practor from Toronto and who instigated the idea of bringing chiropractic to the event. DeWolfe’s father is from Plaster Rock, N.B., where the annual World Pond Hockey Champion-ships are held. “I realized there was an opportunity for a chiroprac-tic clinic at this event,” said DeWolfe, who first started volunteering at this hockey tournament in 2007, and have been there every year since. As an athlete and a sports chiropractor, DeWolfe has a keen interest in the manage-ment of sports injuries. Vol-unteering at the World Pond Hockey Championships is an opportunity to practice what she loves and give back to the Village, where some of her family members still live. “This (event) originated because the old arena had been condemned and the Village knew that if they didn’t have a hockey rink, people would move away and they knew that would be the death of their village,” DeWolfe said. The Village now has a new indoor arena and continues to benefit from this yearly event – which now boasts 120 teams 10 Canadian Chiropractor April 2018 WOMEN’S HEALTH 10 heart health facts every woman should know Nearly every minute, a woman dies from heart disease in the United States – it is the number one killer of women, causing one in three deaths each year, according to the American Heart Association (AHA). When it comes to heart disease, women experience unique causes, symptoms and outcomes com-pared to men. In addition, certain conditions appear to increase heart disease risk in women, in-cluding pre-eclampsia and ec-lampsia, gestational diabetes, migraine headaches with aura, early onset menopause and auto-immune diseases such as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. Dr. Holly Andersen, director of education and outreach at the Ronald O. Perelman Heart Institute at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, and Dr. Jennifer Haythe, a cardiologist specializing in cardiac health dur-ing pregnancy at the Center for Advanced Cardiac Care at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center, say more work needs to be done. Here’s why: • Women are more likely to die from heart disease than men, according to the AHA. • Despite outreach efforts, a Women’s Heart Alliance survey of more than 1,000 women be-tween 25 and 60 years of age found that 45 per cent of women still don’t know that heart disease is the leading cause of death for women in the United States. • Women are less inclined to call 911 when they believe they may be experiencing heart attack symptoms. • Cardiovascular disease compli-cates up to four per cent of pregnancies, and that number has been increasing. • Women’s heart attack symp-toms are often different from men’s. They may experience from around the world. DeWolfe had been the lone chiropractor at the event until 2011, when she was finally joined by a fellow sports chiropractor, Dr. Matt Cochran from Freder-icton. The number of volun-teers gradually increased – through active promotion by the New Brunswick Chiro-practors Association to its members – to six chiroprac-tors volunteering at this year’s tournament held last February. The chiropractic clinic also had a volunteer “office manager” this year, who took care of all paperwork, including informed consent forms that those coming into the chiropractic tent for treatment had to sign, De-Wolfe said. DeWolfe is hopeful more chiropractors, especially those with special interest in sports injuries, would come and volunteer at the World Pond Hockey tournament. “We were doing sports chiropractic, we showed the athletes (at World Pond Hockey) that chiropractic wasn’t what they had pre-conceived. We were treating ankle injuries, hip injuries. We were able to really show people what we could do as chiropractors, showcase chiropractors in a sporting event,” De Wolfe said. – Mari-Len De Guzman • • • • • shortness of breath, nausea, palpitations, jaw discomfort or overwhelming fatigue, accord-ing to the AHA. Women are less likely to be re-ferred for cardiac rehab after a heart attack. Women’s heart disease is un-der-researched: only 35 per cent of participants in clinical trials of cardiovascular disease are women, and just 31 per cent of the studies report outcomes by gender. Pre-eclampsia is an independ-ent predictor of developing cardiovascular disease later in life. Women who have had pre-eclampsia should be mind-ful of having their blood pres-sure, fasting glucose and cho-lesterol checked annually. Women are less likely to receive bystander CPR in public than men (45 per cent in men versus 39 per cent in women). Learning hands-only CPR can help save a life. Recent blood pressure guide-lines from the American College of Cardiology recommend all people to have a blood pressure target of 120/80 or lower. Additionally, after the age of 65, hypertension (high blood pres-sure) is more common in wom-en. Stay up-to-date on your annual physical and have your doctor check your blood pres-sure and other cardiovascular disease risk factors. Get your daily dose of health care news at canadianchiropractor.ca www.canadianchiropractor.ca
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