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Open Enrollment

It’s Time to Evaluate Your Options and Choose the Insurance Plan That’s Best for You by TERESA SCIHFFER It’s open enrollment season for Medicare and the Affordable Care Act (ACA) plans. If having health insurance that covers your actual medical needs, as well as your preferred doctors and necessary medications, is important to you, then…
Pop Quiz: If You Don’t Snooze, You Lose! How Much Do You Really Know About Sleep Apnea?

A full night’s sleep is supposed to be restful and recharging, but for millions of Americans, that’s not the case. Many wake up in the morning tired and unrested, and most don’t know that sleep apnea is to blame. Sleep apnea is a condition that disrupts sleep, keeping sufferers from getting that restful, restorative sleep…
Young Warriors

Twins Don’t Let Type 1 Diabetes Stifle Their Dreams by TIM CRAIG photos by CELESTE JO WALLS When 8-year-old Amelia Walls was hospitalized in 2016, Cecilia, her older sister by a whole 10 minutes, was worried. When Cecilia found out that her identical twin sister was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, she went from worried…

Healthy Cook: Food safety for the outdoor cookouts

Food Safety for the Outdoor Cookouts The sun is shining and the kids are playing and the picnic lunch is waiting to be eaten. It’s a perfect day in Florida. But tomorrow could be a bummer if the cook and helpers don’t know how to keep the food from spoiling. Food safety is a…
Editor’s Dose: My tips if you plan to do a ‘staycation’

In my opinion, there’s nothing better than summer in Florida. You have the beaches, the theme parks, and of course, the sunshine to beckon you outdoors. For residents planning their vacations this season, there are just as many reasons to stay close to home as there are to get away. So how do you…
Get healthy STAT!

Weighing in on National Statistics Take a Shot 13 percentage of parents not vaccinating children on the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention’s recommended schedule. Source: U.S. CDC The rates in Polk County of parents not completing immunizations on time is 1.6 percent for kindergarten and 1.3 percent for seventh grade, but they…