It’s amazing how many invitations I get every year around this time to attend a charity walk, golf outing, or dinner dance. While each is important to the people the charity helps, most of the time I discard the information unless it’s an event to which I’m connected.
Recently, I was invited to participate in a walk to raise money to create a new women’s hospital on Long Island, New York. This would be the first hospital geared specifically to women’s needs and will include state-of-the-art equipment for early detection of diseases.
The information I received got me thinking. All too many times, I hear about women who had procedures that were more invasive than they needed to be. Then I thought about my daughter. Wouldn’t it be great, if in her lifetime she ever needs medical treatment, to be able to go to an all-women's facility where she feels completely comfortable and can relate to the other patients because they’re all women going through the same thing?
That’s when I made the commitment to be a team captain and organize a team for the “Every Woman Matters” 5K Walk, which will be held on Sunday, May 16 at 10 am at Jones Beach State Park.
The hospital, which will be part of the North Shore-LIJ Health System, will be called the Katz Women’s Hospital (benefactor Saul Katz is part owner of the New York Mets). It will target health care issues from birth onward. It will focus on: cardiac diseases, thyroid conditions, cancer, bleeding disorders, orthopedics, maternal-fetal medicine, neurosciences, and emotional disorders. It will offer all women a full range of obstetrical and gynecological services. In addition to that, North Shore-LIJ is developing a Women’s Health Institute, which will be a community service providing education and outreach on lifestyle and wellness programs. The new hospital already broke ground on July 30, 2009 and it is anticipated that it will be completed by spring, 2012.
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