Caring for the carers: Family carers save the State more than €2 billion a year. So how should the Government help them in return?
The Carers Association of Ireland is hosting a free conference, Family Carers: the International Experience, on Tuesday next week at Citywest Hotel, in Saggart, Co Dublin.
Six guest speakers will discuss the social policies that help family carers in Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, Australia and the United States. You can register by calling 0506-22933.
Mind over matter
Understanding psychological factors is a key to solving eating disorders. Colm Humphries, a psychologist, will speak about the use of cognitive-behavioural therapy to treat eating disorders on Wednesday at 8 p.m. in the Central Hotel, Dublin 2. Admission is 5.
More details from Bodywhys (01-2834963), the support group for people with eating disorders.
The best medicine?
A minute of laughter is equal to 10 minutes on a rowing machine, according to Dr William Fry, a researcher at Stanford University, in California. The followers of laughter yoga would have to agree.
Introduced to Ireland by Mary Mitchell, a Castlebar-based therapist, laughter yoga is a combination of deep breathing, stretching and stimulated laughter. Mitchell is running a laughter-yoga weekend in Castlebar, Co Mayo, on the weekend of June 28th-29th. Call 1890-946466 for more details about the course, which costs €250.
Work hard, play hard
Nine out of 10 women say they have no time to themselves - and, according to a new report, European women are partying harder, sleeping less, eating more convenience foods and finding their lives more stressful than ever. The lifestyles of the vodka-and-vitamins generation increase demand for nutritional supplements, pampering spa treatments and indulgent beauty
products.
Following through
Cancer patients benefit from being phoned at home to see how they are coping following a day's chemotherapy, a new study has found. Giving them individual attention is also an important if often neglected part of the service in the busy day-hospital setting, according to Sonja McIlfatrick, who recently won a Royal College of Nursing research award for her study of patients' experiences of day-hospital chemotherapy compared with in-patient treatment.