Kevin Dewaele was practicing for his upcoming Presidency and subbing for Maura. He opened the meeting leading the Pledge of Allegiance followed by Deacon Ron Hesson with an opening prayer.

 ANNOUNCEMENTS

We have an invitation from Highland Area Community Foundation for their annual awards banquet if anyone is interested in attending.

Mark your calendars for October 21st for a Bonfire at Maura Donnelly's residence.  All participants are encouraged to bring a dish and a guest (spouse and/or potential member).  Drinks will be provided by the club. 

Reminder that 2011-2012 we will be tracking service hours again to see Rotarian's collective IMPACT.  This year's goal is 7500 hours.  There were 831 hours recorded to date. 

Our club will be going to join the Joplin Rotary efforts on November 12th.  Mark your calendars and they will be taking roll call soon for interest.

Kevin Dewaele also added that thanks to Rotary's $1000 donation and Optimists' $1100 donation as well as local and city funding, the Eagle Scout project for an accessible boat dock for all is a 'go'. We will learn more soon about the 'hands on' needs our club can provide.

Go to the website and log your hours or email them to him directly: swconstruct@agtelco.com

Attendance:  60.70%

Guests: Chris Franklin, Practice Manager, St. Joseph's Hospital

Club Anniversaries: None

Birthdays: Skip Butler 9/29 and Kevin Dewaele 10/1. Of course we sang to the birthday boys.

Anniversaries: Len and Alice Daiber on 9/29, Biddy and Kathy Essenpreis (50 years!!) on 9/30 and George and Robin Jones on 10/3.

Make-ups: None

Let these people know that they were missed this week: Dave Diaber, Maura Donnelly, Dan Fieker, Mike Gould, Jon Greve, Bret Gruender, Lisa Hunsche, Linda Jakel, James Kemper, Mark Latham, Terry Lietschuh, Glenn Meffert, Henry Metzger, Armand Miranda, Bob Nagel, David Peters,  James Rankin, Mark Reaka, Brad Rench,  Rick Ringwald, Eunice Rogier, Floyd Rogier, Randy Schorfheide, Ron Schneider, Art Scheutz, Gordon Smith, and Buzz Widmer

There was $650 in the 50/50 and Bill Sullivan's table attempted to find the Ace to no avail.  There are 35 cards left in the deck.

Happy Bucks:

• Jennifer gave 2 promo bucks to shamelessly sell some candy for St. Paul Space Camp. If you didn't get any this week, there just might be some left for next week!
• Biddy Essenpreis was happy to celebrate 50 lovely years with his Rotary Partner.

Fines: Phil was feeling in good spirits today and skipped the fines!

PROGRAM: Dr. Nitu Aryal, St. Joseph's Hospital

Dr. Aryal joined St. Joseph's on July 1, 2011. She served her residency in Chesterfield MO at St. Luke's. Prior to that she attended medical school in Pakistan. Her husband works at SIUE. She has a 2 year old at home. Her specialty is preventive medicine as a general practitioner. She sees patients 16 years old and over and is located in the Medical Arts Building adjacent to St. Joseph's Hospital in Highland.

Currently Life expectancy for men is 78 years and for women it's 81 years. They expect both to rise in the next 10 years do to excellent health care and more and better preventive screenings for many of the related causes of death:

1 - Heart Disease 25.4% of people die from this

2 - Cancer

3 - Stroke

4 - Respiratory illness including COPD

5 - Accidental death

A few other facts:

• Blood pressure monitoring can prevent 30% of heart attacks and 50% of strokes!
• Cancer is getting more curable
• Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm screening is critical for men with risk factors, especially smoking.
• Most of the men were not happy to hear that although many doctors forgo the 'digital' prostate exam and rely on PSA levels only, both should be completed annually for maxium preventive benefit.

 For more information check out Dr. Aryal's handout here.

Peggy Sebastian also let us know that all HSHS employees at the hospital are required to get flu shots or wear a mask from November to March. This is a new requirement to do the most they can to prevent the spread of the flu. There is not an issue with an outbreak, but this is their decision to keep their patients as safe as possible.

UPCOMING PROGRAMS -  Jennifer Whitten