http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=1170&mname=ArticleGroup Your Health en-us 60 CAFFEINE COSTLY TO STUDENT HEALTH By: Amber Gramza of the Frontpage Milwaukee reporting staff Jan. 29, 2009 UWM students are consuming unhealthy levels of caffeine, a trend that is especially acute during finals. Students admit that they are drinking high level caffeinated beverages in large quantities. With students wishing they were able to administer caffeine through an I.V. drip, questions surface involving how much they’re drinking and what that can do to their bodies. Sleep is a symptom of caffeine deprivation Colleen Bernstein, a registered nurse and a current health educator at UWM lists the average amount of caffeine (in milligrams) in the most common beverages: • Coffee-100 mg • Expresso-100 mg • Soda- 50mg • Energy Drink- 200mg Bernstein admits that while small amounts of caffeine can be helpful to a person’s concentration, the side effects of an overdose may outweigh the benefits. “When you get into the 400-500-600-700 mg, which is quite a bit, your body will react to that stimulus by giving you stomach pain, and a rise in blood pressure,” said Bernstein. The Centre for Addictions Research of BC adds, “People who consume excessive quantities of caffeine may experience headaches, tremors, insomnia, anxiety, and a rapid irregular heartbeat.” Doing it for the Grade “I most often consume caffeine during crunch time of exams, or quizzes, or early morning classes,” said Cynthia Piemeisel, a junior at UWM. With her Ipod on and a coffee at her side, she looked back to her Biology notes in the Union. Cynthia, along with other UWM students have been increasing their caffeine dose to do school work, or stay up later than usual in order to study for exams. According to the Journal of the American Diabetic Association, “Nearly 90% of adults ingest caffeine every day.” But, exactly what are they ingesting? “Bold coffee, Rockstar energy drinks, mochas, and anything from Starbucks,” said Cynthia. With three out of her four answers including coffee, it’s easy to see why students are leading to high sales at UWM’s The Grind. “Provide the students of UWM with a jolt to kick start their studies”-Grind Website Even with current recession, Food Service (and The Grind) Supervisor Chad Boppel isn’t fazed. “Sales are very strong they have not been effected by the economy as of yet,” said Boppel as he glanced at his “Grind” blue coffee cup sitting on his desk with it’s protective cardboard sleeve. “Even though the population will go down [during final’s week], my sales will stay steady so I guess you could say they’re going up… they’re not going down, put it that way.” Lauren Abramowski, UWM sophomore and employee of the Library Grind, notices students having up to four cups of coffee depending on their work load. “I would say from about the time I get here, which is about 11 to the time I leave, which is our closing time at seven, we never have a dead spot. I would say some students come in repetitively two or three times a day.” Abramowski herself admits to being a caffaholic while adjusting her Grind apron and fixing a customer a chi latte. “I love coffee! I’m trying to cut back, but I used to drink two or three cups of coffee and later a latte which would end up being like five cups of coffee.” It Gives You Wings! National Geographic has described caffeine as “the world’s most popular psychoactive drug.” This fact concludes the Grind isn’t the only place experiencing an increase in beverages bought. “We’ve had a lot of energy drinks sold, more than sodas, because of finals coming up and everybody needs an energy drink,” observes Shavvoni Dawson, a freshman at UWM as well as a cashier at the Terrace in the Union. That “everybody” used to include Tracy Nnowak, a tiny blonde senior at UWM who had a bad experience with energy drinks her freshman year. “I decided to try a Red Bull for the first time,” said Nnowak. “I had an exam the next day and decided to drink it at midnight since I had a lot of cramming to do. After going to bed an hour and a half later I couldn’t fall asleep all night. I was tossing and turning and completely exhausted the next day.” Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise Nnowak now tries to avoid caffeine because of the negative affects it gave her. Kasia Brezezicka, an athletic and health-conscious UWM sophomore only has caffeine about once every six months. She has a plan to tackle finals without the risky side effects of too much caffeine. “I’ll be studying, and not all in one night, and spacing it through out, and getting a lot of sleep and exercise so I can be on my game for the exam,” said Brezezicka. Still the Grind lines protrude so far out into the hallways that it makes Union traffic impossible, and sounds of steaming “low-fat” frothy milk fill the corridors. With hearing can tabs popping open a mile away and that never disappointing fizz around every corner…one can only assume that college students and Mr. Caffeine will stay best friends forever (BFFs). Wed, 28 Jan 2009 22:18:00 CST http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=20603&mname=Article http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=20603&mname=Article Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} McKenzie Gardner of the Frontpage Milwaukee reporting staff Dec. 18, 2008 The Modern-Day “Coffee” Pulling all-nighters in college is nothing new. Students can be found sitting at their desks doing schoolwork at all hours of the night. But whatever happened to coffee as a student’s late-night companion? According to many University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee students, Adderall is the “new coffee,” and it is quickly becoming just as common and easily accessible. Some say they are abusing it. Students at UWM are buying and selling Adderall, a prescription medication intended to help patients with Attention Deficit Disorder or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder to help them get their schoolwork done, stay up all night, and lose weight. However, the medication can cause cardiac problems for those who take it without a prescription. A UWM student whose name will be concealed for privacy said, “I take Adderall as often as I can get it. I’m not prescribed and I don’t think I need to be prescribed but… I love it. I can stay up all night, not eat a thing, and crank out four papers and study for a midterm, no problem. It almost makes schoolwork fun because you get so into it.” When used correctly, Adderall is intended to control hyperactivity and other symptoms associated with attention deficit disorders, according to David Poehlmann of the Adolescent Substance Abuse Services at Columbia St. Mary’s. However, this drug is now being used for other reasons by patients who may not need Adderall at all. Students like this are more common than one may think. At UWM alone, several students said they do not know many people who have not taken Adderall on occasion. Many are now calling Adderall the new “smart pill.” The source of this drug for students is friends with easy access to endless amounts of Adderall. “I have a friend who has a prescription, but he doesn’t take it. Since so many of my roommates and friends want it, he says he’d rather sell it to us and get money. We each pay about $4/pill, so it adds up,” a UWM student said. While it may sound like a harmless behavior to help students get their schoolwork done, Poehlmann says there can be health risks involved. He also says he would liken the intoxicating effects of the drug to that of cocaine. “Certainly there would be potential problems with any cardiac involvement… because it is a stimulant. Also, anybody that gets involved in self-medicating… well, that’s a very dangerous behavior,” he said. Several UWM students who take Adderall without a prescription say they rarely experience bad side effects from the drug, aside from the occasional fast heartbeat. “Sometimes my heart races a little bit, and I know never to work out after taking it, but that’s about it,” an anonymous UWM student said. Many students are now taking Adderall for reasons other than school. One student says, “Doing Adderall just makes you get up in the day and makes you get going to do stuff. I have a lot more energy so I don’t always want to just sit and study. Sometimes I’ll take it to clean the house, or go shopping with friends because I feel so alive and awake and… happy.” Adderall is also becoming more and more common as a weight-loss drug. “Last year, before I went on Spring Break, I took [Adderall] pretty much every day for two weeks and barely ate anything. Food almost makes you feel sick when you’re on it so you just don’t eat. I probably lost, like, 15 pounds before my trip,” a female UWM student said. According to Poehlmann, people that struggle with eating disorders have often abused a stimulant as well because it does suppress the appetite. Another student added, “I don’t take Adderall to lose weight, but I do notice that I never eat… I really never even think about food when I’m on it. I guess it’s an added bonus because we all know college students want to lose weight…” While Adderall is the most popular amphetamine among college students, it is not the only one. According to Poehlmann, Ritalin and Vivance are two similar drugs also prescribed to patients with ADD and ADHD. For more information on Adderall, visit this website: WebMd Thu, 18 Dec 2008 14:24:00 CST http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=20256&mname=Article http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=20256&mname=Article By Holly Nearman Frontpage Milwaukee health editor Nov. 8, 2008 A UWM graduate student who would like to be referred to as “Sarah” made a visit to Norris Health Center in February of 2007. The biggest struggle for Sarah with that visit to Norris was walking past the downstairs waiting room where tissue boxes occupy every coffee table and blue surgeon’s masks adorn the faces of coughing students. She walked past the thunderous sneezes and the scent of menthol cough drops and made the menacing journey up the stairs. She was greeted by a much smaller waiting room in a hallway next to a bulletin board filled with neon flyers announcing support group meetings for issues ranging from eating disorders to depression to abusive relationships. “I always felt a little embarrassed going to counseling appointments,” Sarah said. “All of the mental health counselors’ offices were located on the second floor, and I was afraid someone I knew would see me going up there and know that I was seeing a counselor.” However, Sarah is not alone. One top UW-Milwaukee health official says the number of students seeking counselors is up. Between 2004 and 2007, an average of 4,840 students visited each year with a mental health counselor at Norris Health Center. In the 2006-2007 school year, there were 1,422 students seen by counselors. UWM police are also responding to a steady number of calls each year in cases where students have attempted suicide or pose a threat to themselves In 2006, police responded to 4 calls. In 2007, that number increased to 8. In the first 10 months of 2008, there have been 11 calls. Students receiving counseling at four-year institutions increased an average of 22 percent in the last four years, according to a UW System audit. UWM, ranked the lowest in the UW System in the counselor to student ratio, is experiencing the statewide and national trend of more students seeking counseling, says Julia Bonner, M.D. director of Norris Health Center and co-chairperson of the UWM Mental Health Task Force. While the records of the numbers of students who seek counseling each year at Norris Health Center were unavailable, Bonner said more individuals are coming in for counseling compared to past years. She attributes this to increases in enrollment, lack of health insurance among students, and more students arriving to campus with more severe mental health issues. UWM Chancellor Carlos Santiago has already appointed a Mental Health Task Force to assess campus services and students’ needs, and Norris has recently appointed a counseling director and hired a new counselor to help meet the growing student demand. Increasing need for counseling Bonner credits the dramatic growth of the student population over the last 10 years as a significant contributor to the increasing number of students seeking counseling. UWM has also shifted from mainly being a commuter school to having an increasing number of students living on campus or in nearby neighborhoods. There are also a growing number of health insurance issues, which motivate more students to take advantage of the free services offered at Norris. Additionally, there is an increasing number of students arriving on campus with pre-existing mental illnesses. “All of these merging issues placed more strain on UWM and pushed the school further back compared to other campuses,” Bonner said. The most common diagnoses students are given by counselors at Norris are: · Depression · Anxiety · Phase of Life Problems · Relationship Issues Sarah sought help after her self-esteem issues became too overwhelming. “I knew I needed help when the issues were beginning to interfere with my relationships,” Sarah said. “I just wasn’t able to be myself anymore, even around my close friends.” Meeting Needs Although the demand for counseling is growing, UWM students have not been adversely affected by the statewide strain in resources. “We’ve been able to be strategic, to try to make time for initial contact, even if it’s very small,” Bonner said. There is usually a 2-3 week wait for appointments, but can be longer around mid-terms, which is the busiest time for counseling, Bonner said. However, time slots are always available for emergencies. The counseling appointment times have not been restricted due to the increasing student demand and still remain an hour long. Norris still faces some consequences of not having additional resources. When students need ongoing therapy, Norris has to look broader within the community for help. If these students have their own private health insurance, they are often referred by counselors to other institutions in the community, Bonner said. Progress at Norris Dr. Paul Dupont, a current psychologist at Norris and chair of the Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Task Force, was recently appointed as the new counseling director, a position that has been vacant for six months. Norris also added a crisis counselor in January 2007. With this service, students are able to call in and speak to the counselor within 24 hours. “We’ve developed a strategy to be able to reach the increasing demands.” Bonner said. “We’ve made it as efficient and streamlined as possible.” The UWM Mental Health Task Force was created in October 2008 to analyze the current status of mental health services and the mental health needs of UWM’s student population. The task force will begin by trying to understand the basic fundamentals occurring nationally in colleges with mental health services and needs. They are also pulling in consultants and focus groups to address UWM specifically. “We’re trying to identify specific problems and issues and come up with creative solutions for them,” Bonner said. “The next step we absolutely have to take, and not just Norris Health Center, but the whole campus, is to create the right environment and give students the help they need,” Bonner said. “We need to work as a community on this.” Sun, 09 Nov 2008 14:31:00 CST http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=19789&mname=Article http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=19789&mname=Article Alisha Fischer arf@uwm.edu April 6, 2008 A study released last month shows one-in-four of sexually active teen girls has a STD, with the majority affected with HPV, a silent and misunderstood disease that can rear serious consequences years later in some individuals if undetected. The startling study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports 18 percent of the teenagers, aged 14-to-19, is infected with HPV, or human papillomavirus virus. Since more has become known about the disease and its connection to cervical cancer, more questions are being raised over its long-term effects and consequences. Physicians and health organizations such as the CDC agree that HPV can be a difficult disease to understand. HPV is a common yet potentially serious STD. Studies done by the CDC estimate that 50 percent of sexually active adults will contract HPV sometime in their lives. The American Cancer Society estimates that 11,070 women will be diagnosed with cervical cancer this year. “It’s very distressing for individuals to be diagnosed with this disease,” said Dr. Julie Bonner. She is the executive director at UWM’s Norris Health Center. She lectures about HPV and works to demystify the disease in the medical and public communities. The misconceptions between HPV and cervical cancer are a major cause for this distress. According to the American Cancer Society, 60 percent of women diagnosed with HPV that had a normal pap test will not have HPV six months later and even fewer will have it after 12-to-18 months. Both men and women can contract HPV and spread it to their partners, but there is currently no mainstream test for HPV in men. HPV is detected in women through regular pap test that find abnormal cell changes on the cervix. HPV can be confirmed through a separate test that is very similar to the pap test. The American Cancer Society also states that HPV is so common that any woman who has ever had sex can get it, but is women who do not get pap tests or that do not get them as often as they should that are at the greatest risk for cervical cancer. While there is no treatment or cure for HPV infections, a vaccination against the subtypes that cause the majority of HPV related cervical cancers was approved by the FDA in June 2006. The vaccine protects against four subtypes of HPV: six, 11, 16, and 18. Subtypes 16 and 18 account for 70 percent of HPV related cervical cancers. Subtypes six and 11 are commonly associated with genital warts. The American Cancer Society estimates that about half of all women diagnosed with cervical cancer are between 35 and 55 years old. Many of these women may not realize that it was in their teens and 20s that they were exposed to the high-risk strains of HPV that may have led to their cancers. Although it has been approved for women age nine-to-26, ideally, the current HPV vaccine is meant to be given to girls aged 11-to-12 by their pediatricians. This is because it is best to give the vaccination before girls become sexually active and exposed to high-risk strains of HPV. According to National Youth Risk Behavior Surveys from 2005, 6 percent of high school students surveyed said that they had sex before age 13. That same year, a Milwaukee survey showed 12 percent high school students had sex before the same age. The percentages of young men and women who engage in sexual activity increase dramatically during high school years. According to a report done by the CDC, 33 percent of high school freshmen have engaged in sexual activity. By twelfth grade, that number has nearly doubled to 62 percent. Still, misconceptions over the commonality of HPV and concern parents have over vaccinating their young daughters are far reaching. While 87 percent of parents surveyed knew that HPV might lead to cervical cancer, only 34 percent knew that it wasn’t a rare infection. Only 40 percent knew there was no cure for HPV. Studies show that the more parents learn about HPV and the vaccine, the more willing they are to have their daughters vaccinated. After reading a fact sheet on the disease, 37 percent of previously opposed and 65 percent undecided parents wanted to have their daughters vaccinated. For women who miss the chance to be vaccinated at an early age, the current vaccine is safe to be given to women up to 26-years-old. Norris Health Center is one facility that offers the vaccine and has given about 100 shots since it began carrying it in 2006. The recent CDC study results have caused strong reactions across the country. In a press release posted to its website, Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, blamed the high infection rate on abstinence only education and conflicting messages about sex. “The national policy of promoting abstinence-only programs is a $1.5 billion failure, and teenage girls are paying the real price,” said Richards. A slew of angry editorials from major newspapers across the country echoed this sentiment. Many believe that anger and finger pointing will not work to help this situation. Bonner believes that health organizations would be better off if they worked together. While critics continue to debate, Bonner suggests that there are no substitutes for using condoms and knowledge about sexual partners and their sexual histories. The American Cancer Society says the best step to prevent cervical cancer is to have a pap test. Norris Health Center gives about 1,800 pap tests annually to the UWM community. For more information, or to schedule an exam, contact Norris Health Center at (414) 229-4716. Sun, 06 Apr 2008 12:26:00 CST http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=17815&mname=Article http://www.frontpagemilwaukee.com/site/Viewer.aspx?iid=17815&mname=Article