by Steve Mallory

January has been an especially cold and snowy month. I hope that everyone has had his or her heat up high. Spastiscity usually becomes worse in colder weather and can become quite a burden!

We begin the month of February by welcoming our new friends from Good Samaritan Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Good Samaritan is the hospital where I received rehab, after my stroke in 1994. For those of you who do not understand what is going on, our organization chose Good Sam for its community Outreach Program and donated three new computers to their stroke ward, which were recently installed. They will acknowledge the contribution with a ribbon cutting ceremony this upcoming week. Stroke survivors and their caregivers will have access to the computers while receiving inpatient care and going through their rehab therapy. Hopefully, the computers can be used by them to help them understand that people, like the members in our organization, are here on-line, and can assist and support them through their journey in the life of a stroke survivor or stroke caregiver.  

We all learned AFTER our discharge that this community exists on-line and that local resources are not necessarily an option once settled back at home. We also would like to give them the capability of learning of some of the software and assistive technology resources that will potentially be available to help their transition into independence and with their neurological rehabilitation. One of the objectives of our organization is to help develop the ways that computers can become valuable tools to hospitals with rehabilitation facilities and possibly assist the recovery and stroke support for their stroke patients and the families of the stroke survivor.

We have a position open for someone with technical abilities to screen and add articles about the latest stroke news, our Newsfeed. This job requires a person with the basic understanding of how to perform basic Internet commands. It will require approximately one to two hours per week of volunteer service. Please use the Volunteer Request form at http://www.strokenetwork.net/questions/volunteerrequest.htm if you are interested in this position. You should refer to the request in the February newsletter.

Copyright © February 2004

The Stroke Network, Inc.

P.O. Box 492 Abingdon, Maryland 21009

All rights reserved.