Statistics suggest that of the 63 people at a free program about genetic diseases more common among Ashkenazi (eastern European) Jews, 15 are carriers of at least one of those Jewish genetic diseases.  read more »

When Sharon Henifin was diagnosed with breast cancer 18 years ago, family and friends said to let them know if they could help in any way.  read more »

Now 25, Jennifer Morse decided it was time to deal with her father’s deteriorating condition resulting from living with Parkinson’s disease for 23 years.  read more »

LOS ANGELES (JTA)—Every parent who has a child at sleepaway camp dreads the call. This summer the call came in the evening—not because my teenage son Micah was injured or had broken one of the camp’s rules.
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Parkinson’s Resources of Oregon’s annual gala and dinner, Celebrate Hope on May 20 at the Oregon Convention Center, will features a cocktail hour, seated dinner, silent and live auction, lively entertainment, and an opportunity to celebrate those impacted with Parkinson’s disease.  read more »

On Sunday, May 16, Jewish Family and Child Service will host a free community-wide educational program/resource fair called “A Day of Empowerment: Solutions and Support for Individuals with Acute or Chronic Illness or Disability and their Friends and Families.”
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SYDNEY, Australia (JTA)—Pressed to find a name for his new technology enabling a more accurate Internet search, Israel native Ori Allon looked to Greek mythology—and perhaps his own name.
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History and heredity play an essential role in the lives of Jewish women. Cultural, religious and culinary traditions have been passed down through the generations. Heredity also plays an important role in health.  read more »

Susan G. Rosenzweig, Psy.D. announced the opening of her new psychology practice in Northwest Portland. The Center for Psychology and Health will offer psychological treatment to adults and teens, especially those dealing with medical illnesses themselves or in family members.  read more »

PHILADELPHIA (JTA)—In genealogy research, crumbling documents and high-speed Internet connections often go hand in hand. So it goes for Schelly Talalay Dardashti.
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Sweat trickled down the back of my neck as I craned to see over the crowd surrounding the table. We were in a concrete shed, on a sweltering August morning, on the campus of the University of California at Davis, and people were pushing forward eagerly to get a good look at a chicken.

The chicken, held by Naf Hanau, was one of three pasture-raised New Hampshire Reds, an heirloom breed, from Dinner Bell Farms, located in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas in Northern California.

All three chickens were shechted that morning, as part of an educational session on shechting (kosher ritual slaughter) at the Sixth Annual Hazon Food Conference.

Hanau is a certified shochet, trained in Crown Heights, N.Y., and Scranton, Pa., He also has studied at butcher shops and slaughterhouses across the country with many experts in the field of kosher meat production.

Hanau demonstrated a special way to hold the chicken, in which the chicken’s body is upside down, with its head facing up. Instantly the chicken, which had been clucking and fussing, quieted down. Hanau explained that this particular method of holding a chicken calms them and keeps them from getting agitated.

Many of the participants, city-raised folks like myself, were somewhat apprehensive. Although we wanted to witness this process, we were concerned about actually seeing an animal being killed. In the end, nobody bolted, and the people I spoke with gained new insights about meat, kashrut, humane slaughter, and their own attitudes about consuming animals for food.

During the three-hour session, the three birds were shechted and placed upside down in a plastic tube, under which a bucket was placed to catch the blood.

After the birds were bled, participants came forward to help pluck the feathers. Kosher slaughter forbids the scalding of chickens.

Scalding makes plucking much easier, but scalding is interpreted under kosher law as a kind of cooking, which is forbidden until all blood is removed. (According to the laws of kashrut, blood, the life force of the animal, cannot be consumed in any form, so all meat must be soaked and salted to remove any remaining blood.)

In a kosher meat processing plant, mechanical chicken plucking machines are used, but because they cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, they are not economically viable in smaller scale operations. So the 50 or so of us at the session were pressed into service, plucking feathers off the still-warm bodies. As with many farm skills, like milking, this is harder than it looks, and there is a technique to doing it well.

Josh Shupack, a Web designer from Ashland and a member of this year’s conference planning committee, said, “I’ve been to a non-kosher chicken slaughtering before and this was pretty similar, but I didn’t like the chicken-plucking machine at the non-kosher slaughter. It was kind of gross; watching a dead chicken whirling around in hot water having its feathers removed felt kind of disrespectful. Plucking by hand seems more respectful.”

Susan Bivens, one of ten Portlanders attending the conference as part of a cohort funded by a Jewish Federation of Greater Portland Community Impact Grant, grew up on a commercial fishing boat. She’s familiar with harvesting salmon, but this was her first chicken shechita. “It’s amazing that the bird is still warm while you’re plucking it,” she said. “To see the skin emerging from the plucked feathers makes you realize you’re seeing the food it’s going to become.”

Lauren Henderson, a rabbinical student at Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles, agreed. “It was a privilege to have a connection, to see the entire process from the animal going from being alive to just after death, feeling the warmth of the chicken while plucking it,” she said. “We usually only see animals in two stages: completely alive or on our plates. We’re more familiar with the store-packaged version of what a chicken looks like than the natural bird with feathers and a carcass with skin.”

After the birds were plucked, they were placed in cold salted water for an hour, and Hanau talked to us about the particulars of his training as a shochet. It’s an extremely rigorous process,

“I did basically nothing but study and practice while I was learning it,” he explained. His training included hours of text study, as well as hours of knife sharpening (shochet’s knives, which are checked by hand before shechting, must have no nicks that can tear the skin and cause pain). Hanau also spent days in a poultry plant to learn how to hold birds properly.

While Hanau is a happily self-described carnivore, he takes his role as a shochet very seriously. “There’s serious kedusha (holiness) involved with shechting,” he explained. “It’s all about the kedusha of working at the intersection between life and death.”

Aki Fleshler never thought he’d be a poster boy.
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In 2005 Sherie Hildreth turned her diagnosis of ovarian cancer into a mandate to create funding for research of the disease.  read more »

As part of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Rose Schnitzer Manor at Cedar Sinai Park will host Becky Olson, author and co-founder of Breast Friends, on Oct. 4, at 6:45 p.m. in Zidell Hall. The event is free and open to the community.  read more »

Eighteen months ago, Paul Richard Solomon had a head full of reddish brown hair and few worries. Today, his hair is gray and after failing to respond to the three chemotherapy treatments approved for myelogenous leukemia, his main hope rests in finding a bone marrow donor.  read more »

Ashkenazi Jewish women, have a higher chance of having a high risk for breast cancer.  read more »

We came from all over North America and as far away as Japan, England and Israel.

More than 300 enthusiastic, passionate food activists, cooks, teachers, writers, clergy, farmers and learners, most Jewish, some not, converged on the campus of the University of California at Davis for the Sixth Annual Hazon Food Conference  read more »

When Laurie Brown’s mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2000, 10 years after having breast cancer, Brown wondered if the two cancers were related.
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SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (JTA)—Although most working stiffs imagine retired life to be heaven, "A life of incessant recreation and indolence is enough to drive any business entity like you or me mad after 3.5 years. And after you go mad you get old.  read more »

“Rooootate,” yells a stern-faced drill sergeant, Chris Mikilas, wearing a camouflage shirt that reads “No excuses,” running shorts and a matching buzz cut. About 30 boot campers, mostly women dripping with sweat run in a loop around an indoor gym,  read more »

While the old adage about Jewish mothers wanting their sons to grow up to be doctors or lawyers may well be true, many Jewish women say they themselves pursue health care careers to fulfill their sense of Jewish values.  read more »

While a Portland native’s new book on surrogacy focuses on a study in Israel, the country with the world’s first and most extensive surrogacy regulations  read more »