Rotary Rig for June 4th, 2018 (Jun 04, 2018)

Rotary Club of Casper WY

Meeting Summary

05/21/2018

President Richard Schwahn called the meeting to order promptly at 12:24, with the ring of the bell and welcomed everyone to today’s meeting. He also announced that we were going to change things up and have the program earlier in the meeting.

Inspiration, Pledge, 4-Way Test:

Charles Schoenwolf

Greeters:

Vickery Fales-Hall and Peaches Lynch were our greeters today and Vickery introduced the members who brought guests:

President Richard Schwahn introduced his wife Michelle and his daughter Madeline;
Cori Burton introduced Alissa Thyfault (Mercer Family Resource Senter;
Kimberly Mazza introduced Sabrina Hamner (WY Oil & Gas Conservation);
Jim Beck introduced Liz Roth (KCWY);
Bill Thompson introduced Lacy Meade (Jonah Bank);
Bill Devore introduced his youngest daughter Olivia;
Casey Allison introduced Jesse Glasgow (Summit Electric);
Maribeth Plocek introduced Andre Acosta (WY ANG);
Frida our exchange student was here as well;
Frida introduced her friends from NCHS and KWHS who are exchange students as well, Melanie (Buenos Aires Argentina), Julia Witt (Velbert Germany), Camila Cunha (Ouro Preto Brasil), Cecilia Carugo (Milan Italy)

Program (WMC Stroke):

President Elect Dick Jay introduced our speaker, Dr. David Wheeler from Wyoming Medical Center. Dr. Wheler spoke to us about recognizing strokes and how WMC has developed a wonderful program to improve the rate of survival from strokes. He introduced his stroke coordinator from WMC Melanie Bower, and he thanked her for her great work. A Stroke is caused by the interruption of blood flow to the brain like a blood clot which causes ischemic strokes which account for 80-90% of all strokes. The other type of stroke is a hemorrhagic stroke where a blood vessel ruptures and bleeding happens in and or around the brain. Today he is focused on the ischemic strokes. A stroke happens in the U.S. about every 40 seconds so every year over 800,000 people have a stroke. Strokes are the 5^th leading cause of death in the U.S. and about 10 years ago it was the third leading cause so this shows that they are getting better at treating them. Strokes still however remain the leading cause of long term disability. A stroke is preventable by eating properly getting exercise and not over consuming too many fats and proteins. If you are a smoker, that is the number one cause of strokes and if you quit smoking you improve your chances of not having a stroke by tenfold. Stroke is treatable, if the patient arrives early in the stroke they can give blood thinners which will break up the clot and allow it to pass through, if they are later on then they can go in with a stent and hook and remove the clot. The sooner you get to treatment the better off you will be, every minute your brain loses brain cells and fiber so the faster it is resolved the better. He suggests that everyone should know the warning signs: weakness or numbness on one side of the body, confusion or difficulty speaking or understanding speech, difficulty seeing with one or both eyes, dizziness or loss of balance, trouble walking or stumbling, and a severe headache with no known cause. At the onset of any of these symptoms it is good to call 911 and then there is a test that you can do called the FAST test. FAST stands for Face, Arms, Speech, Time, ask then to smile and if their face is crooked that is one point, if you ask them to hold their arms up in the air and one of them droops down or they can’t lift one then that is 2 points. You ask them to repeat a simple phrase and they have slurred speech or can’t answer a question or repeat the phrase that’s another point. One point means very good likelihood they are having a stroke so call 911, time is essential. It is very important to call 911 rather than drive them to the hospital because that triggers the wheels that will save their life. The EMS immediately calls the Doctor and if it is a stroke then they activate code stroke which gets everyone involved ready to move quickly. They do a CAT Scan as soon as they arrive in the hospital to determine the type of stroke and decide the treatment needed. They can use clot busters within the first 4.5 hours and it may break down the stroke. Any longer than that then they need to go to the blood clot removal with a catheter that goes in and grabs the clot with a cage and they apply suction and pull the clot out which restores the blood flow. Most people up to 6 hours after symptom onset can have this treatment and now they have discovered that they can do this treatment up to 24 hours after for some patients which will save many more lives. He told us of a patient that had a stroke and had a great outcome. Her scan showed how clogged up the vessels were before the treatment and he showed us the scan after the treatment which was amazing. The program at WMC is evolving rapidly and is saving many lives. There does however need to be more awareness so that more people get to the hospital for treatment sooner so they can have a good outcome. They have received many awards for the stroke program at WMC and they are determined to make it even better. He also has been working on trying to share this program with other hospitals around the State to improve care for all people in WY.

Special Presentation:

Frida, our awesome exchange student, gave us a presentation on her year in Casper. She showed us a great slide show with her friends and she passed around a book for everyone to sign. She then turned the mic over to Olivia Devore who was her host sister for December through March. Olivia gave a great tribute to Frida and told us about how close they have become as sisters. Olivia told us how great an experience they had during the three months Frida was with them.

Frida then showed us some more of her time in Casper through a slide show presentation. Frida told us that she was scared to come and had to leave her comfort zone but she is very glad she did because it has meant a lot to her and she has many wonderful memories. She thanked all of her host families for all they have done. She said she will miss everything about being here.

President Schwahn presented a Paul Harris Fellow plus four to Rick Reimann, congratulations and thank you!

Announcements:

President Schwahn announced that the highway cleanup will be this Thursday May 24 from 5:30-7:30 and afterwards there will be a gathering at Racca’s Restaurant. He also announced that there was a good turnout at the Platte River Trail cleanup.
Bill Schilling told us that the past two weekends they had an Eagle Scout project and got the tables installed along with other work and he thanked all of those involved. He also told us that there is more work coming up to put in some post and rail fencing Saturday June 16^th at 8:00 am and Jim Anderson will be heading up that project and all red badgers were voluntold to participate.
President Schwahn announced that we will be getting another exchange student, a young man from Argentina. We will need to have host families chosen ASAP so that he can be accepted at school here in Casper.

Family of Rotary:

Deb Theriault announced that they just returned from a trip to Spain and France where they met up with two of our previous exchange students who are both doing well and fondly remember the club and their time here in Casper.
Darren Divine said that Tony Valdez’ Granddaughter won the State conference golf tournament.
Mike McIntosh announced that his son Mikhail graduated with his MFA from the School of The Art Institute of Chicago last Monday.
John Starnes announced that his wife, who is from Canada, has been in the States for the past 23 years and just last week became a U.S. Citizen and Judge Skavdahl officiated.
Mike Ward announced that Dale Bohren’s daughter Anna graduated from St Louis University in Madrid Spain and also she got engaged recently and will be married in Morocco in August.
Jim Porter announced that Hal Hutchinson’s son graduated from Penn State with his Doctorate.

Rotarians of the Week:

Mike Ward nominated Brad Diller for being in Jackson supporting the boys’ and girls’ soccer teams.
Lisa Scroggins nominated John Jorgensen for another amazing Wyoming Reads, she also nominated all of the Rotarians who were guest readers.
Cori Costner-Burton also nominated John Jorgensen for his award of excellence from the Casper College Board. She also nominated John and Lauren Griffith for posing for the picture for the upcoming Dancing with the Stars of Casper.
Eric Easton nominated Bert Toews for helping with the bike race this past weekend.
Steven Schnell nominated Brian Deurloo and John Griffith for the gutter bin installation downtown.
Bill Devore then got up and spoke about how great it is to have an exchange student and how attached they became. He also told everyone that they need to take the time to host an exchange student. He and his wife talked about it for 25 years and finally decided it was time and now they wish they had done it sooner. He said do not delay, volunteer now. They had a great time having Frida with them and he also encouraged us all to invite the students to dinner or any activity, share your time with them.

Song:

Gary Pehrson had us all stand and sing “Cowboy Joe”

President Richard Schwahn concluded the meeting at 1:26 letting us know that next week we do not have a meeting as it is Memorial Day. The following week we will be back at the Ramkota.