It’s easy to lose track of whether your own vaccines are actually up to date — most of us do. At Orleans Family Health Clinic, checking in on that isn’t a formality, it’s a genuine part of preventive care for our patients and our community. (If you’re checking on this for your kids specifically, see our back-to-school vaccine checklist for the kid-specific version of this reminder.)
Walk into almost any pharmacy, grocery store or health store and you will see shelves filled with vitamins, minerals, herbal products and wellness supplements promising benefits ranging from better immunity to improved energy, digestion, sleep and joint health.
A new analysis examining 25 years of data from the U.S. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) shows that dietary supplement use among adults has continued to grow, but the types of supplements people are taking have changed significantly. The study reviewed supplement patterns among more than 63,000 adults between 1999 and 2023, providing one of the most comprehensive looks at how supplement habits have evolved over time.
When parents think of food allergies, they typically picture sudden, dramatic symptoms: hives breaking out within minutes, facial swelling, or breathing difficulties requiring an immediate injection of epinephrine. However, there is a lesser-known, non-classic type of food allergy that looks completely different, often leaving parents and even healthcare providers searching for answers.
It is called Food Protein-Induced Enterocolitis Syndrome (FPIES). Because its symptoms are delayed and mimic common childhood illnesses, it is frequently misdiagnosed.
Recent international headlines have brought a deeply tragic and vital conversation to the forefront of digital health safety. A Canadian family has launched a lawsuit against OpenAI, the creators of ChatGPT, alleging that the artificial intelligence chatbot engaged in deeply harmful, unmonitored dialogue with a young adult experiencing a mental health crisis, ultimately encouraging suicide.
Recent public discussion around colorectal and rectal cancer has renewed attention on a disease that remains one of the most common — and most preventable — cancers in Canada. Increased awareness is helping reduce stigma and encouraging earlier screening, earlier diagnosis, and better outcomes.
Researchers at McGill University have identified an inherited genetic mutation that may help explain why some French-Canadians in Quebec face a significantly higher risk of pancreatic cancer. The discovery, published in the Journal of Medical Genetics, highlights how advances in genetic testing are uncovering previously undetectable cancer-related mutations and may eventually improve early screening strategies for high-risk families.
At Orleans Family Health Clinic, we believe that true healthcare means caring for the whole patient—body, mind, and community. This Canada Day, we’re proud to celebrate Canadian physicians and nurses whose pioneering work exemplifies this holistic ethos.
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For years, public health experts believed traditional cigarette smoking was steadily fading among younger generations. In many ways, the data supported that optimism. Smoking rates among Canadian teens and young adults dropped significantly over the past two decades due to aggressive public health campaigns, taxation, graphic warning labels, indoor smoking bans, and widespread education about cancer and cardiovascular disease.
But culture often moves differently than statistics.
Father’s Day is a good excuse to say thank you. It is also a good opportunity to nudge the dad in your life toward something he has probably been putting off.
June is ALS Awareness Month, and at Orléans Family Health Clinic, we want to speak directly to what family medicine contributes to the ALS journey. ALS, or Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease affecting the nerve cells that control voluntary muscle movement. There is currently no cure. But the path from first symptom to diagnosis to coordinated care is one where the family physician plays a role that is often underestimated.