The COVID-19 pandemic and its evolving aftermath are reshaping the world around us, and myriad Long Island forces – large and small, corporate and nonprofit, industrial and academic – have risen to the challenge. Innovate Long Island presents Innovation in the Age of Coronavirus as a real-time journal of this region’s resourceful response to the greatest global challenge since World War II. Stay healthy, dear readers. ‘Like waiting in line at the DMV’…
By GREGORY ZELLER // Long Island hearts are in very good hands – literally, when necessary. Two of the region’s busiest healthcare systems, operating some of Long Island’s most active hospitals, have earned high praise for their cardiac operations, ranging from emergency surgeries to postoperative discharge protocols. First up are a pair of Northwell Health facilities – Manhasset’s Sandra Atlas Bass Heart Hospital and Bay Shore’s Southside Hospital – commended in a fresh New York State…
By GREGORY ZELLER // Do you believe in miracles? Tito Velasquez just might. At a minimum, you can bet the Valley Stream resident believes in Northwell Health, where Velasquez earned the mantle of “miracle patient” but entire teams of providers did the heavy lifting, repeatedly pulling the COVID-19 victim back from death’s door during an incredible four-month odyssey. Velasquez, 36, went home to a grateful family Monday, but you might not have taken that bet…
By TERRY LYNAM // Even as the world focuses attention and resources on COVID-19, it is also crucial to take heed of other illnesses and injuries that may require medical attention. As we all work toward a new normal during these unprecedented times, the healthcare professionals at Northwell Health are doing everything possible to keep our communities and our colleagues safe. “We would never want to make patients feel as if they’re abandoned just because…
Rock on: It’s another work-from-home Wednesday, dear readers, as we muscle through a tough workweek marked by bitter national divisions, phased re-openings and no real endgame (yet) for the great 2020 pandemic. The good news is, a mile-wide planet-killer asteroid zooming through the Solar System at a breezy 19,000 miles per hour will narrowly miss Earth today. So, no worries there. Wish list: On that cheery note, welcome to April 29 – World Wish…
By GREGORY ZELLER // For those who suffer cardiac arrest outside of a hospital setting, the odds are not good – less than 8 percent survive, according to the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research. To improve their odds once they reach the hospital, researchers at Manhasset’s North Shore University Hospital and the Feinstein Institutes have taken a decidedly backwards step – if not in terms of medical science, certainly in terms of video technology. With…
By GREGORY ZELLER // Just when you thought it was safe to check in for joint-replacement surgeries – actually, it’s a lot safer now, with these Makos swimming around. Innovation dives deeper at four Northwell Health Long Island hospitals, where the Mako device, a robotic assistant for total joint-replacement procedures, has surfaced. Manufactured by Michigan-based medical-device multinational Stryker, the interactive robotic arm gives human specialists new levels of surgical precision, helping to reduce recovery times…
By GREGORY ZELLER // From the Two Birds One Stone File comes Northwell Health, which is helping out its employees – and bolstering its own future – with a new scholarship program. The New Hyde Park-based health system has awarded the first educational stipends through its STEM Scholarships program, designed to assist college-bound dependents of Northwell Health employees – primarily, future collegians pursuing degrees in science, technology, engineering and math disciplines. The $7,500 individual scholarships…
Half full: Welcome to Wednesday, dear readers, and the midpoint of this latest summery week of socioeconomic progress. Hard to believe, but tomorrow is already Aug. 1 – making today July 31, a busy one for the sweet-toothed (National Raspberry Cake Day, National Cotton Candy Day and National Jump For Jelly Beans Day) and puppy-lovers (National Mutt Day, an annual mixed-breed mixer). Aloha: To our readers in the great State of Hawaii, a happy…
By GREGORY ZELLER // Remote, around-the-clock consultations for mental-health patients in crisis are now beaming around Greater New York, thanks to Northwell Health. Trumpeting an “innovative, secure online videoconferencing platform” built to connect psychiatrists to patients “when they need them most,” the health system this week debuted its new Emergency Telepsychiatry Hub inside its Lenox Health Greenwich Village facility. From that Manhattan location, the 770-square-foot center – featuring nine video workstations and a staff that…
By GREGORY ZELLER // A New York City startup backed by Northwell Health’s new business-development division may be on the verge of eliminating infectious pathogens from hospitals. An ultraviolet disinfection technology deployed by biotech startup PurpleSun – officially, the “focused multivactor ultraviolet device” – dramatically lowers the risk of hospital-acquired infections by eliminating 97.7 percent of pathogens in operating rooms, according to a new study published in the American Journal of Infection Control. The study…
By GREGORY ZELLER // With new treatments for obesity, heart failure and a host of other conditions in sight, a Feinstein Institute researcher will zero in on specific abdominal targets in a new “precision bioelectronic medicine” study. North Shore University Hospital and Long Island Jewish Medical Center Chief of Gastroenterology Larry Miller, who also directs the Gastroenterology Laboratory at the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, has received a $1.4 million National Institutes of Health grant…
By GREGORY ZELLER // A gathering of top Long Island oncologists and other expert physicians will discuss the latest advances in the war against breast cancer this week at the Zucker School of Medicine. Northwell Health and the Susan G. Komen Greater New York City organization are joining with the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell to present the inaugural Long Island Metastatic Breast Cancer Conference, a daylong symposium slated for Saturday…
By GREGORY ZELLER // Northwell Health may be laser-focused on providing top healthcare services, but as one of New York State’s largest commercial enterprises, it also needs to take care of business. To that end, the New Hyde Park-based company – New York’s largest health system (by number of providers and number of patients) and largest private employer (with 66,000-plus workers, and counting) – has named a new chief revenue officer: Gerard Brogan Jr., a…
By GREGORY ZELLER // From the You Are What You Eat file comes a New York State first: a hospital-based initiative designed to comprehensively address hunger-related issues. The New Hyde Park-based Northwell Health system and Bethpage-based Island Harvest Food Bank have announced the launch of Food as Health, a unique effort to address “the full range of factors that can lead to food insecurity,” according to Northwell Health, including poverty, lack of nutritional awareness, difficulty…