SageHealth Network Executive Director, Michele Cauch, will be appearing at several conferences this month presenting on topics covering senior speed dating and senior sexuality. See calendar below:
Monday, October 19, 2009: OACAO Conference(Older Adult Centres' Association)
Doubletree Hotel Airport, Toronto ON
Tuesday, October 20, 2009: Keep on Rockin' Sexuality and Aging Symposium (Canadian Research Network for Care in the Community)
Sheraton Parkway North, Richmond Hill ON
Thursday, October 22, 2009: OCSA Great Ideas Conference (Ontario Community Support Association).
Sheraton Parkway North, Richmond Hill ON
Thursday, October 29, 2009: Risky Business- 35th Annual Fall Aging Conference, Minneapolis Area Senior Workers' Association & St. Paul Senior Workers' Association
Earl Brown Heritage Center, Brooklyn Center MN
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
The CFLE's Bringing Laughs to Sex Ed
By Joy O'Donnell, NSRC director of outreach
Created 10/07/2009 - 14:03
Let's face it: Old school sex ed, which focused on scare tactics and tales of “disease, disaster, and dysfunction” within a clinical presentation format, is so over.
The NSRC and many of our allies—including Planned Parenthood of Greater Northern New Jersey's Center for Family Life Education [1](CFLE)—are increasingly promoting fresh ways to teach people about sexuality throughout the lifespan. At NSRC we have incorporated film, spoken word, Internet resources, comic books, and board games into sex education in order to engage people of all ages and ensure that the lessons learned actually stick.
But really until now, despite these and other new creative approaches, using humor as a tactic in and of itself hadn’t been explored. That's why I was completely thrilled when I learned of CFLE's 2009 annual conference theme “Using Humor to Teach Sex Ed [2].” I just had to take a few minutes and ask CFLE Director Bill Taverner, What's so funny?
Clearly, as Bill describes below, humor is one more powerful tool in our quest to give nationwide, lifelong sexuality education an A+. Hopefully, this will spark some ideas for your own work, and Bill’s words will inspire you to attend the conference on October 29 [2]!
NSRC: Why did the CFLE Annual Conference choose this year to focus on humor as a strategic approach to sex ed?
Bill Taverner: I think humor is a valuable resource for sexuality educators in any year. Sex ed is often presented in somber terms, whether it’s abstinence-only speakers using scare tactics or other teachers droning on with lectures about various aspects of sexuality. Even some teachers who present sex ed in a positive, comprehensive way would benefit by taking a step back and recognizing that while there is a serious side to sex, there is also a lot about it that is funny.
NSRC: What are some of the challenges and opportunities of using humor in a sex ed classroom? What about using it to teach adults and older adults?
Bill Taverner: While my copresenters, Allyson Sandak and Ashley Generallo, and I were preparing for our plenary session, we were very fortunate to come across someone who had done her dissertation on humor and sex ed. The research of Marcy Vogel greatly informed our presentation. The first thing we learned was actually kind of funny: That conferences on humor are some of the most boring conferences around. Of course we were determined not to have a boring presentation!
Dr. Vogel researched the use of humor in sex ed with sixth graders. One of her most significant findings was that the use of humor increased student comfort with the subject as the sex ed classes progressed. Dr. Vogel also explored the use of “tendentious” (disparaging, put-down) humor and “nontendentious” humor. She found that the use of nontendentious humor facilitated learning to the greatest extent. In short, when teachers used humor in their classes, students learned more than when their teachers taught the subject matter without humor.
Some teachers might avoid using humor because they don’t consider themselves funny. But teachers don’t have to worry about being standup comics! One example of humor that helps students retain information is the use of “comic action”. A teacher might employ this technique by making an exaggerated swimming motion to show how and where sperm travel. Students remember such information because the delivery is out of the ordinary. It catches them off guard and facilitates attentiveness as they await the next such moment.
As for using humor with older adults, my coauthors—Peggy Brick, Jan Lunquist, and Allyson Sandak—and I devoted an entire lesson plan to humor in our book Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter. In that lesson participants listen to examples of jokes about sex and senior citizens. Here’s a sample:
An eighty-five-year-old man tells his doctor that he plans to marry a twenty-five-year-old. The doctor warns him that too much sex could be fatal. The old man replies, “If she dies, she dies!”
After most people laugh we ask participants to examine the joke a little more carefully. Why is it funny? In this process we can explore stereotypes rooted in sex, gender, and aging.
NSRC: Could you share a couple of other examples of how you have used humor to teach sex ed? What were the results?
Bill Taverner: My colleagues at Answer developed an animated interactive learning program with Elizabeth Schroeder doing the voiceover in a funny German accent. (This is another example of comic action.) I am sure that the learning is enhanced because the students will want to continue the activity to see what Elizabeth says next!
Parody and satire provides great opportunities for introducing or exploring different sexual topics. Voluminous examples can be found on television, such as The Colbert Report [3], The Simpsons [4], Saturday Night Live [5], and whatever other comedy shows your audience might be watching. There are plenty of movies, too, such as a number of great scenes in The 40-Year-Old Virgin [6]. The Onion [7] news repeatedly tackles sexual topics, too.
One of my favorite ways to introduce the topic of menstruation is with a funny, ninety second video on YouTube [8] that features singing droplets of blood. Such a video relaxes the class, makes them laugh, before proceeding into a discussion about the mechanics of ovulation and menstruation. For that matter a careful examination of YouTube for sexual topics is a terrific idea for teachers because this is what young people are really watching.
Sometimes humor is intentional and strategic and sometimes it’s accidental. Peggy Brick was once asked what might make a condom fail. She replied, “Well, I suppose if there’s a little prick in it . . .” She was referring, of course, to a puncture, but the students took it the other way and had a good laugh!
NSRC: Are there any existing humor related resources out there for sexuality educators?
Bill Taverner: Humor resources are all at our fingertips: the email jokes we receive (often about sex), comics that can be accessed quickly using “Google Images”, videos on YouTube [9] and Hulu [10].
We also need to recognize students as important allies in using humor in sex ed. Let them laugh, let them be funny! We can explore the subject of sexuality seriously while maintaining a balance between somber and giddy.
We also have the stories we can tell. Elizabeth Schroeder told me once she was buying a series of seemingly unrelated items at Wal-Mart— markers, greeting cards, a bag of chocolates, Play-Doh, and . . . four boxes of condoms. When the checkout person continued to scan the items nonchalantly, Elizabeth stopped her and asked, "Ok, seriously? Aren't you dying to know what I do for a living?" Telling such a story lightens the mood and reminds participants that the presenter recognizes the innate humor in the subject.
Bill Taverner, M.A., is the director of The Center for Family Life Education at Planned Parenthood of Greater Northern New Jersey, editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Sexuality Education [11], and special projects consultant for the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality [12]. He has coauthored many sex ed teaching resources, including Making Sense of Abstinence [13]; Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter; and Sex Ed 101. He has received national awards recognizing his leadership in sexuality education, including AASECT’s first “Schiller Prize” for best workshop using interactive strategies and the “Golden Apple Award,” given by the Association for Planned Parenthood Leaders in Education.
Source: http://nsrc.sfsu.edu/article/bill_taverner_bringing_laughs_sex_ed_2
Created 10/07/2009 - 14:03
Let's face it: Old school sex ed, which focused on scare tactics and tales of “disease, disaster, and dysfunction” within a clinical presentation format, is so over.
The NSRC and many of our allies—including Planned Parenthood of Greater Northern New Jersey's Center for Family Life Education [1](CFLE)—are increasingly promoting fresh ways to teach people about sexuality throughout the lifespan. At NSRC we have incorporated film, spoken word, Internet resources, comic books, and board games into sex education in order to engage people of all ages and ensure that the lessons learned actually stick.
But really until now, despite these and other new creative approaches, using humor as a tactic in and of itself hadn’t been explored. That's why I was completely thrilled when I learned of CFLE's 2009 annual conference theme “Using Humor to Teach Sex Ed [2].” I just had to take a few minutes and ask CFLE Director Bill Taverner, What's so funny?
Clearly, as Bill describes below, humor is one more powerful tool in our quest to give nationwide, lifelong sexuality education an A+. Hopefully, this will spark some ideas for your own work, and Bill’s words will inspire you to attend the conference on October 29 [2]!
NSRC: Why did the CFLE Annual Conference choose this year to focus on humor as a strategic approach to sex ed?
Bill Taverner: I think humor is a valuable resource for sexuality educators in any year. Sex ed is often presented in somber terms, whether it’s abstinence-only speakers using scare tactics or other teachers droning on with lectures about various aspects of sexuality. Even some teachers who present sex ed in a positive, comprehensive way would benefit by taking a step back and recognizing that while there is a serious side to sex, there is also a lot about it that is funny.
NSRC: What are some of the challenges and opportunities of using humor in a sex ed classroom? What about using it to teach adults and older adults?
Bill Taverner: While my copresenters, Allyson Sandak and Ashley Generallo, and I were preparing for our plenary session, we were very fortunate to come across someone who had done her dissertation on humor and sex ed. The research of Marcy Vogel greatly informed our presentation. The first thing we learned was actually kind of funny: That conferences on humor are some of the most boring conferences around. Of course we were determined not to have a boring presentation!
Dr. Vogel researched the use of humor in sex ed with sixth graders. One of her most significant findings was that the use of humor increased student comfort with the subject as the sex ed classes progressed. Dr. Vogel also explored the use of “tendentious” (disparaging, put-down) humor and “nontendentious” humor. She found that the use of nontendentious humor facilitated learning to the greatest extent. In short, when teachers used humor in their classes, students learned more than when their teachers taught the subject matter without humor.
Some teachers might avoid using humor because they don’t consider themselves funny. But teachers don’t have to worry about being standup comics! One example of humor that helps students retain information is the use of “comic action”. A teacher might employ this technique by making an exaggerated swimming motion to show how and where sperm travel. Students remember such information because the delivery is out of the ordinary. It catches them off guard and facilitates attentiveness as they await the next such moment.
As for using humor with older adults, my coauthors—Peggy Brick, Jan Lunquist, and Allyson Sandak—and I devoted an entire lesson plan to humor in our book Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter. In that lesson participants listen to examples of jokes about sex and senior citizens. Here’s a sample:
An eighty-five-year-old man tells his doctor that he plans to marry a twenty-five-year-old. The doctor warns him that too much sex could be fatal. The old man replies, “If she dies, she dies!”
After most people laugh we ask participants to examine the joke a little more carefully. Why is it funny? In this process we can explore stereotypes rooted in sex, gender, and aging.
NSRC: Could you share a couple of other examples of how you have used humor to teach sex ed? What were the results?
Bill Taverner: My colleagues at Answer developed an animated interactive learning program with Elizabeth Schroeder doing the voiceover in a funny German accent. (This is another example of comic action.) I am sure that the learning is enhanced because the students will want to continue the activity to see what Elizabeth says next!
Parody and satire provides great opportunities for introducing or exploring different sexual topics. Voluminous examples can be found on television, such as The Colbert Report [3], The Simpsons [4], Saturday Night Live [5], and whatever other comedy shows your audience might be watching. There are plenty of movies, too, such as a number of great scenes in The 40-Year-Old Virgin [6]. The Onion [7] news repeatedly tackles sexual topics, too.
One of my favorite ways to introduce the topic of menstruation is with a funny, ninety second video on YouTube [8] that features singing droplets of blood. Such a video relaxes the class, makes them laugh, before proceeding into a discussion about the mechanics of ovulation and menstruation. For that matter a careful examination of YouTube for sexual topics is a terrific idea for teachers because this is what young people are really watching.
Sometimes humor is intentional and strategic and sometimes it’s accidental. Peggy Brick was once asked what might make a condom fail. She replied, “Well, I suppose if there’s a little prick in it . . .” She was referring, of course, to a puncture, but the students took it the other way and had a good laugh!
NSRC: Are there any existing humor related resources out there for sexuality educators?
Bill Taverner: Humor resources are all at our fingertips: the email jokes we receive (often about sex), comics that can be accessed quickly using “Google Images”, videos on YouTube [9] and Hulu [10].
We also need to recognize students as important allies in using humor in sex ed. Let them laugh, let them be funny! We can explore the subject of sexuality seriously while maintaining a balance between somber and giddy.
We also have the stories we can tell. Elizabeth Schroeder told me once she was buying a series of seemingly unrelated items at Wal-Mart— markers, greeting cards, a bag of chocolates, Play-Doh, and . . . four boxes of condoms. When the checkout person continued to scan the items nonchalantly, Elizabeth stopped her and asked, "Ok, seriously? Aren't you dying to know what I do for a living?" Telling such a story lightens the mood and reminds participants that the presenter recognizes the innate humor in the subject.
Bill Taverner, M.A., is the director of The Center for Family Life Education at Planned Parenthood of Greater Northern New Jersey, editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Sexuality Education [11], and special projects consultant for the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality [12]. He has coauthored many sex ed teaching resources, including Making Sense of Abstinence [13]; Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter; and Sex Ed 101. He has received national awards recognizing his leadership in sexuality education, including AASECT’s first “Schiller Prize” for best workshop using interactive strategies and the “Golden Apple Award,” given by the Association for Planned Parenthood Leaders in Education.
Source: http://nsrc.sfsu.edu/article/bill_taverner_bringing_laughs_sex_ed_2
Adventures in Adult Sex Education
By Amanda Robb from O, The Oprah Magazine, July 2009
With memories of mortifying class discussions led by the gym teacher, what grown-up in her right mind would sign up for another round of sex ed? Turns out, lots of them. Only this time, the lessons are intimate, the questions are provocative, and the homework is electrifying.
Nine middle-aged men and women are sitting in a circle in a cluttered, colorful classroom in a church annex in Austin. Judith, the oldest, is an artist, and her long, curly gray hair is piled into a messy halo atop her head. Larry is a gregarious man who works for the U.S. government. Elizabeth, an information technology manager at a local government agency, is an athletic woman, efficient in her movements. Her husband, Eugene, sitting nearby, was raised in Spain and has handsome features and courtly manners.
The teacher, Barbara Tuttle, begins class. "Touch one of your hands with the other," she says. "Feel the smoothness and roughness of all the various parts, the places where it's dry or moist." Some of the students close their eyes as they follow her instructions. Small smiles play on their lips. Tuttle's birdlike mouth breaks into a huge grin. "Congratulations," she says. "You all just masturbated. And in public!"
Next Tuttle, a retired sex therapist, asks the students about the experience of mindfully touching themselves: "How did it feel? Was that pleasant?"
"It made me wish someone else were touching me," Elizabeth says.
"It was just nice to be touched at all," says Judith.
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So begins the fifth session of Our Whole Lives (OWL): Sexuality Education for Adults, at the First Unitarian Church of Austin. Tonight's class is one of 14 in the seven-month course, which is the result of an initiative of the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) and the United Church of Christ (UCC). Since 1998 the institutions have coproduced sex education materials for children ages 5 to 18; as church leadership reexamined the curricula, they noticed a need for age-appropriate material for grown-ups.
"We see sexuality as a very important part of the human experience that is lifelong," says Janet Hayes, public relations director for the UUA. "That's why we named our program Our Whole Lives. Your sexuality doesn't end after you stop having babies or get divorced or after you turn 60. It is who we are in our core. We feel it has to be integrated into our spirituality because, for us, spirituality is about wholeness." So in 2008, the churches -- which together have about 6,600 U.S. congregations and 1.4 million members -- introduced classes for adults 18 to 35. (In the past ten years, it's estimated, more than 40,000 children, young adults, and adults have taken at least one OWL class.)
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Michael Tino, a Unitarian Universalist minister with a PhD in cell biology, cowrote the young adult OWL curriculum and understands why the adult classes have proved popular. "You can have the best high school sexuality curriculum in the world," he says, "but a lot of critical issues are not going to be addressed in those classes: How do I enjoy my sexuality if I've lost a breast to cancer? How do I manage being a parent and a sexual person? Can I feel sexually satisfied if I don't have a life partner?"
There's one simple reason those questions aren't tackled, Tino says. "Teenagers don't have them yet. Most of what affects our sexuality happens in adulthood -- long-term relationships, breakups, parenthood, illness, sheer exhaustion from managing life."
Although the courses the churches prepared were aimed at adults in their 20s to early 30s, to the organizers' surprise, middle-aged parishioners have stampeded the discussion-based program. Students in tonight's class, for instance, are in their late 40s to mid-60s.
After wrapping up the discussion about self-touch, during which Tuttle encourages students to "think about sensuality broadly and not shut off the pleasure of getting to know the whole body," she and her coteacher, Michael West, an economic development project manager in the Texas A&M University system, explain the next exercise: a sexuality timeline. (OWL facilitators are trained over three days, and the program is typically team taught, usually by a woman and a man.)
Thirty feet of newsprint is rolled out across two long tables. Red and black pens are placed on each table. The men are assigned one sheet; the women, the other. The students are asked to write down sexual experiences in chronological order, using the black pen for those that were in their control (such as a first kiss) and the red pen for those that were not (such as getting their first period).
The women are a flurry of activity, practically tripping over each other to scribble -- "played doctor," "found a pubic hair," "menstruation," "kissed a boy," "kissed a girl," "touched by a cousin," "fell in love," "lost my virginity," "had an abortion," "had a baby," "breasts sagging," "menopause," "discovered sex without love." The men look on and appear intimidated. Finally, Eugene picks up a pen and writes down "first time had sex." The other men slowly begin to join in. Together they manage to write: "accidentally masturbated," "masturbated," "first time had sex," "prostate," and "Viagra."
Tuttle calls time and invites the students to look at the timelines. "What comes up?" she asks.
Judith says the exercise made her realize that one huge thing she can't control about her sexuality is her fading looks. "Like, I'm still looking at 40-year-old men," Judith says, "but they're not looking back." A few of the other women agree.
Elizabeth stares at them as if they're insane. "I love being middle-aged," she says.
The women return her you're-out-of-your-mind look, so she explains: "When I was young, I'd see these older women and they just seemed as if they had confidence and were wise -- and more comfortable in their skin. I'm much more comfortable in my skin today than I was at 30, 25, 20, and definitely 15."
"How?" asks Judith.
Elizabeth thinks for a minute. "I didn't get any mileage out of being cute when I was young. Maybe that's the positive side of not being cute or flirty at 20 -- when you don't get that attention at 45, you haven't lost anything."
A little later, Judith admits that she can think of a few good things that result from getting older. "My husband of 13 years always accused me of being frigid because I never had an orgasm with him," she says. "After we split up, I definitely learned I wasn't frigid. Which was a relief. Which was fun."
The women marvel that virtually all of them have had distressful sexual experiences. One says her sex life was "messy," explaining that she means nonlinear. "I was always a little ashamed because I didn't do the perfect progression of first kiss, go steady, first love, first sex," she says. "It's nice to see that all the women were a littleout of order."
She turns to the men and asks if they ever felt that way. One says men don't think about sex in those terms. "Especially for young men, sex is very goal oriented," he says. "Get a kiss, get a girlfriend, get laid."
Larry agrees. In fact, he later explains, that's why he signed up for the course with his wife of 15 years. "We're past the Kama Sutra part of life," Larry says. "You want to—you need to—broaden the definition of sex. Like the other night, my wife was singing to me, and I said, 'Oh, you're making love to me.'"
One of the first pilot classes for the OWL program took place in Boston three years ago. Several of the participants say that the course lessons were not only useful but surprising. Sylvie*, a 35-year-old medical counselor, signed up for the class after seeing it advertised in the church bulletin. Speaking from her home near Boston, she explains that she'd always felt fortunate to have what she considered healthy feelings about her sexuality.
"My dad was a general practitioner and my mom was a counselor, and they were very open with my brother and me growing up," she says. Her parents didn't shy away from explaining things, and kept books like Our Bodies, Ourselves and The Joy of Sex in the house.
But in 2005, Sylvie and her husband began struggling with infertility. "It took all the joy out of sex," Sylvie says now. "We were always trying to get pregnant." So she signed up, with the hope of refiling sex under "pleasure" instead of "work" in her brain.
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The first few workshops turned out to be exactly what Sylvie was looking for. Jane Detwiler, a certified sexuality educator, and her cofacilitator led the group through "anatomy of pleasure" and "understanding sexual response" exercises. Contacted recently at her office, Detwiler says many people learn about the reproductive capacity of sexual organs in traditional sex ed, but not the "pleasure capacity."
She says that despite the sexualization of our culture, many of her students don't know what normal genitals look like, and she has discovered that loads of women worry that theirs are abnormal or ugly. In Sylvie's class, Detwiler used diagrams and photographs to explain that the truth is, of course, that there's a variety of "normal," as wide ranging as human faces.
Her students also discussed the parts of the body besides the genitals that are wired for sexual response—skin, lips, breasts, nipples, tongue, hands, brain. Then Detwiler pulled out a model of a penis and the "Wondrous Vulva Puppet." She had labels ready (clitoris, perineum, vagina, glans, PC muscle) and asked volunteers to place them correctly. As students moved through the lesson, they talked about how the different parts contribute to pleasure.
Next, the instructors asked the students to compare the Masters and Johnson linear model of sexual response—excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution—to a circular model of mutual pleasure. To explain the idea, Detwiler drew a large circle on newsprint and asked students to think of all sorts of sexy, fun activities and list them around the circle.
The students came up with "caress, oral sex, kiss, massage, lubrication, talking, fondling, phone sex, kiss again, snuggle." In a circular model, Detwiler pointed out, partners can start or stop sensual activity anytime they want, and the activities don't necessarily lead to orgasm.
Sylvie says that some students thought that type of sex would be an exercise in frustration, but others said they could imagine times in their lives when those options would work—when they were not ready to have sex with a new partner, when they were too tired to have intercourse with their current partner, when they were trying to liven things up with a longtime lover.
After most classes, Sylvie came home and described what she had learned to her husband (who did not attend, because the course was something she wanted to do on her own). "Oh, you know," she'd say at the end of each night's summary, "that reminds me. Let's have sex just for fun."
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Then a few sessions later came the "values voting" game.
During this exercise, the instructors asked the class to envision a line on the floor, with one end representing "I strongly agree" and the opposite end signaling "I strongly disagree." Then Detwiler read statements, directing students to stand on the line in a position that represented their values.
Detwiler called out things like "It is more fulfilling to be free of commitment than committed" and "If I made vows to my partner during a marriage or commitment ceremony, I would stick to them no matter what." Each person explained why they stood where they did and moved if someone said something to change their mind. About midway through the game, Detwiler said: "Viewing pornography is not healthy."
Sylvie stepped to a place she considered completely noncontroversial. The "sort of agree" spot on the line. "I'd gone to very progressive summer camps when I was a teenager, and a lot of my counselors were strong feminists," she says. "I guess I'd just gotten the message that pornography was exploitative of women." Sylvie did not boycott newsstands that carried Playboy or refuse to stay in hotels that offer adult pay-per-view. She didn't consider herself an extremist, so she figured she'd have plenty of company at her spot.
She was amazed to see that most of her classmates—each a very likable, not-perverse-seeming person, in Sylvie's opinion—were in the "sort of disagree" to "strongly disagree" part of the line. They explained that yes, pornography could be exploitative, but it could also be a safe form of fantasy.
Sylvie went home and told her husband the news.
"The porn I have is on my computer," he said. For the second time that evening, Sylvie says, she was shocked. Her husband said that he looked at it every few weeks; she asked if he could show it to her. He did. Sylvie was surprised to find some of it turned her on.
"I thought married men who look at pornography must be unhappy with their spouses," Sylvie says. "But my husband said, 'No, sometimes when I feel like being sexual I just feel like being alone.' And I thought about that. And I thought, 'Well, sometimes when I want to be sexual I want to be alone, too. For me, that doesn't involve porn, but if it does for him, so be it.'"
Over the next few weeks, as she discussed the subject more with her husband and her classmates, her opinion changed. "My parents had told us that smoking was bad," she says. "So my brother came to think that people who smoked were bad. I did a similar thing with pornography. I still don't think pornography is a great thing for women, but now I don't think people who look at it necessarily want to exploit them."
Another member of this pilot class, Kim, then 35, had been happily married for more than a decade; she had even taught the OWL classes to middle school students for three years. "I was functioning well," she says, on the phone from Framingham, Massachusetts.
"But deep down, I still had some weird, mixed-up feelings about sex left over from my childhood." Her parents had divorced when she was 3. "Afterward my mother was very free with her sexuality," Kim remembers. "I would hear a lot, and the sounds scared and confused me. I'd say, 'Mom, what are you doing?' She'd say, 'Kissing.' Well, I knew that wasn't it. I signed up for the adult OWL course to keep peeling back the layers, to keep getting better, healthier, happier."
The early sessions confirmed for her that she needed to deal with free-floating shame around her sexuality. In the same workshop that featured the "anatomy of pleasure" exercise (identifying body parts), the instructors led them through the "pleasure pinwheel" game. In this lesson, students arrange themselves in two concentric circles, with each person in the inner ring facing a partner in the outer ring.
One of the instructors asks questions regarding the messages students have received about sexual pleasure from their parents, schools, peers, and lovers. The students have one minute to give their answer to the person facing them; then the outer circle shifts one place. By the end of the exercise, Kim had a better sense of the messages she'd received throughout her life—many dating to childhood—and she began to see that the ones that made her feel the worst related to her libido, which was stronger than her husband's.
"There wasn't one moment in the class when I said, 'Wow, amazing, I'm okay, and [my classmates] are okay about my wanting to have sex more often than my spouse,'" Kim says. "But gradually, over 14 sessions, talking and talking and talking about how weird and wildly varied sexuality is for people, you get to feeling more and more normal yourself."
"Often the question behind a question in sexuality education," Detwiler says, "is 'Am I normal?'"
Although the unitarian universalist and UCC churches are among the leading organizations promoting adult sex education, they aren't alone. The U.S. government is in the field, too. In 2005 Congress passed an act that provides $150 million annually for healthy marriage and responsible fatherhood initiatives.
So far the government has paid to educate more than 290,000 Americans on the how-tos of building and maintaining relationships. One popular program that receives federal funding is a course called It's All About M.E. (Marriage Education), which is given in hospitals and community centers, as well as at the army base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. The eight-hour curriculum was a product of WAIT Training, a 17-year-old Colorado-based nonprofit founded by Joneen Mackenzie, RN.
Mackenzie believes that the best and healthiest place for sex is a committed, long-term monogamous relationship, but she agrees with the UUA and UCC churches that sexuality education—especially for adults—is generally less about plumbing than about emotional issues. Because It's All About M.E. courses encourage young adults to wait until marriage to have sex, much of the training is focused on relationship skills.
For instance, participants learn the program's ten keys to successful dating (such as get a life of your own, take it slow, set clear boundaries, engage in healthy responses to conflict, and choose a partner who makes you feel affirmed, inspired, and challenged to be a better person). But they do discuss sexual relationships. It's All About M.E. instructors ask students to reflect on what has influenced their view of sexuality and then offer exercises to help the students imagine alternative ways of being intimate.
For example, in a lesson called Steps of (Physical) Intimacy, students arrange types of contact—eye-to-eye, hand-to-hand, hand-to-waist, face-to-face, French kissing, touching above the waist, etc.—from the least to the most intimate. They discuss the physical, intellectual, social, spiritual, and financial consequences of doing the steps too quickly or out of order.
Mackenzie says the All About M.E. curriculum includes sex education because couples who have satisfying sex lives have stronger, healthier marriages. "When you're talking about adult relationships," she says, "you're talking about sexuality, and when you're talking about sexuality, you're talking about adult relationships."
Jessica, 23, who works for a nonprofit in Denver, had attended WAIT Training abstinence workshops in college. When she and her boyfriend got engaged last year, she volunteered to attend the group's pilot program for marriage education. She says it gave them the tools for a happy sex life (both had chosen to be abstinent until marriage).
One hugely important concept they took from the course was discussing sexual issues in nonsexual moments. The idea is to make a potentially fraught conversation less emotional, less likely to hurt feelings. Jessica and her husband have these talks anywhere but the bedroom. "We talk about what we're comfortable doing or not," she says. "How often we want to have sex. What time of day. What feels good and what doesn't."
Jessica thinks the class gave them the skills to deal with conflict before they found themselves tangled up in an argument, as well as a means to explore their sexual desires in a way that felt comfortable. "Knowing how to communicate is empowering," she says.
Back in Austin after the OWL class, a group of students settle in at a nearby diner to discuss the value of the course. "It hasn't solved all my sex problems," says Judith, the lone single student. "It's still very hard to find older guys who don't have a truck full of baggage with them.
But it's been nice to have a place to talk honestly about things that are never talked about. Like how after a certain age you're not touched anymore. Certainly not lovingly. It's just 'Excuse me' if someone bumps into you at the grocery store. It's been nice to talk about my needs and have them taken seriously."
This is why the courses are so popular, says Elizabeth, the happy-to-be-middle-aged student. "There's those almost pornographic women in Sex and the City. There's a Victoria's Secret in nearly every mall." The other women at the table nod in commiseration. "So many TV shows revolve around some sex problem—someone cheats, someone wants someone he can't have.
But no one ever talks about sex in a meaningful way. It's always innuendo. It is always pretending to be about something else," Elizabeth says. Now the men are nodding. "Sexuality is this thing you carry around all the time. It grows and changes—it's part of your health and relationships and your age and your self-image, but our culture likes to talk about it in this really silly, trivial way," she says. "People—especially grown-ups—are sick of it. We want adult conversation about an adult subject."
Her husband, Eugene, gives her a smile, then raises his hand to the waiter and orders another round of drinks.
Amanda Robb is a contributing writer at O
By Amanda Robb from O, The Oprah Magazine, July 2009 © 2009 Harpo Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Source: http://lifestyle.ca.msn.com/love-sex-relationships/oprah-article.aspx?cp-documentid=20470594
With memories of mortifying class discussions led by the gym teacher, what grown-up in her right mind would sign up for another round of sex ed? Turns out, lots of them. Only this time, the lessons are intimate, the questions are provocative, and the homework is electrifying.
Nine middle-aged men and women are sitting in a circle in a cluttered, colorful classroom in a church annex in Austin. Judith, the oldest, is an artist, and her long, curly gray hair is piled into a messy halo atop her head. Larry is a gregarious man who works for the U.S. government. Elizabeth, an information technology manager at a local government agency, is an athletic woman, efficient in her movements. Her husband, Eugene, sitting nearby, was raised in Spain and has handsome features and courtly manners.
The teacher, Barbara Tuttle, begins class. "Touch one of your hands with the other," she says. "Feel the smoothness and roughness of all the various parts, the places where it's dry or moist." Some of the students close their eyes as they follow her instructions. Small smiles play on their lips. Tuttle's birdlike mouth breaks into a huge grin. "Congratulations," she says. "You all just masturbated. And in public!"
Next Tuttle, a retired sex therapist, asks the students about the experience of mindfully touching themselves: "How did it feel? Was that pleasant?"
"It made me wish someone else were touching me," Elizabeth says.
"It was just nice to be touched at all," says Judith.
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So begins the fifth session of Our Whole Lives (OWL): Sexuality Education for Adults, at the First Unitarian Church of Austin. Tonight's class is one of 14 in the seven-month course, which is the result of an initiative of the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) and the United Church of Christ (UCC). Since 1998 the institutions have coproduced sex education materials for children ages 5 to 18; as church leadership reexamined the curricula, they noticed a need for age-appropriate material for grown-ups.
"We see sexuality as a very important part of the human experience that is lifelong," says Janet Hayes, public relations director for the UUA. "That's why we named our program Our Whole Lives. Your sexuality doesn't end after you stop having babies or get divorced or after you turn 60. It is who we are in our core. We feel it has to be integrated into our spirituality because, for us, spirituality is about wholeness." So in 2008, the churches -- which together have about 6,600 U.S. congregations and 1.4 million members -- introduced classes for adults 18 to 35. (In the past ten years, it's estimated, more than 40,000 children, young adults, and adults have taken at least one OWL class.)
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Michael Tino, a Unitarian Universalist minister with a PhD in cell biology, cowrote the young adult OWL curriculum and understands why the adult classes have proved popular. "You can have the best high school sexuality curriculum in the world," he says, "but a lot of critical issues are not going to be addressed in those classes: How do I enjoy my sexuality if I've lost a breast to cancer? How do I manage being a parent and a sexual person? Can I feel sexually satisfied if I don't have a life partner?"
There's one simple reason those questions aren't tackled, Tino says. "Teenagers don't have them yet. Most of what affects our sexuality happens in adulthood -- long-term relationships, breakups, parenthood, illness, sheer exhaustion from managing life."
Although the courses the churches prepared were aimed at adults in their 20s to early 30s, to the organizers' surprise, middle-aged parishioners have stampeded the discussion-based program. Students in tonight's class, for instance, are in their late 40s to mid-60s.
After wrapping up the discussion about self-touch, during which Tuttle encourages students to "think about sensuality broadly and not shut off the pleasure of getting to know the whole body," she and her coteacher, Michael West, an economic development project manager in the Texas A&M University system, explain the next exercise: a sexuality timeline. (OWL facilitators are trained over three days, and the program is typically team taught, usually by a woman and a man.)
Thirty feet of newsprint is rolled out across two long tables. Red and black pens are placed on each table. The men are assigned one sheet; the women, the other. The students are asked to write down sexual experiences in chronological order, using the black pen for those that were in their control (such as a first kiss) and the red pen for those that were not (such as getting their first period).
The women are a flurry of activity, practically tripping over each other to scribble -- "played doctor," "found a pubic hair," "menstruation," "kissed a boy," "kissed a girl," "touched by a cousin," "fell in love," "lost my virginity," "had an abortion," "had a baby," "breasts sagging," "menopause," "discovered sex without love." The men look on and appear intimidated. Finally, Eugene picks up a pen and writes down "first time had sex." The other men slowly begin to join in. Together they manage to write: "accidentally masturbated," "masturbated," "first time had sex," "prostate," and "Viagra."
Tuttle calls time and invites the students to look at the timelines. "What comes up?" she asks.
Judith says the exercise made her realize that one huge thing she can't control about her sexuality is her fading looks. "Like, I'm still looking at 40-year-old men," Judith says, "but they're not looking back." A few of the other women agree.
Elizabeth stares at them as if they're insane. "I love being middle-aged," she says.
The women return her you're-out-of-your-mind look, so she explains: "When I was young, I'd see these older women and they just seemed as if they had confidence and were wise -- and more comfortable in their skin. I'm much more comfortable in my skin today than I was at 30, 25, 20, and definitely 15."
"How?" asks Judith.
Elizabeth thinks for a minute. "I didn't get any mileage out of being cute when I was young. Maybe that's the positive side of not being cute or flirty at 20 -- when you don't get that attention at 45, you haven't lost anything."
A little later, Judith admits that she can think of a few good things that result from getting older. "My husband of 13 years always accused me of being frigid because I never had an orgasm with him," she says. "After we split up, I definitely learned I wasn't frigid. Which was a relief. Which was fun."
The women marvel that virtually all of them have had distressful sexual experiences. One says her sex life was "messy," explaining that she means nonlinear. "I was always a little ashamed because I didn't do the perfect progression of first kiss, go steady, first love, first sex," she says. "It's nice to see that all the women were a littleout of order."
She turns to the men and asks if they ever felt that way. One says men don't think about sex in those terms. "Especially for young men, sex is very goal oriented," he says. "Get a kiss, get a girlfriend, get laid."
Larry agrees. In fact, he later explains, that's why he signed up for the course with his wife of 15 years. "We're past the Kama Sutra part of life," Larry says. "You want to—you need to—broaden the definition of sex. Like the other night, my wife was singing to me, and I said, 'Oh, you're making love to me.'"
One of the first pilot classes for the OWL program took place in Boston three years ago. Several of the participants say that the course lessons were not only useful but surprising. Sylvie*, a 35-year-old medical counselor, signed up for the class after seeing it advertised in the church bulletin. Speaking from her home near Boston, she explains that she'd always felt fortunate to have what she considered healthy feelings about her sexuality.
"My dad was a general practitioner and my mom was a counselor, and they were very open with my brother and me growing up," she says. Her parents didn't shy away from explaining things, and kept books like Our Bodies, Ourselves and The Joy of Sex in the house.
But in 2005, Sylvie and her husband began struggling with infertility. "It took all the joy out of sex," Sylvie says now. "We were always trying to get pregnant." So she signed up, with the hope of refiling sex under "pleasure" instead of "work" in her brain.
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The first few workshops turned out to be exactly what Sylvie was looking for. Jane Detwiler, a certified sexuality educator, and her cofacilitator led the group through "anatomy of pleasure" and "understanding sexual response" exercises. Contacted recently at her office, Detwiler says many people learn about the reproductive capacity of sexual organs in traditional sex ed, but not the "pleasure capacity."
She says that despite the sexualization of our culture, many of her students don't know what normal genitals look like, and she has discovered that loads of women worry that theirs are abnormal or ugly. In Sylvie's class, Detwiler used diagrams and photographs to explain that the truth is, of course, that there's a variety of "normal," as wide ranging as human faces.
Her students also discussed the parts of the body besides the genitals that are wired for sexual response—skin, lips, breasts, nipples, tongue, hands, brain. Then Detwiler pulled out a model of a penis and the "Wondrous Vulva Puppet." She had labels ready (clitoris, perineum, vagina, glans, PC muscle) and asked volunteers to place them correctly. As students moved through the lesson, they talked about how the different parts contribute to pleasure.
Next, the instructors asked the students to compare the Masters and Johnson linear model of sexual response—excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution—to a circular model of mutual pleasure. To explain the idea, Detwiler drew a large circle on newsprint and asked students to think of all sorts of sexy, fun activities and list them around the circle.
The students came up with "caress, oral sex, kiss, massage, lubrication, talking, fondling, phone sex, kiss again, snuggle." In a circular model, Detwiler pointed out, partners can start or stop sensual activity anytime they want, and the activities don't necessarily lead to orgasm.
Sylvie says that some students thought that type of sex would be an exercise in frustration, but others said they could imagine times in their lives when those options would work—when they were not ready to have sex with a new partner, when they were too tired to have intercourse with their current partner, when they were trying to liven things up with a longtime lover.
After most classes, Sylvie came home and described what she had learned to her husband (who did not attend, because the course was something she wanted to do on her own). "Oh, you know," she'd say at the end of each night's summary, "that reminds me. Let's have sex just for fun."
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Then a few sessions later came the "values voting" game.
During this exercise, the instructors asked the class to envision a line on the floor, with one end representing "I strongly agree" and the opposite end signaling "I strongly disagree." Then Detwiler read statements, directing students to stand on the line in a position that represented their values.
Detwiler called out things like "It is more fulfilling to be free of commitment than committed" and "If I made vows to my partner during a marriage or commitment ceremony, I would stick to them no matter what." Each person explained why they stood where they did and moved if someone said something to change their mind. About midway through the game, Detwiler said: "Viewing pornography is not healthy."
Sylvie stepped to a place she considered completely noncontroversial. The "sort of agree" spot on the line. "I'd gone to very progressive summer camps when I was a teenager, and a lot of my counselors were strong feminists," she says. "I guess I'd just gotten the message that pornography was exploitative of women." Sylvie did not boycott newsstands that carried Playboy or refuse to stay in hotels that offer adult pay-per-view. She didn't consider herself an extremist, so she figured she'd have plenty of company at her spot.
She was amazed to see that most of her classmates—each a very likable, not-perverse-seeming person, in Sylvie's opinion—were in the "sort of disagree" to "strongly disagree" part of the line. They explained that yes, pornography could be exploitative, but it could also be a safe form of fantasy.
Sylvie went home and told her husband the news.
"The porn I have is on my computer," he said. For the second time that evening, Sylvie says, she was shocked. Her husband said that he looked at it every few weeks; she asked if he could show it to her. He did. Sylvie was surprised to find some of it turned her on.
"I thought married men who look at pornography must be unhappy with their spouses," Sylvie says. "But my husband said, 'No, sometimes when I feel like being sexual I just feel like being alone.' And I thought about that. And I thought, 'Well, sometimes when I want to be sexual I want to be alone, too. For me, that doesn't involve porn, but if it does for him, so be it.'"
Over the next few weeks, as she discussed the subject more with her husband and her classmates, her opinion changed. "My parents had told us that smoking was bad," she says. "So my brother came to think that people who smoked were bad. I did a similar thing with pornography. I still don't think pornography is a great thing for women, but now I don't think people who look at it necessarily want to exploit them."
Another member of this pilot class, Kim, then 35, had been happily married for more than a decade; she had even taught the OWL classes to middle school students for three years. "I was functioning well," she says, on the phone from Framingham, Massachusetts.
"But deep down, I still had some weird, mixed-up feelings about sex left over from my childhood." Her parents had divorced when she was 3. "Afterward my mother was very free with her sexuality," Kim remembers. "I would hear a lot, and the sounds scared and confused me. I'd say, 'Mom, what are you doing?' She'd say, 'Kissing.' Well, I knew that wasn't it. I signed up for the adult OWL course to keep peeling back the layers, to keep getting better, healthier, happier."
The early sessions confirmed for her that she needed to deal with free-floating shame around her sexuality. In the same workshop that featured the "anatomy of pleasure" exercise (identifying body parts), the instructors led them through the "pleasure pinwheel" game. In this lesson, students arrange themselves in two concentric circles, with each person in the inner ring facing a partner in the outer ring.
One of the instructors asks questions regarding the messages students have received about sexual pleasure from their parents, schools, peers, and lovers. The students have one minute to give their answer to the person facing them; then the outer circle shifts one place. By the end of the exercise, Kim had a better sense of the messages she'd received throughout her life—many dating to childhood—and she began to see that the ones that made her feel the worst related to her libido, which was stronger than her husband's.
"There wasn't one moment in the class when I said, 'Wow, amazing, I'm okay, and [my classmates] are okay about my wanting to have sex more often than my spouse,'" Kim says. "But gradually, over 14 sessions, talking and talking and talking about how weird and wildly varied sexuality is for people, you get to feeling more and more normal yourself."
"Often the question behind a question in sexuality education," Detwiler says, "is 'Am I normal?'"
Although the unitarian universalist and UCC churches are among the leading organizations promoting adult sex education, they aren't alone. The U.S. government is in the field, too. In 2005 Congress passed an act that provides $150 million annually for healthy marriage and responsible fatherhood initiatives.
So far the government has paid to educate more than 290,000 Americans on the how-tos of building and maintaining relationships. One popular program that receives federal funding is a course called It's All About M.E. (Marriage Education), which is given in hospitals and community centers, as well as at the army base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. The eight-hour curriculum was a product of WAIT Training, a 17-year-old Colorado-based nonprofit founded by Joneen Mackenzie, RN.
Mackenzie believes that the best and healthiest place for sex is a committed, long-term monogamous relationship, but she agrees with the UUA and UCC churches that sexuality education—especially for adults—is generally less about plumbing than about emotional issues. Because It's All About M.E. courses encourage young adults to wait until marriage to have sex, much of the training is focused on relationship skills.
For instance, participants learn the program's ten keys to successful dating (such as get a life of your own, take it slow, set clear boundaries, engage in healthy responses to conflict, and choose a partner who makes you feel affirmed, inspired, and challenged to be a better person). But they do discuss sexual relationships. It's All About M.E. instructors ask students to reflect on what has influenced their view of sexuality and then offer exercises to help the students imagine alternative ways of being intimate.
For example, in a lesson called Steps of (Physical) Intimacy, students arrange types of contact—eye-to-eye, hand-to-hand, hand-to-waist, face-to-face, French kissing, touching above the waist, etc.—from the least to the most intimate. They discuss the physical, intellectual, social, spiritual, and financial consequences of doing the steps too quickly or out of order.
Mackenzie says the All About M.E. curriculum includes sex education because couples who have satisfying sex lives have stronger, healthier marriages. "When you're talking about adult relationships," she says, "you're talking about sexuality, and when you're talking about sexuality, you're talking about adult relationships."
Jessica, 23, who works for a nonprofit in Denver, had attended WAIT Training abstinence workshops in college. When she and her boyfriend got engaged last year, she volunteered to attend the group's pilot program for marriage education. She says it gave them the tools for a happy sex life (both had chosen to be abstinent until marriage).
One hugely important concept they took from the course was discussing sexual issues in nonsexual moments. The idea is to make a potentially fraught conversation less emotional, less likely to hurt feelings. Jessica and her husband have these talks anywhere but the bedroom. "We talk about what we're comfortable doing or not," she says. "How often we want to have sex. What time of day. What feels good and what doesn't."
Jessica thinks the class gave them the skills to deal with conflict before they found themselves tangled up in an argument, as well as a means to explore their sexual desires in a way that felt comfortable. "Knowing how to communicate is empowering," she says.
Back in Austin after the OWL class, a group of students settle in at a nearby diner to discuss the value of the course. "It hasn't solved all my sex problems," says Judith, the lone single student. "It's still very hard to find older guys who don't have a truck full of baggage with them.
But it's been nice to have a place to talk honestly about things that are never talked about. Like how after a certain age you're not touched anymore. Certainly not lovingly. It's just 'Excuse me' if someone bumps into you at the grocery store. It's been nice to talk about my needs and have them taken seriously."
This is why the courses are so popular, says Elizabeth, the happy-to-be-middle-aged student. "There's those almost pornographic women in Sex and the City. There's a Victoria's Secret in nearly every mall." The other women at the table nod in commiseration. "So many TV shows revolve around some sex problem—someone cheats, someone wants someone he can't have.
But no one ever talks about sex in a meaningful way. It's always innuendo. It is always pretending to be about something else," Elizabeth says. Now the men are nodding. "Sexuality is this thing you carry around all the time. It grows and changes—it's part of your health and relationships and your age and your self-image, but our culture likes to talk about it in this really silly, trivial way," she says. "People—especially grown-ups—are sick of it. We want adult conversation about an adult subject."
Her husband, Eugene, gives her a smile, then raises his hand to the waiter and orders another round of drinks.
Amanda Robb is a contributing writer at O
By Amanda Robb from O, The Oprah Magazine, July 2009 © 2009 Harpo Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Source: http://lifestyle.ca.msn.com/love-sex-relationships/oprah-article.aspx?cp-documentid=20470594
Saturday, September 5, 2009
For Common Male Problem, Hope Beyond a Pill
By LESLEY ALDERMAN
The New York Times
August 29, 2009
IF you watch enough television, you’d think that treating erectile dysfunction was as effortless as popping a pill and then whirling your partner around the living room in a romantic dance. Correcting erectile dysfunction, alas, is not so simple — and it can be rather costly. One Viagra pill, for example, the most common way to treat erection problems, costs about $15.
Insurers can be chary of reimbursements. And despite the fact that E.D., as the dysfunction is known, becomes increasingly common after men reach 65, Medicare Part D does not cover drugs for it.
An estimated 30 million men in this country experience erectile dysfunction. Nearly a third of men in their 50s experience E.D., whereas more than half of those in their 60s have the problem.
If you’re hoping to have Viagra-aided sex twice a week, your bill for the entire year could run around $1,500. If you’re fortunate enough to have insurance that covers the medications, your co-pay will be on the high side, around $40 for a one-month supply of six to eight pills — bringing your annual bill to a more manageable $500 or so. There are no generic versions of E.D. meds yet.
Even among the name-brand drugs, which also include Cialis and Levitra, the medications do not work for about half of the men with E.D., says Dr. Ajay Nehra, professor of urology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. He is also president of the Sexual Medicine Society, an association of health care professionals.
And yet, as it turns out there are other treatments for E.D. And some of them are more cost-effective than the brand-name pills advertised on television.
“There is not a man out there that cannot be helped in some way with his E.D. — even if money is an issue,” says Dr. Andrew McCullough, an associate professor of urology and director of Male Sexual Health and Fertility at the Langone Medical Center at New York University.
The first step is to see a doctor who specializes in E.D. (usually a urologist) and have your overall health checked out. If your primary care physician can’t make a recommendation, contact the Sexual Medicine Society and ask for a referral.
In many of cases, E.D. is the sign of an underlying disorder like diabetes or hypertension. In fact, in younger men, erection problems are often the first symptom of cardiovascular disease.
“Erectile problems may show up about three years before a cardiovascular event such as a heart attack or stroke,” says Dr. Ira Sharlip, clinical professor of urology at the University of California, San Francisco.
That’s because plaque will start to clog the small arteries in the penis before the wider coronary arteries. Your doctor will also try to determine whether your E.D. is the result of a psychological issue, in which case he will refer you to a therapist. Depending on your policy, your insurer may cover a set number of visits. (One way for you to check on your own whether your issue may be psychological or physical is try the postage stamp test, also known as nocturnal penile tumescence test.)
By adopting healthier habits, you may be able to improve your overall well-being and restore your erectile function.
“There is increasing evidence that we can reverse erectile dysfunction with lifestyle changes,” says Dr. Drogo K. Montague, director of the Center for Genitourinary Reconstruction in the Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at Cleveland Clinic.
In a recent study of men with E.D., or at risk for developing it, researchers in Italy found that the men could improve their erections by losing weight, improving their diet and exercising more frequently. After two years of significant lifestyle changes, 58 percent of the men had normal erectile function, according to the study, which was published in The Journal of Sexual Medicine in January.
But lifestyle changes, while basically free, can be difficult to make and may take months to take effect. In the meantime, your doctor will probably prescribe a phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitor, also called a PDE-5 inhibitor, like Viagra, Cialis or Levitra. These drugs enhance the effects of nitric oxide, a chemical that helps to increase blood flow in the penis. The three drugs work in the same way, but differ in how quickly they take effect and how long they last. If the PDE-5 drugs don’t work for you, don’t give up quickly, says Dr. McCullough, who theorizes that “in over 40 percent of drug failures the problem is with the user, not the drug.” Dr. McCullough adds, “it’s important to take these medications as directed, like on a totally empty stomach, rather than a full one, and not less than 60 minutes before sex.”
If the pills don’t work for you, you might want to try self-administered injections of alprostadil, a drug that helps blood vessels expand and facilitates erections. Granted, this may sound onerous, but the shot, which is sold under the brand names Edex and Caverject, is done with a fine needle, feels no worse than a pinprick and produces an erection that can last up to four hours, according to doctors who recommend it.
The shots cost about $35 per injection and are covered by most insurers, but not by Medicare.
But ask your doctor about an injection that’s a cocktail of generic forms of alprostadil, papaverine and phentolamine.
Although this generic combination is not F.D.A.-approved as an E.D. treatment, doctors are legally free to administer it — and both Dr. Sharlip and Dr. McCullough recommend it.
“The generic injections clearly work the best,” Dr. Sharlip said, “and are usually less expensive.”
Another cost-effective option is a vacuum erection device or penis pump. It works like this: you place a tube on the penis and then pump the air out of the tube, which pulls blood into the penis. When the penis is erect, you then put a snug ring around the base to maintain the erection, which lasts long enough to have sex.
The cost for the device, which requires a prescription, can run from $300 to $600, but most insurers and Medicare will cover part of the cost and the device should last for years. Even if you spend $300 out of pocket and use the device once a week, you’ll be spending much less per year than on pills or injections. You can also buy a nonprescription pump online (even Amazon carries some) for as little as $30, Dr. McCullough said.
Finally, if all other treatments fail, you could consider getting penile implants, an effective and permanent solution for chronic E.D. The most common type of implant works through inflation: two cylinders are placed inside the penis and a fluid-filled reservoir is implanted under the abdominal wall or groin muscles; a pump and a deflation valve are placed inside the scrotum. To create an erection, you pump fluid from the reservoir into the cylinders. To deflate the penis, you press the release valve.
Most insurers and Medicare cover the surgery, so your out-of-pocket costs will be minimal. This might be the most cost-effective strategy of all since, according to Dr. Nehra, 80 percent of implants last 10 years.
Original link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/29/health/29patient.html?_r=2&hpw=&pagewanted=print
The New York Times
August 29, 2009
IF you watch enough television, you’d think that treating erectile dysfunction was as effortless as popping a pill and then whirling your partner around the living room in a romantic dance. Correcting erectile dysfunction, alas, is not so simple — and it can be rather costly. One Viagra pill, for example, the most common way to treat erection problems, costs about $15.
Insurers can be chary of reimbursements. And despite the fact that E.D., as the dysfunction is known, becomes increasingly common after men reach 65, Medicare Part D does not cover drugs for it.
An estimated 30 million men in this country experience erectile dysfunction. Nearly a third of men in their 50s experience E.D., whereas more than half of those in their 60s have the problem.
If you’re hoping to have Viagra-aided sex twice a week, your bill for the entire year could run around $1,500. If you’re fortunate enough to have insurance that covers the medications, your co-pay will be on the high side, around $40 for a one-month supply of six to eight pills — bringing your annual bill to a more manageable $500 or so. There are no generic versions of E.D. meds yet.
Even among the name-brand drugs, which also include Cialis and Levitra, the medications do not work for about half of the men with E.D., says Dr. Ajay Nehra, professor of urology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. He is also president of the Sexual Medicine Society, an association of health care professionals.
And yet, as it turns out there are other treatments for E.D. And some of them are more cost-effective than the brand-name pills advertised on television.
“There is not a man out there that cannot be helped in some way with his E.D. — even if money is an issue,” says Dr. Andrew McCullough, an associate professor of urology and director of Male Sexual Health and Fertility at the Langone Medical Center at New York University.
The first step is to see a doctor who specializes in E.D. (usually a urologist) and have your overall health checked out. If your primary care physician can’t make a recommendation, contact the Sexual Medicine Society and ask for a referral.
In many of cases, E.D. is the sign of an underlying disorder like diabetes or hypertension. In fact, in younger men, erection problems are often the first symptom of cardiovascular disease.
“Erectile problems may show up about three years before a cardiovascular event such as a heart attack or stroke,” says Dr. Ira Sharlip, clinical professor of urology at the University of California, San Francisco.
That’s because plaque will start to clog the small arteries in the penis before the wider coronary arteries. Your doctor will also try to determine whether your E.D. is the result of a psychological issue, in which case he will refer you to a therapist. Depending on your policy, your insurer may cover a set number of visits. (One way for you to check on your own whether your issue may be psychological or physical is try the postage stamp test, also known as nocturnal penile tumescence test.)
By adopting healthier habits, you may be able to improve your overall well-being and restore your erectile function.
“There is increasing evidence that we can reverse erectile dysfunction with lifestyle changes,” says Dr. Drogo K. Montague, director of the Center for Genitourinary Reconstruction in the Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at Cleveland Clinic.
In a recent study of men with E.D., or at risk for developing it, researchers in Italy found that the men could improve their erections by losing weight, improving their diet and exercising more frequently. After two years of significant lifestyle changes, 58 percent of the men had normal erectile function, according to the study, which was published in The Journal of Sexual Medicine in January.
But lifestyle changes, while basically free, can be difficult to make and may take months to take effect. In the meantime, your doctor will probably prescribe a phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitor, also called a PDE-5 inhibitor, like Viagra, Cialis or Levitra. These drugs enhance the effects of nitric oxide, a chemical that helps to increase blood flow in the penis. The three drugs work in the same way, but differ in how quickly they take effect and how long they last. If the PDE-5 drugs don’t work for you, don’t give up quickly, says Dr. McCullough, who theorizes that “in over 40 percent of drug failures the problem is with the user, not the drug.” Dr. McCullough adds, “it’s important to take these medications as directed, like on a totally empty stomach, rather than a full one, and not less than 60 minutes before sex.”
If the pills don’t work for you, you might want to try self-administered injections of alprostadil, a drug that helps blood vessels expand and facilitates erections. Granted, this may sound onerous, but the shot, which is sold under the brand names Edex and Caverject, is done with a fine needle, feels no worse than a pinprick and produces an erection that can last up to four hours, according to doctors who recommend it.
The shots cost about $35 per injection and are covered by most insurers, but not by Medicare.
But ask your doctor about an injection that’s a cocktail of generic forms of alprostadil, papaverine and phentolamine.
Although this generic combination is not F.D.A.-approved as an E.D. treatment, doctors are legally free to administer it — and both Dr. Sharlip and Dr. McCullough recommend it.
“The generic injections clearly work the best,” Dr. Sharlip said, “and are usually less expensive.”
Another cost-effective option is a vacuum erection device or penis pump. It works like this: you place a tube on the penis and then pump the air out of the tube, which pulls blood into the penis. When the penis is erect, you then put a snug ring around the base to maintain the erection, which lasts long enough to have sex.
The cost for the device, which requires a prescription, can run from $300 to $600, but most insurers and Medicare will cover part of the cost and the device should last for years. Even if you spend $300 out of pocket and use the device once a week, you’ll be spending much less per year than on pills or injections. You can also buy a nonprescription pump online (even Amazon carries some) for as little as $30, Dr. McCullough said.
Finally, if all other treatments fail, you could consider getting penile implants, an effective and permanent solution for chronic E.D. The most common type of implant works through inflation: two cylinders are placed inside the penis and a fluid-filled reservoir is implanted under the abdominal wall or groin muscles; a pump and a deflation valve are placed inside the scrotum. To create an erection, you pump fluid from the reservoir into the cylinders. To deflate the penis, you press the release valve.
Most insurers and Medicare cover the surgery, so your out-of-pocket costs will be minimal. This might be the most cost-effective strategy of all since, according to Dr. Nehra, 80 percent of implants last 10 years.
Original link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/29/health/29patient.html?_r=2&hpw=&pagewanted=print
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Seniors' Dating in the New Millennium
For Immediate Release
August 18, 2009
Seniors' Dating in the New Millennium
(Scarborough, ON): Due to overwhelming success, St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre will host another Companion Connections, a social networking event designed for adults 55 years and older on Saturday, September 12, 2009 from 2:00-5:00 pm. A city-wide event, Companion Connections is a unique social event that allows older adults and seniors to meet new people, expand their social network, and make social connections.
As people get older, it becomes more challenging for them to expand their social networks and meet new people. This is especially true for individuals who are widowed, divorced, or isolated. Companion Connections is a fun, relaxed, and safe environment in which participants can meet up to 20 other single seniors in one day.
Companion Connections is modeled on a typical speed dating framework in which participants are given time to get to know each other in a relaxed conversation. Icebreaker questions are available for those who are nervous or shy. Men rotate seats every 6 minutes while women remain seated. If an individual is interested in their conversation partner, he or she will check off the person’s name on their score sheet. Contact information will only be given if both parties have checked off each other’s name. Our April event was successful with 21 matches being made.
St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre’s Executive Director, Larry Burke, acknowledges the need for such programs in facilitating friendships for this audience. “The success of our first Companion Connections program demonstrates the need for these socialization opportunities for older adults and seniors.”
Companion Connections is a collaboration among several community agencies and seniors’ centres across the GTA. Partners include West Hill Community Services, Harmony Hall, North York Seniors Centre, Premier Home Care Services, Scarborough Support Services, and Revera Living. Participants are eligible to win several door prizes and will receive goody bags to take home. Steeles Deli Restaurant in Thornhill, Ontario, a long time supporter of St. Paul’s, will once again provide refreshments for participants.
Registration will be on a first come, first served basis. St. Paul’s will not be reserving spaces. The last day to register for this event is Friday, August 28, 2009.
For more information, please call 416-493-3333 ext 271 visit our website at www.splc.ca
About St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre
St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre provides community services and housing to older adults and seniors. Our vision is to provide a services and housing environment for seniors that allows them to live independently in their community with wellness and dignity and to provide this environment regardless of language, culture or ability to pay.
-30-
August 18, 2009
Seniors' Dating in the New Millennium
(Scarborough, ON): Due to overwhelming success, St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre will host another Companion Connections, a social networking event designed for adults 55 years and older on Saturday, September 12, 2009 from 2:00-5:00 pm. A city-wide event, Companion Connections is a unique social event that allows older adults and seniors to meet new people, expand their social network, and make social connections.
As people get older, it becomes more challenging for them to expand their social networks and meet new people. This is especially true for individuals who are widowed, divorced, or isolated. Companion Connections is a fun, relaxed, and safe environment in which participants can meet up to 20 other single seniors in one day.
Companion Connections is modeled on a typical speed dating framework in which participants are given time to get to know each other in a relaxed conversation. Icebreaker questions are available for those who are nervous or shy. Men rotate seats every 6 minutes while women remain seated. If an individual is interested in their conversation partner, he or she will check off the person’s name on their score sheet. Contact information will only be given if both parties have checked off each other’s name. Our April event was successful with 21 matches being made.
St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre’s Executive Director, Larry Burke, acknowledges the need for such programs in facilitating friendships for this audience. “The success of our first Companion Connections program demonstrates the need for these socialization opportunities for older adults and seniors.”
Companion Connections is a collaboration among several community agencies and seniors’ centres across the GTA. Partners include West Hill Community Services, Harmony Hall, North York Seniors Centre, Premier Home Care Services, Scarborough Support Services, and Revera Living. Participants are eligible to win several door prizes and will receive goody bags to take home. Steeles Deli Restaurant in Thornhill, Ontario, a long time supporter of St. Paul’s, will once again provide refreshments for participants.
Registration will be on a first come, first served basis. St. Paul’s will not be reserving spaces. The last day to register for this event is Friday, August 28, 2009.
For more information, please call 416-493-3333 ext 271 visit our website at www.splc.ca
About St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre
St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre provides community services and housing to older adults and seniors. Our vision is to provide a services and housing environment for seniors that allows them to live independently in their community with wellness and dignity and to provide this environment regardless of language, culture or ability to pay.
-30-
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Octegenarians heat up the dancefloor
Here are two links to women who are dancing into their 80s. These women are truly inspirational to people of all ages. And there's the role model piece, "if she can do it, so can I."
The first link is to a woman named Sarah Jones, also known as Paddy Jones. Although some youtube posts claim she's 87, she's a 75 year old salsa dancer who's been dazzling viewers all over the world with her sexy, classical moves on the dancefloor. Watch Sarah and her salsa partner, Nico, heat up the floor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkHvRCp3z5A&feature=related
Dorothy Dale Kloss is an amazing woman. She's gorgeous, she's in great shape and she still dances at the Fabulous Palm Springs Follies. At 85 years old, she's the world's oldest showgirl. Physical activity, healthy eating, taking care of one's whole health is the key to not only long life, but living well longer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkHvRCp3z5A&feature=related
To watch the video on Dorothy, click here:
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/articles/Dorothy_Dale_Kloss_Oldest_Showgirl_in_the_World.html
To learn more about the Fabulous Palm Springs Follies, click here:
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/reinventing/articles/fabulous_palm_springs_follies_is_still_kicking.html
The first link is to a woman named Sarah Jones, also known as Paddy Jones. Although some youtube posts claim she's 87, she's a 75 year old salsa dancer who's been dazzling viewers all over the world with her sexy, classical moves on the dancefloor. Watch Sarah and her salsa partner, Nico, heat up the floor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkHvRCp3z5A&feature=related
Dorothy Dale Kloss is an amazing woman. She's gorgeous, she's in great shape and she still dances at the Fabulous Palm Springs Follies. At 85 years old, she's the world's oldest showgirl. Physical activity, healthy eating, taking care of one's whole health is the key to not only long life, but living well longer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkHvRCp3z5A&feature=related
To watch the video on Dorothy, click here:
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/articles/Dorothy_Dale_Kloss_Oldest_Showgirl_in_the_World.html
To learn more about the Fabulous Palm Springs Follies, click here:
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/reinventing/articles/fabulous_palm_springs_follies_is_still_kicking.html
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Like a fine wine, sex life improves with age
This survey on sexual lifestyles in 50+ population was sponsored by Eli Lilly. The perspective focuses on erectile dysfunction. It discusses how older adults and seniors are sexually satisfied, how many engage in risky behaviours and sexually adventurous activities. No where in the study is sexually transmitted infections mentioned which is a shocking omission.
With 41% of respondents stating they are sexually adventurous, it is unbelievable and unconscionable to leave out the importance of safer sex practices. But then Eli Lilly, makers of Cialis, would not be concerned about consequences of unprotected sexual activity.
I stated in the CBC's Sex and Seniors documentary, that pharamaceutical companies must do more to educate their older adult and senior patients on safer sex practices. The Cialis website has a link to a 5 page info sheet on "Patient Information." Page two indicates, "CIALIS does not protect a man or his partner from sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV. Speak to your healthcare provider about ways to guard against sexually transmitted diseases."
If Eli Lilly wanted to do more inthe way of corporate social responsibility, they should consider an ad campaign advocating the joys of senior sexuality AND safer sex practices in this population.
MCauch
SageHealth Network
August 8, 2009
-------------------
The Globe and Mail
Report on Business
July 23, 2009
But sex and aging can raise new concerns for couples
TORONTO, July 23 /CNW/ - Many Canadians 50+ are finding that changes to their lifestyle are having a positive impact on their sex life, confessing they are more sexually adventurous, frisky or ferocious in bed. The 50+ crowd admits that the newfound freedom in their lives - as their nests become empty, they enter retirement, and some focus on new relationships - has had a positive impact on their sex life. Yet, despite these positive changes, many are concerned about how aging may lead to sexual issues like erectile dysfunction and the impact it may have on their sex life.
A national survey of Canadians 50+ reveals the sexual attitudes of this aging population. The survey showed that Canadians 50+ are gaining a new lease on life and returning to the spontaneity and intimacy enjoyed earlier in their relationships. In fact, key survey findings showed that among Canadians 50+:
<<
- 41 per cent stated they were sexually adventurous;(1)
- 40 per cent said they were frisky;(1)
- 16 per cent consider themselves ferocious in bed;(1)
- Close to half (45%) stated that their sexual inhibitions have
decreased since they turned 50;(1)
- More than one quarter (27%) stated the quality of their sex life has
improved since they turned 50;(1) and
- Close to half (49%) say that they are satisfied sexually.(1)
>>
"With retirement fast approaching and with sex having fewer taboos than for previous generations, what's not to celebrate about being over 50?" says Dr. David McKenzie, Couples and Sex Therapist in Vancouver. "Reducing stress and having a long-term connection with your partner can greatly contribute towards a more emotionally satisfying relationship as well as a more rewarding sex life."
Spontaneity: Keeping things interesting in the bedroom
Spontaneity is important to the sex life of Canadians 50+, according to almost three quarters of respondents, and over half wish that their sex life was more spontaneous.(1) However, there are concerns as the 50+ think about how sexual difficulties, such as erectile dysfunction (ED), will impact the spontaneity of their sex life as they age. Specifically, one quarter admitted that they or their partner has experienced erectile dysfunction and that it has a negative impact on their sex life.(1) Sexual issues such as experiencing erection difficulties can impact spontaneity in relationships as partners can become frustrated, embarrassed or anxious which, in turn, inhibits the ability for the man to maintain his erection.(2)
"If men and their partners are concerned about achieving and maintaining an erection, they should know that it is a very common medical condition that affects more than a third of Canadian men," says Dr. Gerald Brock, Professor of Surgery, Division of Urology, University of Western Ontario. "Furthermore, experiencing difficulty with erections doesn't have to mean the end of spontaneous intimacy, and many treatment options are available that can give couples the freedom they desire and help to ensure an active and healthy sex life as they age, with great success. The really important message, for the literally tens of thousands of Canadian couples affected with sexual dysfunction, is to speak to their healthcare professional for information and understand their treatment options."
The national online survey was conducted by Leger Marketing using Leger Marketing's Web panel between April 14th and April 20th, 2009. It was sponsored by Eli Lilly Canada Inc. The survey interviewed a total of 1,510 respondents who were Canadian adults, 18 years of age and older. Of those 1,510 respondents, 494 were over the age of 50. Using a national random sample of 1,510 respondents from Leger Marketing's Web panel, this method simulates a probability sample that would yield a maximum margin of error of +/-2.5%, 19 times out of 20. The margin of error among the 494 respondents over the age of 50 is +/-4.4%, 19 times out of 20.
About Lilly
Lilly, a leading innovation-driven corporation, is developing a growing portfolio of first-in-class and best-in-class pharmaceutical products by applying the latest research from its own worldwide laboratories and from collaborations with eminent scientific organizations. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, Lilly provides answers - through medicines and information - for some of the world's most urgent medical needs. Eli Lilly Canada, headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, employs close to 700 people across the country. Additional information about Eli Lilly Canada can be found at www.lilly.ca.
To see original link: http://www.globeinvestor.com/servlet/story/CNW.20090723.C8037/GIStory
With 41% of respondents stating they are sexually adventurous, it is unbelievable and unconscionable to leave out the importance of safer sex practices. But then Eli Lilly, makers of Cialis, would not be concerned about consequences of unprotected sexual activity.
I stated in the CBC's Sex and Seniors documentary, that pharamaceutical companies must do more to educate their older adult and senior patients on safer sex practices. The Cialis website has a link to a 5 page info sheet on "Patient Information." Page two indicates, "CIALIS does not protect a man or his partner from sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV. Speak to your healthcare provider about ways to guard against sexually transmitted diseases."
If Eli Lilly wanted to do more inthe way of corporate social responsibility, they should consider an ad campaign advocating the joys of senior sexuality AND safer sex practices in this population.
MCauch
SageHealth Network
August 8, 2009
-------------------
The Globe and Mail
Report on Business
July 23, 2009
But sex and aging can raise new concerns for couples
TORONTO, July 23 /CNW/ - Many Canadians 50+ are finding that changes to their lifestyle are having a positive impact on their sex life, confessing they are more sexually adventurous, frisky or ferocious in bed. The 50+ crowd admits that the newfound freedom in their lives - as their nests become empty, they enter retirement, and some focus on new relationships - has had a positive impact on their sex life. Yet, despite these positive changes, many are concerned about how aging may lead to sexual issues like erectile dysfunction and the impact it may have on their sex life.
A national survey of Canadians 50+ reveals the sexual attitudes of this aging population. The survey showed that Canadians 50+ are gaining a new lease on life and returning to the spontaneity and intimacy enjoyed earlier in their relationships. In fact, key survey findings showed that among Canadians 50+:
<<
- 41 per cent stated they were sexually adventurous;(1)
- 40 per cent said they were frisky;(1)
- 16 per cent consider themselves ferocious in bed;(1)
- Close to half (45%) stated that their sexual inhibitions have
decreased since they turned 50;(1)
- More than one quarter (27%) stated the quality of their sex life has
improved since they turned 50;(1) and
- Close to half (49%) say that they are satisfied sexually.(1)
>>
"With retirement fast approaching and with sex having fewer taboos than for previous generations, what's not to celebrate about being over 50?" says Dr. David McKenzie, Couples and Sex Therapist in Vancouver. "Reducing stress and having a long-term connection with your partner can greatly contribute towards a more emotionally satisfying relationship as well as a more rewarding sex life."
Spontaneity: Keeping things interesting in the bedroom
Spontaneity is important to the sex life of Canadians 50+, according to almost three quarters of respondents, and over half wish that their sex life was more spontaneous.(1) However, there are concerns as the 50+ think about how sexual difficulties, such as erectile dysfunction (ED), will impact the spontaneity of their sex life as they age. Specifically, one quarter admitted that they or their partner has experienced erectile dysfunction and that it has a negative impact on their sex life.(1) Sexual issues such as experiencing erection difficulties can impact spontaneity in relationships as partners can become frustrated, embarrassed or anxious which, in turn, inhibits the ability for the man to maintain his erection.(2)
"If men and their partners are concerned about achieving and maintaining an erection, they should know that it is a very common medical condition that affects more than a third of Canadian men," says Dr. Gerald Brock, Professor of Surgery, Division of Urology, University of Western Ontario. "Furthermore, experiencing difficulty with erections doesn't have to mean the end of spontaneous intimacy, and many treatment options are available that can give couples the freedom they desire and help to ensure an active and healthy sex life as they age, with great success. The really important message, for the literally tens of thousands of Canadian couples affected with sexual dysfunction, is to speak to their healthcare professional for information and understand their treatment options."
The national online survey was conducted by Leger Marketing using Leger Marketing's Web panel between April 14th and April 20th, 2009. It was sponsored by Eli Lilly Canada Inc. The survey interviewed a total of 1,510 respondents who were Canadian adults, 18 years of age and older. Of those 1,510 respondents, 494 were over the age of 50. Using a national random sample of 1,510 respondents from Leger Marketing's Web panel, this method simulates a probability sample that would yield a maximum margin of error of +/-2.5%, 19 times out of 20. The margin of error among the 494 respondents over the age of 50 is +/-4.4%, 19 times out of 20.
About Lilly
Lilly, a leading innovation-driven corporation, is developing a growing portfolio of first-in-class and best-in-class pharmaceutical products by applying the latest research from its own worldwide laboratories and from collaborations with eminent scientific organizations. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, Lilly provides answers - through medicines and information - for some of the world's most urgent medical needs. Eli Lilly Canada, headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, employs close to 700 people across the country. Additional information about Eli Lilly Canada can be found at www.lilly.ca.
To see original link: http://www.globeinvestor.com/servlet/story/CNW.20090723.C8037/GIStory
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