NyE Coalition hosting chronic disease workshops

Those who are suffering from chronic diseases may want to consider attending NyE Communities Coalition’s Chronic Disease Self-Management Workshop.

The workshop is a six-week, two-and-a-half-hour program that teaches the skills needed in the day-to-day management of a variety of serious ailments.

Matteline Becker is the Director of Health Programs at the coalition.

Becker, who earned a master’s degree in social work, said the program, which is based on curriculum from Stanford University in many cases, can lead to a reduction in illness and improved overall health.

“The class deals with things like nutrition, physical activity, fall prevention, and dealing with difficult emotions surrounding chronic diseases, and any kind of illness that you will have for the rest of your life, so it’s a very broad range,” she said. “We take anyone who either has a chronic disease or is a caregiver for somebody with a chronic disease. We have a lot of participants who take the class over and over and over because they just get so much from it each time with different individuals in the class as well.”

Communication is key

Becker also spoke about the skills needed to help manage chronic diseases.

“Communication is a big one, not only for family, friends, but also your medical providers,” she noted. “It also covers dealing with difficult emotions such as anger and sadness, and things like that. It’s also about just learning different skills when it comes to nutrition and physical activity. We do a lot of things having to do with reading food labels and understanding what healthy food is.”

Not in person

Additionally, Becker noted that out of an abundance of caution, the classes are presently being taught virtually.

“Since the participants all mostly have a chronic disease, we want to make sure that we’re being really careful in terms of COVID-19,” she said. “We try to have at least eight people, and we’ve done the class with less, but we want to have a full class whenever possible. The classes started on August 18, and run through September 22nd, however, we can do makeup classes, so if anybody wants to start next week, we can do a makeup class in between and get them all ready for the following week. We actually have six people that are trained to lead this class, so we rotate.”

More to come

Further, Becker said there are more workshops coming up later this year as well.

“We are scheduled out through the end of the year, and we’re also going to be looking into doing a condensed phone version of the class,” she said. “If any of these times don’t work for individuals, we’ll be able to schedule them in groups of two to three, I believe. We can do it either over the phone or Zoom and it’s just a shorter amount of time and then it can be outside of our regular workshop dates. In the class, we always talk about all of the other health and wellness programs that we have here at the coalition and encourage people to join those as well. Along with the class, attendees get a free workbook, meditation CD. So those are all just other things that you get for free with the class.”

Following the current class, which is now underway, additional classes are scheduled to run from Sept. 29, through Nov. 3, along with another class beginning Nov. 10, through Dec. 22.

The classes are open to Lincoln and Esmeralda County residents as well.

For more information on the workshops, or to reserve a spot, email Becker at matteline@nyecc.org

Contact reporter Selwyn Harris at sharris@pvtimes.com. On Twitter: @pvtimes