20-Minute Health Talk

You might think that living a full life past 100 is a stretch, but these centenarians say otherwise: They’re active, inspired and full of energy after 100-plus years and counting. They shared their New Year's resolutions in a commercial from Northwell Health, and now they’re revealing their thoughts on healthy aging. From diet and exercise to purpose, pets and stress, these centenarians share thei...

As 2023 comes to a close, we look back on five exciting medical advances coming from the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research — the research arm of Northwell Health. In the last year alone, investigators published more than 3,000 papers in peer-reviewed journals. In this episode, we spotlight studies that made strides against cancer, knee pain, paralysis, postpartum depression and inflammator...

Two years after surviving a high shooting that claimed the lives of four of her fellow students, Kylie Ossege, now 19, is still recovering from the physical and emotional trauma left by the bullet that shattered her clavicle and nearly left her paralyzed. On this episode, Sandra Lindsay, RN , speaks with Kylie about the November 30, 2021 attack, her fight to regain the ability to walk and her rece...

In recognition of World AIDS Day today, we encourage you to listen to this classic episode of the podcast from early 2022 exploring the injectable form of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), the first option to prevent HIV that does not involve taking a daily pill. At the time of this recording (June 28, 2022), the newly approved treatment had begun to hit the market. Our colleague David Reich-Hale s...

Exposure to the smoke from burn pits — the large open-air fires the military has used to dispose of waste — harmed veterans such as Juan Serrano , Patrick McCaffery and Robert Auletta, who work with Northwell Health's Military Liaison Services. Of the more than 10K U.S. veterans who have already been diagnosed with burn pit damage to their airways, the picture is grim and the reaction, most often,...

On this episode of 20-Minute Health Talk, we take another look at our August 2022 conversation with Anthony Szema, MD . At the time of this episode's recording, the pulmonologist was days removed from a visit to the White House to celebrate the passage of the  PACT Act , new legislation that is now helping impacted veterans get treatment. As a leading expert in the health effects of burn pits , he...

While the flu shot has been around since 1945, 2023 marked the introduction of a new vaccine for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) — the first ever — and the latest Covid-19 shot. The Food and Drug Administration recently approved the two new vaccines, and the protection they offer comes just in the nick of time: Health officials say there is a strong likelihood of another " tripledemic " this win...

In recent months the FDA and CDC approved two new drugs that experts say will change how respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is managed. This comes at a critical time, says Mundeep Kainth, DO, MPH , as hospitals prepare for the influx of RSV, flu and Covid cases this fall and winter. The convergence of those three respiratory viruses, termed a " tripledemic ," overwhelmed hospitals nationally last w...

On today’s episode, we revisit a conversation we had with two pioneers of the mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccines, Katalin Karikó, PhD, and Drew Weissman, MD, PhD. The two were just awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their groundbreaking research in messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. When we spoke with Dr. Kariko and Weissman in June 2022, they had just received the Ross Prize in Mo...

On the third and final episode in our series on child suicide prevention , we discuss the spike in suicidality among our LGBTQIA+ youth, as reported in 2023 by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, as well as The Trevor Project. David Rosenthal, DO, PhD, and Helena Roderick, PhD, highlight the many challenges negatively impacting these kids, including minority stress, discrimination an...

“We need to change the conversation from mental illness to mental wellness,” says Sharon Feldstein, who helped launch a nonprofit called YourMomCares with the goal of creating and supporting programs that better behavioral health in our kids. This group of concerned mothers, whose children are prominent athletes, musicians and actors, is bringing much-needed attention to the crisis in children's b...

With suicidal thoughts and behaviors on the rise in the U.S., Vera Feuer, MD , director of Emergency Psychiatry Services at Cohen Children’s Medical Center, joins Sandra Lindsay, RN , on the podcast to explain the warning signs and helpful resources for caretakers, including what language to use — as well as what to avoid — when talking to children struggling with suicidality. This is Part 1 of ou...

Murray Bocian, 76, was prone to spilling things: His hands were so shaky that he had to begin using a child's sippy cup. Murray was battling a condition called essential tremor , and it was impacting many aspects of his daily life. A nervous system disorder, essential tremor starts in the brain and triggers shakiness in the extremities, most often the hands. For most of the 10 million Americans li...

The field of sports medicine isn’t just for serious athletes: The Nicholas Institute for Sports Medicine and Athletic Trauma (NISMAT) , Northwell’s sports injury clinic, has made sports medicine better, more accessible, and grounded in research. On this episode, the 20-Minute Health Talk team pays a visit to NISMAT, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, to talk to Tak Fukunaga, DPT,...

While cancer deaths are in decline in the United States, there is one glaring exception: Prostate cancer. Over the last decade, the number of prostate cancer deaths has risen by 3%. Our guest today, Ardeshir Rastinehad, DO , has made it his mission to turn that number around. In addition to his leading role in developing a safer, more accurate approach to prostate biopsies, the former National Ins...

Within a three-block radius of P.S. 175 in Harlem, there are 55 fast-food restaurants, 29 pharmacies and not one affordable food option, something Tony Hillery noticed while volunteering at the school more than a decade ago. He also saw an opportunity to help, which is why he launched Harlem Grown . Starting with one abandoned lot across the street from the school, Tony and the kids have built it...

The lack of consistent access to quality food, or food insecurity , can have a devastating impact on people's health and well-being. In the wealthiest nation in the world, 34 million people, including 9 million children, are food insecure — a silent crisis that our guest, Debbie Salas-Lopez, MD, MPH , says is only getting worse. She explains how food insecurity impacts health at every age and what...

Hospital food  has a reputation for being bland and inedible — something that's no longer true at Northwell's 21 hospitals. Over the last seven years, our guests — Sven Gierlinger and Chef Bruno Tison — have transformed hospital meals by ditching frozen food and sugary drinks for fresh meats, fruits and vegetables. They've ensured that hospital kitchens prioritize fresh ingredients and cater to th...

Pregnancy is like a stress test on the body. Most women adapt just fine, but for some, the strain can dramatically raise the risk of heart disease — even in young women. Worse, that risk can remain elevated for years and even decades. On this episode, host Sandra Lindsay, DHS-c, RN, speaks with Evelina Grayver, MD , about how to prevent heart-related problems before, during and after pregnancy. Be...

Knowing what you want to be when you grow up can be tricky, but the New York City's Department of Education internship program, FutureReadyNYC , is designed to help. The program provides high school students with exposure to professional careers; Northwell is the program's first healthcare partner. Lenox Hill Hospital on Manhattan's Upper East Side, LIJ Forest Hills Hospital in Queens, and Lenox H...

Of the 1 million people who need hernia surgery in the US each year, most get a procedure that inserts a mesh patch to cover the hernia. Mesh surgery has a high rate of success and satisfies most patients, but some people would rather skip the insert. There is an alternative called the Shouldice Approach: Instead of using mesh, this procedure stitches together the patient's own tissue to repair a...

On this episode,  Sandra Lindsay  speaks with  Monique Rainford, MD , about her new book, " Pregnant While Black: Advancing Justice for Maternal Health in America ." The Yale Medicine OB-GYN discusses the role implicit bias and institutional racism play in the birthing experience for Black women in the United States. She offers strategies to reduce maternal mortality rates, which are three times h...

For too long, Black women have faced high maternal mortality rates, largely due to institutional bias, says Dawnette Lewis, MD , director of Northwell Health's Center for Maternal Health. She joins host Sandra Lindsay, RN, DHSc on this episode during Black Maternal Health Week to discuss the barriers to care Black women face, and what her team is doing to improve access to life-saving services bef...

This new docu-series follows the lives of a diverse cast of healthcare pros, including paramedics, nurses, emergency physicians and surgeons. On this podcast, we speak with two of the people featured in Emergency NYC: David Langer, MD , and his patient Julian Primiano, a young opera singer who underwent brain surgery. Dr. Langer is the chair of neurosurgery at Lenox Hill Hospital, one of several N...

In Part 2 of this deep dive into ECT, which stands for electroconvulsive therapy,  Sohag Sanghani, MD , director of the ECT service at Zucker Hillside Hospital, talks about how the treatment was born, from its invention in 1938 by Italian scientists Ugo Cerletti and Lucio Bini, to the advent of modified ECT, to it’s impact today. He shares the importance of shedding stigma around ECT, which contin...