County Officials, Community Efforts Focus on Underage Drinking

SCHODACK, NY (03/24/2008)(readMedia)-- As members of the Greenbush Area School Community Partnership Underage Drinking Coalition and the Safe Homes Program, the providers of Schodack Internal Medicine and Pediatrics will join Rensselaer County Executive Kathleen M. Jimino and local community members for a Town Hall Meeting to discuss efforts to prevent underage alcohol use. This meeting will be held April 3, 2008 at 7pm at the Comfort Inn Suites, Miller Road, East Greenbush, Schodack, NY.

Participating in the discussion will be local community and school board members, community leaders, local law enforcement and county official Kathleen Jimino, who has made decreasing underage alcohol use a priority for her office. In addition, a panel of Columbia High School students will discuss their experiences and perceptions regarding the topic. The purpose of this meeting is to gather information from local youth and the community at large regarding truths about drinking among teenagers. Attendees will be asked to participate in a discussion about how to collectively solve the problems facing our youth today. These recommendations will then be shared with elected officials and community leaders.

“This meeting is a collaborative effort to curb underage drinking in our community, among our children,” says James Leyhane, MD from Schodack Internal Medicine and Pediatrics. “As a provider, I know that compromised health is a frequent corollary of alcohol abuse. By discussing underage alcohol use with my community members and moreover, with youths who are directly experiencing this, I can do my part outside the clinical setting.”

The fact is that drinking continues to be widespread among adolescents. According to the Surgeon General in 2007, alcohol is the most widely used substance of abuse among America’s youth. More importantly, these bad habits can have lasting effects. There are physical consequences ranging from death from alcohol poisoning, medical problems, risky sexual behavior, driving accidents, injuries, assaults, and even suicide.

There are also legal implications to underage drinking, as pointed out by ‘Safe Homes’, a Columbia High School program that recruits parents to pledge not to serve alcohol in their homes to underage children. Underage drinking is a crime and parents are liable. Safe Homes stresses that all teenagers need to be appropriately supervised because parents don’t need to be in the home to be sued for what happens there. The goal is to get parents to take a proactive role in keeping kids safe.

Dr. Leyhane stresses, “Parents need to let go of the ‘not my child’ mentality and get involved. There are secondhand effects of drinking and your child can still get hurt even if they are not the one using.“ In fact, about 45% of people who die in crashers involving a drinking driver under the age of 21 are people other than the driver.

This Town Meeting allows for open dialogue that will hopefully offer insight into the experiences of teenagers and foster an environment for positive change.

Schodack Internal Medicine and Pediatrics is a member of Community Care Physicians, PC. Community Care Physicians, PC, is a physician-owned, physician-governed, multi-specialty medical group with more than 200 physicians and other clinical providers, located in four counties surrounding the Albany, New York greater Capital District. Community Care Physicians medical services include Internal Medicine, Pediatrics, Family Medicine, Obstetrics & Gynecology, Radiology, Radiation Oncology, Laboratory, General Surgery, Urology, Dermatology, Physical Therapy, Podiatry, Audiology, Occupational Medicine, Urgent Care, Diabetic Education, and Nutrition.

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If you would like more information on this topic, please call Alexis Musto at 518-213-0322 or John Sawchuk at 518-207-2000.