The Health Minister, Jillian Skinner, was in Forbes on Tuesday to visit the $40.9 million redevelopment at the Hospital. She toured the refurbished ambulatory care, oral health and renal units. The refurbished building houses outpatient services (including physiotherapy, dietetics, occupational therapy, speech pathology, child and family health and women’s health), counselling services (such as mental health, drug and alcohol), visiting specialists and
pathology services.

The Minister’s visit came on the day when she announced that patients and visitors to the Orange Hospital will have more free parking options with 160 new spaces to be created at the cost of about $1 million. “We understand accessible car parking is vital to ensuring a hospital visit is not made more stressful than it often is,” Jillian said.

A first tranche off 77 spaces will be constructed by the NSW Government in partnership with Orange City Council on the northern boundary of Orange Hospital and at the rear of the Orange Ex-Services Club. These spaces are scheduled to be available for use early in the new year.

Forbes joined the rest of the country on Tuesday to get dressed up with hat or fascinators included, have lunch and watch the Melbourne Cup. Almost 30 Neighborhood Central clients were treated to a lunch at the HACC Centre and a Fashions on the Field Show afterwards.

The ladies are all from the craft group and made their fascinators for the special day.

At the Forbes Services Memorial Club more than 70 women attended a special lunch in support of the Forbes Breast Cancer Support Group. There was a fashion parade and prizes for best hat and best dressed.

The short answer is Yes.
All hamstring injuries have some involvement either directly or indirectly from our back and nerves and how we control movement of the pelvis. Our hamstrings attach to the bottom of our pelvis. They work to not only straighten the hip and bend the knee but to also help stabilise the pelvis. Any change in back position affects our pelvic position which in turn affects our hamstring length.

The nerves supplying our hamstrings originate in the lumbar spine. Any tightness or stiff joints in the lower back can impact on the ability of the nerves to glide and move through the hamstrings. We know muscles protect nerves, so if we have a tight nerve coming from our lower back, the hamstrings will tighten to protect this nerve. This tightness puts the muscle at risk of injury when it is working hard. The load is magnified if the hamstring is working overtime to control the pelvis when the gluteal muscles or the joints in the lumbar spine are not working efficiently.

This is why sometimes you can stretch and stretch your hammies and they just won’t loosen up. They may be protecting a tight nerve. By stretching them you are putting the nerve under strain which actually makes the muscle tighten further. In this case we need to look to the lumbar spine to free up this tight nerve.

If you suffer from hamstring tightness or recurrent hamstring injury it is important to address what is happening in your lumbar spine and pelvic control before your hamstring can completely recover.

“For the fitness of you”
Linda Reilly

CanAssist received $18,100 from the Forbes Services Club on Wednesday from the ticket sales for the Dancing With The Stars charity night to be held on 5th November at the Club. The response to the ticket sales was fantastic with a sellout within seven hours. David Fitzgerald, General Manager of the Club said: “The Club is proud to be the host venue by way of providing assistance and support for the event, which is such a good cause and encourages the whole community to come together to support those suffering from the illness. This is another example of the way the whole of Forbes supports these charities.” Maureen Field, Treasurer of CanAssist said: “At the moment we have given $60,000 a year for patience assistance and this is all done through donations and events such as this, as we receive no Government grants. Special thanks should go to Therese Gunn and Cassandra Tyack, who along with all members of CanAssist have done such a fabulous job.”

On the night of Dancing with The Stars, with all contestants unknown, there will be an auction and raffle prizes to be won. These were sponsored by local businesses who made the event possible.

Children’s Week celebrates the rights of children to enjoy childhood, and plenty of children were doing just that on Wednesday. Northside Chapel was a frenzy of happy faces, as local service providers joined forces to celebrate childhood. About 100 pre-schoolers and toddlers from playgroups, pre-schools and early childhood centres around Forbes brought their carers along for a morning of crafty activities and plenty of fun.

This year’s theme was “children have the right to reliable information from the media”, which is taken from the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. In keeping with the theme the craft play centred around paper – kids made their own newspaper pirate hats, got their fingers into some paper mache, made their own badges, or got busy colouring-in.

Dietician Catherine Forbes had some healthy choices games for the kids, while others got their faces painted or donned temporary tattoos. The jumping castle was another popular activity. The Children’s Week celebrations are an annual event in Forbes, and provide a great opportunity for the service providers to get together. Workers from SaCC, Centacare and Parkes Family Support Service joined the early childhood teachers to celebrate childhood with a lot of very happy kids.