Dove Schmidt from Depew, OK, was crowned Ms OK Senior America on June 25.  She will be competing in the National pageant for Ms Senior America in Atlantic City, NJ in October.  The Ms. Senior Oklahoma Foundation is having a CASINO PARTY FUNDRAISER at  the  Quail Springs Grand Tapestry located at 14201 N Kentucky, Oklahoma City,  Oct. 8th  from 6:00 to 9:00 pm with hors d’ oeuvres and beverages. Join us as we help to provide a special send off and encourage her in the final step of competition.

What is your favorite thing about living at Grand Tapestry at Quail Springs?

“I love the pool.  I also like relaxing on the patio with my friends.  It is beautiful here.” Sue Cooper
Resident

“The people here are fabulous!  Everyone goes out of their way to make things great.” Patti Vienup
Resident

“My favorite part is the friendship. There are two women that I do everything with. We call ourselves, The Three Musketeers.” Mary Hendrickson
Resident

“The people here are wonderful.  I love the many activities and I feel like I am living in a 5-star hotel.” Gwyn Walters
Resident

The Walk to End Alzheimer’s – Southwest Oklahoma, held in Lawton, Okla. on Saturday, August 27, had a record-breaking year with over 300 people in attendance and nearly $45,000 raised to support the mission of the Alzheimer’s Association. To show your support in OKC, join us at the Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark on Sept. 24. Visit OKCwalk.com to start, register or donate to a team today.

Karen Hoyt, of Tulsa, Okla., lives her life in honor of the stranger who gifted her a second chance at life. Now, an active community volunteer, she encourages those in need of that same gift.
Karen lives every day with a grateful spirit and the heart to be an encouragement and motivation to others. She had always lived a healthy life despite being born with only one kidney. She was active in her community as a volunteer, teacher and Sunday school teacher at her church. In 2010, she learned that her liver was failing, and she was later diagnosed with the Hepatitis C virus.
She was sent home thinking her days were numbered. Despite this news, she clung to her faith and began eating even healthier than she had before the diagnosis. Luckily, antiviral medication came out and she was cured of Hepatitis C by 2011 but end stage liver failure still loomed over her.
Karen went back to her career as a teacher and continued to live as healthy as possible. During one of her screenings, the doctor determined that her damaged liver was not removing toxins from her blood, which diminished her mental capabilities. She also became limited on what she could do as she frequently had muscle fatigue, liver pain and joint pain.
After learning to manage her pain, Karen’s luck began to worsen. When she was at one of her regular check-ups, the doctors found a cancerous tumor on her liver. Her doctors recommended a liver transplant, and in the midst of the listing process, she began to make end-of-life plans with her daughter. To cheer their spirits, they began to look online at stories of hope from others who had received a transplant. Karen was encouraged, and continued to eat healthy and walk when she could.
When Karen was fully listed on the transplant waiting list, she was humbled to think that at someone’s greatest crisis in life they would make a decision which would eventually grant her many more years to live. She was so humbled that she called her transplant coordinator and almost asked them to remove her from the list.
As she waited for a second chance at life, Karen underwent many procedures to shrink the tumor on her liver so that she could remain on the transplant waiting list. Twice, Karen was called in hopes that she would receive her liver, but neither were a good fit.
However, on April 13, 2015, Karen received her liver from a selfless donor and learned that her donor was the same age as many of the students she was teaching in school. Karen had the privilege of advising one more English class full of seniors after her transplant.
Karen continues her work with senior high school students. To this day, Karen volunteers at the school she taught at for many years and at the hospital with people who have just received a transplant.
Karen is a motivation and encouragement to many. She encourages others waiting to receive their life saving transplant, and she spends her time teaching nutrition classes. The classes help those struggling with kidney or liver disease learn to eat better in order to live a healthier life.
Driven to honor her donor, Karen participated in the 2016 Transplant Games of America. She began entering 5K runs to raise awareness for organ donation. She also is more adventurous and does things she wouldn’t have tried before to honor him and his life.
Karen has had the opportunity and privilege to be involved in her grandkids lives and is thankful for the chance to be a sister, mother and wife.
While Karen has never had the opportunity to meet her hero’s family, she truly lives her life in honor of the young man who saved her life.
About LifeShare
LifeShare is a nonprofit, federally designated organ procurement organization (OPO) dedicated to the recovery of organs and tissue for transplant purposes. We work closely with five transplant centers and 145 healthcare organizations in the state of Oklahoma to facilitate donation. Additionally, we strive to raise awareness for organ, eye and tissue donation and transplantation through public education.
For more information about LifeShare, please visit:
www.LifeShareOK.org.

Photography and Text by Terry “Travels with Terry” Zinn  t4z@aol.com

Some Florida resorts are located amid a massive amount of traffic and tourist activity. The Marriott Pompano Beach Resort and Spa is somewhat off the beaten track, and is boon for motorists, with their own transportation.
While a stroll within a mile of the property can be charming, there are not many cafes, restaurants or shops within the immediate area. If your desire is to get away from it all, and just ensconce yourself in a comfortable setting with pristine and maintained beaches, 2 pools, 2 towers of accommodations and delicious eating experiences, Marriott Pompano Beach Resort and Spa may be your ideal.
When you consider a visit to Florida at any time of year, it is important to keep in mind the annual hurricane season from mid-summer through September. Of course these days, predictable weather patterns of past years seem to be unpredictable. It’s a boon to Pompano that they are far North of Miami Beach with its recent health headlines. It also is North of Fort Lauderdale, and a comfortable distance from its neighbor Lauderdale-By-the-Sea, which is a more active community with its many eateries and entertainment options. Again motorists will find it near enough to quench a typical Florida tourist’s appetite.
Near Pompano is the Hillsboro Lighthouse, privately owned and only open for tours at certain times, being a coast guard operated property. Upcoming tour dates for 2016 are: September 10, October 8, November 6, and December 3.
Happily, sequestered in your ninth floor ocean front room with balcony, you might find the sporadic afternoon thunderstorm a real 3-D entertainment, more impactful than the best free action disaster movie, shown on your large in room TV screen. Be sure and inquire about a corner suite room, for added luxury. As with many upscale hotels, housekeeping may be sporadic, even when alerting them to your out of room schedule.
Check in time is listed at 4 pm, but as someone I know had to do, you might have to wait until 6 pm, which will give you time to explore the property, Atlantic Ocean beach, Spa, and exercise room or grab a bite to eat.
McCoy’s restaurant both comfortably inside or out by the active pools, offers a variety of delectable meal options and beverages with congenial wait staff. If you’re a fan of specially cocktails, with the proper and courtesy instruction, they follow through with your requests most satisfactorily.
Florida still offers what many sun worshipers require and the family welcoming Marriott’s Pompano Beach Resort, might be your new favorite Florida oasis for you and your extended family.

For more information and reservations: www.marriott.com/fllpm

Mr. Terry Zinn – Travel Editor
Past President: International Food Wine and Travel Writers Association
http://realtraveladventures.com/author/zinn/
http://www.examiner.com/travel-in-oklahoma-city/terry-zinn
www.new.okveterannews.com – www.martinitravels.com

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has awarded Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation scientist Xiao-Hong Sun, Ph.D., a five-year, $2.76 million grant to investigate a recently discovered immune cell involved in asthma.
The role of the new cell, called an innate lymphoid cell, is to protect the body from parasitic infection. However, when too much of this cell type is present, it seems to result in asthma.
“These cells were previously thought to be made only in bone marrow,” said Sun, who holds the Lew and Myra Ward Chair in Biomedical Research at OMRF. “We discovered that they are also made in the thymus, which brings up some interesting connections to asthma.”
The thymus, which sits on top of the heart, is a major site for the creation of T cells, a type of specialized white blood cell that plays a central role in immunity. During childhood and through puberty, the thymus generates a lifetime supply of T cells—enough to carry through adulthood. When the supply of T cells is adequate, the thymus has done its job and begins to shrink.
Sun postulates that innate lymphoid cells are also present in the thymus and might explain why children have higher rates of asthma than adults.
“Since kids have a very active thymus when they’re born and up to puberty, they’re more likely to have a large number of innate lymphoid cells coming from the thymus along with the T cells,” said Sun. “This is also the stage of life where many kids tend to develop asthma. People often say they ‘grow out” of asthma as they get older, so maybe it’s linked to this later decrease in thymus function. That’s what we hope to find out with this grant.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 7.7 percent of people in the United States suffer from asthma. The highest rates of asthma occur in the 5-14 age group at 10.3 percent and decline over time, reaching a low point of 6.9 percent in Americans over the age of 65.
“We don’t yet know the significance of this finding, but if we determine this hypothesis to be true, it would have great clinical relevance,” she said. “Perhaps the thymus is where we need to look for ways to control asthma in children. That’s what we hope to learn.”
The grant will also allow Sun and her lab to further investigate whether the innate lymphoid cells produced in the thymus differ from the ones made in the bone marrow.
Sun said their discovery of innate lymphoid cells in the thymus came about by accident through study of a particular mouse model in their lab—a model they’ve used for more than two decades to study T cell development.
“This research builds on our experience and what we have been working on the past 25 years, so it puts us in a unique position to do this work,” she said. “I am very excited to see how this cell is controlled and hope we can learn what happens in the thymus and how it might be linked to asthma. It really fits really well with the overall research of this lab and comes back to what started this lab in the first place.”