SPECIAL SECTION   As a woman with lots of coarse, dark hair, I have always been an excellent candidate for expensive grooming. During years of prosperity, I’ve sported multi-tonal color, stayed relaxed with twice-monthly massages and even had twice-yearly therapeutic pedicures.

In these modest economic times, my hooves and tresses are neglected. But while I may do my own dye and dab my roots with black brown mascara, I’d never stoop to cutting my own hair.

Every girl has standards.

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SPECIAL SECTION   Your smile matters. Spokane dentist Stanley Sargent believes people make their first impressions within seven seconds, and their teeth say a lot.

Whether someone is looking for a boost to their self-esteem or an aesthetic edge in the workplace, Sargent says local dentists offer a variety of options for promoting healthy and attractive teeth.

“We can give you that Hollywood smile,” he says. Read More>>

COOKING   The holidays can be magical and all, but bitter cold and lack of sunlight coupled with an in-law invasion could easily drive anyone to drink. And that’s no lie: The Distilled Spirits Company of the United States reports that a quarter of liquor companies’ profits are made in the stretch between Thanksgiving and New Year’s alone. Read More>>

SENIORS   In the last few years, Stephen Willis has talked to more and more patients about the hormone that, physically speaking, makes men be men: testosterone.

It deepens the voice, grows the beard and puts on muscle. It stimulates the sex drive. But after age 30, testosterone levels start a downward trek. Though “T” decreases by only about 1 percent a year, over a couple of decades… well, a lot of testosterone is just not there anymore. And that’s what worries Willis’s patients. Read More>>

NEWS   The future of American health care is being built from the ground up right off Interstate 90 at the Sullivan exit in Spokane Valley.

If this is surprising, it shouldn’t be. Spokane is the largest health care hub between Seattle and Minneapolis. The metropolitan region recently ranked fourth in the nation for the highest employment numbers and wages in this field.

But it’s not the six hospitals in the city, the 20,000 health care professionals who work here or the new medical school being built downtown that mark the change in how our ailments and illnesses are dealt with, though of course they help. Read More>>

FROM THE EDITOR  Grab your mug and fill it up. Just in time for the chilly mornings coming our way, a new study of more than 40,000 healthy Germans confi rms, yet again, that drinking coffee has health benefi ts. In this study, those who drank at least three cups a day of regular or decaffeinated coffee were about 25 percent less likely to develop diabetes over the next nine years as people who drank little or no coffee. Hallelujah! A cup, or three, of coffee each day is one health habit I can wholeheartedly endorse. While coffee has already been found to offer some protection from Parkinson’s disease and gallstones, most of us aren’t drinking it because it’s so healthy. We simply need it to rev up our sleepy selves for the day ahead. Read More>>

GUEST COLUMN  We’ve all heard the old adage: The Spokane area is a great place to raise a family. Central to this statement is a belief about our residents’ health as a resource that enables our community to achieve its fullest potential. But the Spokane Regional Health District’s recent report, Health Inequities in Spokane County, paints a different picture of the town where I was born. In reality, health inequities are affecting the lives and futures of people all over the world. Spokane is no different. Read More>>

NEWS   New technology improves speed and treatment for heart attacks, reasons to count calories before your next night out and where are we at with whooping cough? Read More>>

NEWS   Francisco Velazquez insists on symmetry. Even sitting at a huge table flanked by leather-backed chairs and a jumble of expensive video equipment, he makes sure his Blackberry and iPhone (the former for business, the latter for pleasure) are situated in neat symmetry with each other.

It makes sense, in a way: As the new CEO of Pathology Associates Medical Lab (PAML), ensuring that the supply chain for his labs remains orderly and on-time will be key to growing the business. And growth is what he’s here for. Read More>>

NEWS   When Gregorio Rodriguez worked in construction more than 20 years ago, safety was something workers and employers hid from. When government safety inspectors dropped by the Boise area job sites where he worked, no one wanted to give the inspectors a reason to cause trouble or issue citations. So no one worked.

“You didn’t continue working until they were gone,” he says. “That’s what we were instructed to do.”

Safety regulations weren’t taken seriously. “For us it was like you didn’t really follow them,” Rodriguez says. “You just hoped you didn’t caught.” Read More>>