A wild first season of the expanded Big 12 is down to what should be a chaotic final weekend. Through all the upsets, unexpected rises and falls, there are nine teams still in the mix to play in the conference championship game. No. 14 Arizona State and No. 17 Iowa State have the best odds, yet a multitude of scenarios could play out — 256 to be exact. There's even the possibility of an eight-team tie. It may take a mathematician to figure out which teams are in the Dec. 7 game in Arlington, Texas — even for the ones who win. Travis Hunter, Colorado. The Buffaloes' two-way star has excelled on both sides of the field, making him one of the favorites to win the Heisman Trophy. Cam Skattebo, Arizona State. The senior running back can do a little of everything, but excels at punishing would-be tacklers. He's one of the nation's leaders in yards after contact and the focal point of the Sun Devils' offense. Shadeur Sanders, Colorado. If it weren't for Hunter, Sanders might be the Heisman favorite. The son of coach Deion Sanders, Shedeur is fifth nationally with 3,488 yards passing and has been a big part of the Buffaloes' turnaround. DJ Giddens, Kansas State. The Wildcats' running back is one of the nation's most versatile players. He is ninth nationally with 1,271 rushing yards and has added 21 receptions for 258 yards. Tetairoa McMillan, Arizona. The Wildcats have struggled this season, but McMillan has not. He is third nationally with 1,251 receiving yards with seven touchdowns on 78 catches. Jacob Rodriguez, Texas Tech. The Red Raiders' junior linebacker leads the Big 12 with 68 tackles, averaging 10.2 per game. He also has four sacks. Brendan Mott, Kansas State. He's a menace to opposing quarterbacks, leading the Big 12 with 8 1/2 sacks. The Big 12 has nine teams already bowl eligible and two more a win away. The winner of the Big 12 championship game will be in the mix for a College Football Playoff spot. Arizona State, Iowa State, No. 19 BYU, Colorado, Kansas State, Baylor, TCU, Texas Tech and West Virginia have already clinched bowl berths. Kansas and Cincinnati can get into the postseason with wins this weekend. Gus Malzahn, UCF. Despite successes in recruiting, the Knights are 10-14 in two seasons since moving to the Big 12. Maybe not enough to get shown the door this year, but another mediocre season could lead UCF to make a change. Kyle Whittingham, Utah. Whittingham was one of the Pac-12's best coaches, leading the Utes to consecutive conference titles. Utah was expected to contend for the Big 12 title its first year in the league, but enters the final weekend 1-7 in conference play, which could push Whittingham toward retirement since it's doubtful he'd be fired. Neal Brown, West Virginia. The Mountaineers' coach was in a precarious spot at the end of last season and West Virginia hasn't lived up to expectations this season. The Mountaineers are eligible to go to a bowl game for the second straight season, but Brown could be on the hot seat even after signing a contract extension before the season. Josiah Trotter, West Virginia. The redshirt freshman is the latest Trotter to have success at the linebacker position, following the footsteps of his father, former Philadelphia Eagles player Jeremiah Trotter, and brother Jeremiah Trotter Jr., a current Eagles linebacker. Sam Leavitt, Arizona State. The Michigan State transfer has been just what the Sun Devils' needed: an agile quarterback who extends plays with his legs and rarely makes bad decisions. Bryson Washington, Baylor. The Bears' running back has rushed for 812 yards — 196 against TCU — and 10 TDs. TCU has the Big 12's highest rated 2025 recruiting class with six four-star players among 26 commitments, according to the 247 Sports composite. Receiver Terry Shelton of Carrollton, Texas, is the highest-rated recruit at 71st nationally. Baylor is next with five five-star players among its 20 commitments, including running back Michael Turner, rated 13th at his position out of North Richland Hills, Texas. Texas Tech is ranked seventh in the Big 12, but has four four-star recruits. Get local news delivered to your inbox!Some make the switch from Windows to Mac after a lifetime on the former, and never go back. But sometimes, people go the opposite direction when they get tired of Apple's anti-consumer shenanigans and pricing structures. Maybe you want a fully customizable operating system that doesn't make you wait over a decade for simple features like window tiling, one that you can load up on a PC that you built with your own two hands. Or maybe you're just getting impatient with the state of gaming on a Mac and you need a dedicated Wintendo. Whatever your reasons, if you've spent a long time with macOS, prepare for an adjustment period. In some cases, it's a matter of retraining that muscle memory you've acquired over the years; things like pressing Ctrl + V instead of Cmd + V to paste. In others, it's learning how to navigate the Control Center, make changes in the registry, and being sure to run that virus scan Windows Defender has been begging you to. It can be overwhelming, so use this list to get you started. Here are 12 suggestions brand-new Windows users (who have come over from Mac) need for a soft landing. On Mac, Universal Clipboard lets you copy between devices. But for some odd reason there is no visible clipboard utility. You have to copy things one at a time, or else download a third-party manager like Maccy , which usually won't be free. Thankfully, Windows has a great clipboard manager. You can summon it with the Windows key + V. Clipboard history is off by default, so the first time you press the shortcut, hit Turn on. If you like, you can also enable Share across devices to get something similar to Mac's Universal Clipboard. It will sync copied items to your Microsoft account, which you can access on other computers or through Microsoft SwiftKey on mobile. In addition to saving previously copied items, the Windows clipboard doubles as an emoji picker, a GIF searching tool, and a special symbol list. You can pin any copied item to the clipboard that you frequently paste for convenience's sake. If you'd like to remove the formatting from a copied item, then click the three dots and you'll get the option to paste as text. The only for real limitation to the Windows 11 clipboard is that there's a limit of 25 items, so people who do a lot of copying and pasting may need a third-party solution. On Mac, setting up multiple workspaces is as simple as dragging them to Mission Control in the menubar, or making them full screen and then three-finger swiping back and forth on the keyboard. Windows 11 supports similar functionality. On your taskbar, there should be an icon that looks like two overlapping squares. This is Task view. Click it (or invoke it with Windows + Tab), then click the plus button to create a new desktop — or if you want to do it a little bit faster, Windows key + Ctrl + D. You'll get a fresh workspace where you can open up the apps you want to use in it. It works best when you want to keep, say, your literal workspace separate from your personal one. To better separate the desktops, rename each desktop and change the background image. Right-click on your new workspace and click rename. Clicking the Choose background option will let you select a picture from your existing background library in the Personalize section. Swapping between these new desktops is as simple as clicking Task view (or the shortcut) and clicking your desired desktop, or using the right and left arrow keys with Windows key + Ctrl. For apps that get used regardless of which workspace you're in, we recommend setting up Snap layouts with Windows key + Z. Apple devices are linked together automatically to support nifty features like Handoff. You can get similar functionality through the Samsung ecosystem if you have a Samsung phone, watch, or tablet. However, even if you don't have a Samsung phone, Phone Link will sync any Android device or iPhone with your Windows 11 PC. Phone Link should already be installed on your PC, but you will need to install the app on your smartphone, and go through a fairly extensive setup process, too. In the smartphone app, toggle on Link to Windows and tap Add computer — we recommend disabling use Mobile data and Help us improve. You'll have to pair the devices either with a QR code or manually, then grant a long list of permissions on your smartphone so your Windows 11 PC can access everything from texts to contact info, and beyond. If you only wish to grant certain permissions for privacy concerns, the app will still work with just those permissions. Once you've done all that, the Phone Link app lets you do almost anything from your PC. You can see notifications, check the battery level, enable Do Not Disturb, control playing media, make calls, and control specific apps directly from your PC. There's very little you can't do. Phone Link is so powerful that your phone may never need to leave your pocket anytime you're sitting at your desk — though do be prepared for a bit of extra smartphone battery drain to keep Phone Link running in the background. Focus settings on Mac help to control notifications while you work, and you can share your focus status across devices, so there are no digital distractions anywhere when you set yourself to a task. On Windows, you can replicate this with Do not Disturb (accessible via the Notification Center), which you can program similar to Quiet Hours on Android . Focus sessions goes a step further with a handful of productivity features you won't find on Mac. Search for the Clock application and click the Focus sessions in the sidebar. We recommend pinning it to the taskbar (right-click on the taskbar icon to do so) if you plan on using it frequently. You've got a couple of options here. First, you can start a focus session for a specific period of time, during which there won't be any notifications, taskbar apps flashing you, or app notification badges. This could be helpful whether you want to work for a long, uninterrupted stretch, or do short bursts like the 25-minute Pomodoro technique; the app automatically schedules breaks for you, which you can skip if you'd like. You can also set a daily goal for how long (or how many sessions) you want to work for each day. Focus sessions also bundles in your Microsoft To Do list, and can integrate with Spotify to automatically start focus-specific soundscapes when you kick off a session. Customize all of this further in Start > Setting > System > Focus. While macOS Sequoia finally introduced window tiling shortcuts , it still pales in comparison to the implementation on Windows 11. Window tiling works smoother than ever before; simply drag an application to the top of the screen to maximize it, to the side to halve it, or to a corner to quarter it. Drag the divider lines to smoothly customize the dimensions of halved and quartered windows. Snap Assist will appear when you are tiling windows, showing you other open applications so you can quickly tile them into the remaining space. If you want a quicker way to organize the windows — especially for uncommon groupings like a larger middle window surrounded by two skinny windows — just rest your mouse on the Minimize and Maximize title buttons. The Snap layouts that pop up provide a helpful visual guide for organization. Apps that you group together frequently become a part of a Snap group, which you can revert to if you accidentally change the tiling configuration while using another app. You can do all of this from your keyboard if you like, too; press Windows key + Z, then the corresponding number for the layout you want. Or if you want an even faster option, hold down the Windows key and then press an arrow key; left and right puts it on the sides, up and down halve it horizontally. On macOS, there isn't much data collection going on. You can disable it all with a handful of clicks in Settings. Windows is a whole different beast. Microsoft collects a treasure trove of information about everything you do on your computer, so we recommend disabling the following Windows 11 telemetry settings. Go to Settings > Privacy & Security > General and disable "Let Apps show me personalized ads by using my advertising ID." On the same page, you can also disable "Let websites show me locally relevant content by accessing my language list," "Let Windows improve Start and search by tracking app launches," and "Show me suggested content in the Settings app." Go back to Privacy & Security, then Location to disable tracking for any apps you don't want — or all of them, if you like. Go back to Privacy & Security, then into Activity history and toggle off "Store my activity history on this device." Back again, then Diagnostics & Feedback, then toggle off "Send optional diagnostic data." Lower down on the page, you can also disable "Tailored experiences." Even further down, you can click delete under the "Delete diagnostic data." Last on this page, we highly recommend disabling "Improve inking and typing." Back in Privacy & Security, go to App Diagnostics and disable "App diagnostic access." Last but not least, go to Settings > Windows Updates > Advanced options > Delivery optimization, and toggle off "Allow downloads from other PCs;" this is both a privacy improvement and avoids your data caps going over, since windows tries to use your PC to update other computers with torrent-like peer-to-peer technology. While updates are incredibly important for keeping your computer bug-free, optimized, and secure, there's no denying Windows updates are far more annoying than they need to be. They often pop up at random times. Sometimes you'll walk away in the middle of an important task and return to find your PC randomly restarted by itself . It's less disruptive to disable automatic updates and choose to perform them at a more reasonable time. Disabling them temporarily is easy. Go to Settings > Windows Update and under "Pause updates," you can prevent updates from happening for up to five weeks. Admittedly, this is not a permanent fix. For that, you will need to make a small tweak in Services. Search in the Start menu for Services and click the "Services System" option. Find Windows Update in the list and double-click on it. In the Startup type section, change the drop-down menu from Manual to Disabled. Once you hit Apply, you're good to go. Note: if you do disable automatic updates, you must stay on top of them religiously; set a reminder on your phone to check for updates at least once a week. macOS Sonoma introduced Game Mode, which optimizes system performance and reduces Bluetooth latency, but that's about it. The Xbox Game Bar is on another level, allowing users to do screen capture and recording, chat and voice call with friends, tweak audio settings, see system hardware performance metrics, and much more. It should work as an overlay for any game, regardless of whether or not it's running from the Xbox app or another storefront, such as Steam or Epic. Summon the Game Bar at any time with the Windows key + G shortcut. Within Game Bar, you can add or remove widgets as needed; some non-Microsoft widgets, such as Spotify, are supported, and you can always get more through the Widget Store. Based on personal experience, it's arguably the best PC game overlay of its kind available, even compared to Steam. If in some extreme circumstance your PC requirements aren't enough for the Xbox app, then you can install the mobile version instead and still get many of the same features. A large part of the adjustment period with Windows 11 will be spent re-learning one's habitual shortcuts. A good chunk of them will require only changing a single key — Use Ctrl + A instead of Cmd + A, and so on. Others will be entirely new, such as the many Windows key shortcuts — Windows key + E summons the File Explorer, as one example. Here are a few good ones to get you started. Windows Key opens the Start Menu where you can open apps, search for files, or get basic web results, similar to how the search key or Cmd + spacebar opens Spotlight on Mac. Ctrl + Shift + Esc brings up the Task Manager, the Windows 11 equivalent of the Activity Monitor or Force Quit window; you'll be using this one quite a lot to stop unresponsive programs and find out what's hogging system resources. Windows Key + L will lock your device so you can step away, Windows Key + I opens the settings, and Windows Key + Shift + S opens the screenshot utility — we highly recommend looking at all the Windows key shortcuts, since this activates all the coolest features. F2 renames a selected file. Shift + Delete permanently deletes a file so it skips the Recycle Bin entirely. We've really just barely scratched the surface on the many helpful Windows shortcuts you will need. View a more comprehensive list here . Installing and uninstalling software on macOS is a dream, compared to Windows. You double-click a downloaded .dmg file and drag the application to the programs folder, and if you want to uninstall, you drag the app from the programs folder to the trash can. That's it. Windows handles this situation... differently. Every application will have its own unique install wizard that requires you to click through at least a half dozen sections — which is different for every app, and often full of random settings and crapware — then wait for a long install bar to complete. Uninstalling is worse, since most uninstallers do a pretty terrible job of removing their folders, settings files, and registry items. There's nothing you can do to make the install process smoother, but uninstalling certainly can improve. We highly recommend the program Geek Uninstaller . In addition to uninstalling a program, it removes every last trace of it; it's great whether you want to declutter, or to perform a clean removal to reinstall a problematic app. For power users, we recommend Revo Uninstaller , which does a more comprehensive job, so much so that it asks you whether or not you want to create a restore point before uninstalling any software. The free versions for both apps are incredibly powerful, with pro options for uninstalling hidden apps, Windows apps, browser extensions, and more. System-breaking bugs and errors are rare on macOS — most issues iron themselves out when you force quit an app that's giving you the spinning rainbow wheel , restart your computer, or sign out and back in. In the case of Windows, prepare to deal with regular, unexplained issues that require a deep dive into the forums and a healthy dose of patience, though new troubleshooting tools in Windows 11 may ameliorate that stress a bit. Go to Settings > System > Troubleshoot > Other Troubleshooters. There's a troubleshooter for just about every software or hardware problem you could run into; troubleshooters for your Internet connection, audio, printer, Bluetooth, keyboard, and more. Click Run for the respective issue and give it a second to automatically detect any problems, then follow the steps that appear. Based on personal experience, it usually succeeds in fixing what's wrong about half the time. For example, you may have selected a specific audio device that doesn't seem to be working. Run the Audio troubleshooter first before trawling an online forum to diagnose a deeper issue. Chromebooks have Google Gemini AI , macOS has Siri, and Windows has Copilot. Copilot handles a very broad range of AI-enabled tasks, and integrates ChatGPT-like functionality into a floating window or sidebar. Invoke it with the Windows key + C — or if you have one of the new Copilot+ PCs , the Copilot button. Here, you can ask Copilot questions, the same as you might ChatGPT. You can get basic technical support, such asking where to find a specific setting; install plug-ins to supercharge the assistant, like the Search plugin find things on the web; or, perform a visual search on the selected area of your screen. With a bit of experimentation, it can unlock a staggering, untapped level of power and productivity in your desktop experience. One of its many useful features is asking it to give the minutes for an ongoing meeting that you are late to in Microsoft Teams. In Word, it can rewrite sections of prose. It can convert some file types to another, such making a PowerPoint into a document. You can even generate images like DALL-E, or perform basic image edits to your pictures, such as blurring the background. Experiment with it, and see if you can't find a handful of ways for it to supercharge your productivity — or do something complex with only a prompt.
Irish premier Simon Harris has said Fine Gael will gain seats in the General Election despite a further fragmentation of Irish politics. Fine Gael won 35 seats in the 2020 election, but 18 of those TDs did not seek re-election in Friday’s poll. An exit poll puts the party’s support at 21%, a fraction of a percentage behind the main opposition party Sinn Fein. Mr Harris, the outgoing Taoiseach, was elected with 16,869 first preference votes, well above the quota. He celebrated with his wife Caoimhe, his parents Bart and Mary, his sister Gemma and his political team at the count centre in Greystones, Co Wicklow. Ahead of his re-election, Mr Harris told reporters he was “cautiously optimistic” about the election result and said it was “clear that my party will gain seats”. “It’s also clear that Fine Gael will top the poll in at least 10 constituencies, many more than we did the last time, that we will gain seats in constituencies where we haven’t had seats in many years, like Tipperary South and Waterford, and that we will add second seats in other constituencies as well,” he said. “I think the people of Ireland have now spoken. We now have to work out exactly what they have said, and that is going to take a little bit of time.” In one of the five consecutive broadcast media rounds he did from the Greystones count centre, he said there were a lot of areas where there were “straight shoot-outs” between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael for final seats. He described the Sinn Fein vote as “pretty significantly down”, the Fianna Fail vote as “marginally down” and the Fine Gael vote as “static” compared with its 2020 vote. He said it was “a very close, a very competitive election” and that “we haven’t seen a Sinn Fein surge or anything like it”. He said: “It was predicted by many that I would become the Taoiseach for a brief period of time, take over from Leo Varadkar, and then have to rebuild my party from the opposition benches as Sinn Fein led a government. “We don’t know what’s going to happen on government formation yet, but that is now looking less likely than it was.” He acknowledged that it was “a very difficult day” for the Green Party and paid tribute to their work in the coalition government, alongside his party and Fianna Fail. “Definitely, politics in Ireland has gotten much more fragmented,” he said. Fine Gael minister Helen McEntee said that her party’s campaign had been “positive”. “The feeling on the doors was very much that people were relatively happy with the government,” she said on RTE Radio. “It will come down to the last seats and it will come down to transfers,” she said of the final result, adding that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael were performing better than the exit poll estimated.The Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information has advised that after consultation with key stakeholders, a decision was taken to adjust the dates for the administration of the Primary Exit Profile (PEP) Six exam. This is due to the recent disruptions caused by the inclement weather conditions that Jamaica has been experiencing, and to provide additional preparation time to students who have been impacted. The revised dates for administration of the tests are: Ability Test, Thursday, February 20, 2025; Performance Task Tests - Wednesday, March 19, 2025 (Language Arts), and Thursday, March 20, 2025 (Mathematics); Curriculum-Based Tests - Wednesday, April 30, 2025 (Language Arts and Science), and Thursday, May 1, 2025 (Mathematics and Social Studies). The Ministry, in a bulletin, said it recognises the challenges faced by students, educators and parents during these trying times, and has, therefore, taken proactive measures to facilitate the best possible outcomes for the learners. School administrators are being urged to encourage teachers and parents to maximise the additional time given to ensure adequate preparation of the students for this assessment. The Ministry has given its commitment to provide the support necessary to ensure the best performance by all students. We want to hear from you! Email us at star@gleanerjm.com and follow @thejamaicastar on Instagram and on X @JamaicaStar and on Facebook: @TheJamaicaStarPadres’ Yu Darvish on Roki Sasaki: ‘It’s a good thing if he were to come to San Diego’
By Michelle Marchante, Miami Herald (TNS) MIAMI — As her students finished their online exam, Arlet Lara got up to make a cafe con leche . Her 16-year-old son found her on the kitchen floor. First, he called Dad in a panic. Then 911. “I had a stroke and my life made a 180-degree turn,” Lara told the Miami Herald, recalling the medical scare she experienced in May 2020 in the early months of the COVID pandemic. “The stroke affected my left side of the body,” the North Miami woman and former high school math teacher said. Lara, an avid runner and gym goer, couldn’t even walk. “It was hard,” the 50-year-old mom said. After years of rehabilitation therapy and a foot surgery, Lara can walk again. But she still struggles with moving. This summer, she became the first patient in South Florida to get an implant of a new and only FDA-approved nerve stimulation device designed to help ischemic stroke survivors regain movement in their arms and hands. This first procedure was at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami. Lara’s rehab was at at the Christine E. Lynn Rehabilitation Center for The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis, part of a partnership between Jackson Health System and UHealth. Every year, thousands in the United States have a stroke , with one occurring every 40 seconds, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The majority of strokes are ischemic, often caused by blood clots that obstruct blood flow to the brain. For survivors, most of whom are left with some level of disability, the Vivistim Paired VNS System, the device implanted in Lara’s chest, could be a game changer in recovery, said Dr. Robert Starke, a UHealth neurosurgeon and interventional neuroradiologist. He also serves as co-director of endovascular neurosurgery at Jackson Memorial Hospital, part of Miami-Dade’s public hospital system. Arlet Lara, the first patient in South Florida to get an FDA-approved nerve stimulation implant, right, runs into her rehabilitation neurology physician Dr. Gemayaret Alvarez, before her physical therapy appointment on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, at Lynn Rehabilitation Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital. The implant is designed to help stroke survivors regain function in their arms. (Alie Skowronski/Miami Herald/TNS) Arlet Lara, the first patient in South Florida to get an FDA-approved nerve stimulation implant designed to help stroke survivors regain function in their arms, goes through exercises while her therapist activates the device during her physical therapy appointment on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, at Lynn Rehabilitation Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital. The activation works as positive reinforcement to her muscles when she completes the exercise correctly. (Alie Skowronski/Miami Herald/TNS) Arlet Lara, the first patient in South Florida to get an FDA-approved nerve stimulation implant, does an exercise while Neil Batungbakal, rehabilitation therapist, activates the implant with the black trigger during her physical therapy appointment on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, at Lynn Rehabilitation Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital. The implant is designed to help stroke survivors regain function in their arms. The activation works as positive reinforcement to her muscles when she completes the exercise correctly. (Alie Skowronski/Miami Herald/TNS) Arlet Lara, the first patient in South Florida to get an FDA- approved nerve stimulation implant, does an exercise while Neil Batungbakal, rehabilitation therapist, activates the implant with the black trigger during her physical therapy appointment on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, at Lynn Rehabilitation Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital. Arlet Lara, the first patient in South Florida to get an FDA-approved nerve stimulation implant, right, runs into her rehabilitation neurology physician Dr. Gemayaret Alvarez, before her physical therapy appointment on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, at Lynn Rehabilitation Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital. The implant is designed to help stroke survivors regain function in their arms. (Alie Skowronski/Miami Herald/TNS) The Vivistim Paired VNS System is a small pacemaker-like device implanted in the upper chest and neck area. Patients can go home the same day. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the stroke rehabilitation system in 2021 to be used alongside post-ischemic stroke rehabilitation therapy to treat moderate to severe mobility issues in hands and arms. Lara’s occupational therapist can activate the device during rehabilitation sessions to electrically stimulate the vagus nerve, which runs from the brain down to the abdomen and regulates various parts of the body’s nervous system. The electrical stimulation rewires the brain to improve a stroke survivor’s ability to move their arms and hands. Lara also has a magnet she can use to activate the device when she wants to practice at home. Her therapy consists of repetitive tasks, including coloring, pinching cubes and grabbing and releasing cylindrical shapes. After several weeks of rehabilitation therapy with the device, Lara has seen improvement. “Little by little, I’m noticing that my hand is getting stronger. I am already able to brush my teeth with the left hand,” she told the Miami Herald in September. Since then, Lara has finished the initial six-week Vivitism therapy program, and is continuing to use the device in her rehabilitation therapy. She continues to improve and can now eat better with her left hand and can brush her hair with less difficulty, according to her occupational therapist, Neil Batungbakal. Lara learned about the device through an online group for stroke survivors and contacted the company to inquire. She then connected them with her Jackson medical team. Now a year later, the device is available to Jackson patients. So far, four patients have received the implant at Jackson. Related Articles Starke sees the device as an opportunity to help bring survivors one step closer to regaining full mobility. Strokes are a leading cause of disability worldwide. While most stroke survivors can usually recover some function through treatment and rehabilitation, they tend to hit a “major plateau” after the first six months of recovery, he said. Vivistim, when paired with rehabilitation therapy, could change that. Jackson Health said results of a clinical trial published in the peer-reviewed medical journal The Lancet in 2021 showed that the device, “when paired with high-repetition, task-specific occupational or physical therapy, helps generate two to three times more hand and arm function for stroke survivors than rehabilitation therapy alone.” The device has even shown to benefit patients 20 years from their original stroke, according to Starke. “So now a lot of these patients that had strokes 10-15 years ago that thought that they would never be able to use their arm in any sort of real functional way are now able to have a real meaningful function, which is pretty tremendous,” Starke said. Vivistim’s vagus-nerve stimulation technology was developed by researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas’ Texas Biomedical Device Center and is being sold commercially by Austin-based MicroTransponder, a company started by university graduates. Similar devices are used to treat epilepsy and depression . For Lara, the device is a new tool to help her recovery journey. “Everything becomes a challenge so we are working with small things every day because I want to get back as many functions as possible,” Lara said. Patients interested in Vivistim should speak with their doctor to check their eligibility. The FDA said patients should make sure to discuss any prior medical history, including concurrent forms of brain stimulation, current diathermy treatment, previous brain surgery, depression, respiratory diseases and disorders such as asthma, and cardiac abnormalities. “Adverse events included but were not limited to dysphonia (difficulty speaking), bruising, falling, general hoarseness, general pain, hoarseness after surgery, low mood, muscle pain, fracture, headache, rash, dizziness, throat irritation, urinary tract infection and fatigue,” the FDA said. MicroTransponder says the device is “covered by Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance with prior authorization on a case-by-case basis.” To learn more about the device, visit vivistim.com. ©2024 Miami Herald. Visit at miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.NEW YORK (AP) — Shohei Ohtani won his third Most Valuable Player Award and first in the National League, and Aaron Judge earned his second American League honor on Thursday. Ohtani was a unanimous MVP for the third time, receiving all 30 first-place votes and 420 points in voting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. New York Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor was second with 263 points and Arizona second baseman Ketel Marte third with 229. Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.
Photo: Greater Westside Board of Trade (L to R): Trevor Jones, Stephanie Oliver, Julie Pringle, Dr. Lauren Tomkins, Rod Aubichon, Roberta Fidalgo, Amber Hall, Tina Bisson, Bryan Fitzpatrick and James McCormick. Bryan Fitzpatrick will continue as Greater Westside Board of Trade president. The chamber, which represents West Kelowna and Westbank First Nation, held its annual general meeting last week, and elected its board of directors for the next year. Fitzpatrick, who is a partner at Pushor Mitchell LLP, will lead the group for a second straight year. “I am truly honoured to continue on in the role of president at the Greater Westside Board of Trade,” Fitzpatrick said in a press release. “With a focus on collaboration, innovation and community development, I look forward to working alongside our dedicated board of directors to build upon the strong foundation already in place. “Together we will advocate for the interests of our diverse business community, driving prosperity and resilience across the Greater Westside.” The rest of the executive remains the same for a second straight year. It features Snap Commercial Photography’s Julie Pringle as vice-president, Beaton Rettich Water Advisory’s Scott Beaton as treasurer, and Manchester Signs & Printing’s Tina Bisson as secretary. Amber Hall is past president, Heather Robinson is the executive director, and Rod Aubichon is a board appointee from Kelowna Metis Association and Terracom Systems. The rest of the board consists of Roberta Fidalgo (YET Human Resources & Coaching), Trevor Jones (Il Mercato Social Kitchen & The Landing Kitchen + Bar), James McCormick (SH Financial), Rebecca Myers (COBS Bread), Stephanie Oliver (Porrelli Law), Dr. Lauren Tomkins (West Kelowna Integrative Health Centre) and John Whitehead (John K. Whitehead and Associates).
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12 Windows 11 Tips And Tricks Every Former Mac OS User Needs To Know