Veterans Memorial Hospital (VMH) Community and Home Care-Allamakee Public Health and the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services (Iowa HHS) are working together to raise awareness about shingles (herpes zoster virus) and the vaccine that helps prevent it. Shingles is a viral infection that affects one in three people during their lifetimes, causing a painful rash that can lead to chronic nerve pain, vision loss and other serious health problems. Despite these risks, many people don’t know that shingles is preventable.
Consider a different way to give back to the heart of the community by donating blood. The next local drive will be held in Waukon Monday, April 6 from 12-5 p.m. at the First Baptist Church in south Waukon.
Heart disease remains the number one reason patients are hospitalized and many require blood during treatment. A single blood transfusion can help restore normal heart rhythm and oxygen flow during cardiac emergencies.
People who give blood have an 88-percent lower risk of having a heart attack so giving blood is a win-win situation for both the donor and the recipient. Blood pressure, pulse and hemoglobin are all checked at every blood donation so donors know if it’s high or low and can see patterns that may cause concern, helping keep them healthy and reducing heart attack risk.
by Beth Shafer, Growth and Development Coordinator, Veterans Memorial Hospital
Many of us are busy filing our 2025 taxes. However, it is never too soon to start planning for Tax Year 2026! The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA) introduces policies that will affect how charitable contributions are deducted. In the past, taxpayers who take the standard deduction (about 86% of people) could not deduct their charitable donations on their tax returns. However, beginning with tax year 2026, if you take the standard deduction and do not itemize, you may deduct up to $1,000 ($2,000 if filing jointly) of your cash contributions to certain qualified organizations. This may be the incentive you need to support a cause that is important to you such as the Veterans Memorial Health Care Foundation.
During this Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, you may hear about the different ways to prevent the disease, and besides getting screened annually beginning at age 45, eating a diet rich in fiber is a helpful step.
But fiber isn’t just good for your colon; it’s a nutrient that’s beneficial to your overall health. However, most people in the United States aren’t consuming enough fiber each day – to the tune of more than 90 percent of women and 97 percent of men. That’s a concerning statistic, considering everything fiber can do for the body.
“Fiber has all sorts of benefits for your health,” says Halley Molstad, a registered dietician with Emplify Health by Gundersen. “It can help to lower cholesterol, it can help with good digestion, it can help with blood sugar management, so there are all sorts of reasons to add more fiber to your diet.”
An open house in honor of Bob Teff’s 90th birthday is scheduled for Saturday, April 4 from 2-5 p.m. at Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, 648 Main Street, Lansing.
In honor of this milestone birthday, cards and well wishes may be sent to P.O. Box 165, Lansing, IA 52151.
Main Street Lansing welcomed a new business to the downtown district with a ribbon cutting and First Dollar presentation for LP Styles LLC, owned and operated by local entrepreneur Lilly Peterson. A Lansing native and graduate of Kee High School, Peterson pursued her passion for hairstyling at the Salon Professional Academy in Onalaska, WI. Her dream of opening a salon in her hometown has now come full circle.
Located inside the Driftless Edit storefront at 211 Main Street in Lansing, LP Styles brings professional hair services and a hometown touch to the community. As pictured in the photo above, friends, family, and community members gathered to celebrate Peterson’s accomplishment and officially welcome her business to the Main Street Lansing business district.
The congregation of Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in Lansing invites the community to take part in a meaningful Good Friday tradition: the Justice and Peace Stations of the Cross, scheduled to be held this year Friday, April 3, beginning at 10 a.m. at the church, located at 480 Diagonal Street in Lansing.
Now in its sixth year, this contemplative prayer walk offers participants an opportunity to reflect on the suffering of Christ alongside the ongoing struggles faced in the world today. The walk begins at the church and moves through the heart of Lansing, making 12 stops along the way for prayer, song, and reflection before concluding near the Mississippi River.
Waukon High School senior Dylan Stegen signed his official commitment to play golf for Upper Iowa University in Fayette at a Thursday morning, March 26 signing event in the Waukon High School gym. Pictured in the photo at right submitted by Waukon High School from that signing event, seated in the front row, is Dylan (center) with his parents, Jenny (left) and Lee (right). Standing in the back row, left to right, are Dylan’s brother Vaughn and sister Grace, with older brother Connor also making an appearance by FaceTime at one point during the signing event.
In what was its only competition of this past week, the Waukon girls track and field team competed in its first full meet of its 2026 campaign as the Lady Indians competed in all 15 of the events at the newly-revamped Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) Meet held Tuesday, March 24 at Luther College in Decorah. Competing in that annual event for the first time as a new member of the UIC, the Waukon girls recorded top-three finishes in 10 of those 15 events, including one event victory and three runner-up efforts, to score 117.5 team points and win the team title at this year’s UIC Indoor.
The Lady Indians were next scheduled to compete at Sumner-Fredericksburg Tuesday, March 31. They are then scheduled to take part in the Postville Invitational Tuesday, April 7 before competing at Decorah Thursday, April 9.
The Waukon boys golf team will have plenty to look forward to for its 2026 season, as more than two dozen young men have reported for early-season duty. Within that double-dozen or more linksters lies even more to be excited about, as a full team’s worth of golfers will be coming back with varsity letterwinning experience from a squad last spring that played to a 17-7 record in dual competition and qualification for the Class 2A District Tournament for the first time in quite some time.
