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September 19, 2016 Edition
Focus on Health Care & Wellness

Maine Behavioral Healthcare tackles opioid crisis with holistic approach

James McCarthy

Through the first six months of this year, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner recorded 189 deaths in Maine due to drug overdose — a 50% increase over the same six-month period in 2015 and on track to reach 378 deaths by the end of 2016.

  • Focus on Health Care & Wellness
    Focus on Health Care & Wellness

    Navigating Medicare billing — and creating rural Maine jobs

    Lori Valigra

    Dr. Dan Mingle knew he was onto something when he founded the South Paris-based Mingle Analytics in 2011. Health care costs were spiraling up, and national reimbursers like Medicare were starting to look at the quality of care they were getting for their money.

  • Opinion
    Opinion

    Businesses wrestle with higher health care costs

    This issue's focus on health care and wellness touches on an issue that's at the heart of every business's expenses. What seems like a soft cost for preventative care can take an unexpected turn, affecting an entire company.

  • Humanizing robots and drones

    Lori Valigra

    I've long been a fan of R2-D2 and other movie robots. As a reporter, I've always jumped at the chance to cover researchers making prototype robots. The idea of what robots could potentially do to improve the world piques the imagination.

  • Focus on Health Care & Wellness
    Focus on Health Care & Wellness

    On the Record: Wendy Tardif, executive director of the Dempsey Center

    Peter Van Allen

    Wendy Tardif has been executive director of the Dempsey Center in Lewiston for nearly six years and has been involved since its founding in 2008. The organization offers people with cancer a range of services including cancer education, oncology counseling and yoga. All at no cost.

  • Opinion
    Opinion

    To the Editor

    Thank you for your comments in the September 5 Editor's Viewpoint in Mainebiz. You very politely tiptoed around some issues that many people in Maine need to better understand and appreciate. Maine has a great deal to offer to its residents... to its visitors... to its neighbors... to the rest of the country... and to the world.

  • IN SHORT

    New hiresFontaine Family – The Real Estate Leader in Auburn hired Sally Christner as a real estate agent and Sarah Higgins as a sales agent at its Scarborough office.

Today's Poll

Is it time for the Federal Reserve to start cutting interest rates?
Poll Description

Over the past several months, banks and other businesses have been looking for the Federal Reserve Board to cut interest rates, but the waiting game continues.

Basing its decision on new economic reports, the Fed on May 1 said it doesn’t plan to cut rates until it has “greater confidence” that inflation is slowing toward the central bank's 2% target. Three rate reductions have been projected for 2024, likely starting in June.

But for now, it appears the key borrowing rate in the U.S. will stay at a two-decade high of roughly 5.3%.

Keeping the rate so high for so long may tame inflation, but can also discourage new investment and business growth.

“The Fed is really stressing the banking industry,” said Andrew Silsby, president and CEO of Augusta-based Kennebec Savings Bank, in a Mainebiz story last month. “The economic environment is really quite difficult, but I haven’t quite figured out whether we’re through the storm or in the eye of the storm.”

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