5280 Health 2026

The tissue-thin paper gown crinkled beneath my hands as I anxiously fidgeted. I had been bleeding irregularly for months, and I was hoping my OB-GYN could do what WebMD and my university’s health center could not: give me answers. After a short chat and physical exam, he delivered his diagnosis with detachment. “It could be endometriosis,”he said, hardly looking up from his clipboard. The suggestion seemed strange to me. I didn’t have the heavy, painful periods frequently associated with the condition. How could I know for sure? “A laparoscopy is really the only way to definitively diagnose endometriosis,” he said, as if hearing my internal monologue. But he didn’t recommend undergoing the minimally invasive surgery. Instead, he prescribed me birth control and said that ought to fix the spontaneous bleeding.…

Less Is More If you’re experimenting with a sober lifestyle, you’re not alone. In a 2025 Gallup poll, only 54 percent of Americans reported drinking alcohol, the lowest since tracking began in 1939. Tempted to abandon the bottle? Local holistic nutrition consultant Blair Horton can help you stock a booze-free bar cart via her informative Instagram account, @holisticrendezvous, where she shares zero-proof recipes with her 368,000 followers, and her new book, Everyday Elixirs: Mocktails, Matchas, and Seasonal Drinks to Inspire Wellness, which was released in late December. For the base of her drinks, Horton often uses teas, which provide antioxidants, flavonoids (beneficial plant compounds), and astringency, aka that dry, puckering mouthfeel. Tinctures and bitters add depth of flavor while milk or honey can serve as sweeteners. Mix in some functional…

Jean Bedell may not work a nine-to-five any longer, but her life is as busy as ever. The 90-year-old sings in a choir, plays bridge often, participates in a dance program, and attends exercise classes several times a week. When her senior living community, Balfour Louisville, launched a new partnership with the University of Colorado Anschutz Multidisciplinary Center on Aging, however, Bedell knew she would squeeze one more thing into her calendar. The partnership, coined a “living lab,” allows researchers to conduct some experiments in reserved community rooms at Balfour Louisville. Although studies have yet to commence since the program launched in October, residents may soon participate in research about how high blood pressure affects hearing and if light electrical stimulation can help with walking. It’s one of the first…

Long before experts were sounding the alarm about the negative effects of screen time and social media, health care professionals in 1980s Japan were prescribing walks in the woods to combat technostress. Called shinrin-yoku, which translates to forest bathing, the practice encourages folks to leave notification pings and re-circulated air behind and submerge themselves in the sights, sounds, smells, and textures of the natural world. In addition to mental health benefits, proponents cite studies that show physical perks ranging from lower blood pressure to better sleep to boosted immune systems. Although forest bathing might seem like an obvious fit for recreation-happy Coloradans, it actually runs a bit counter to the way we often approach the outdoors: chasing PRs, snapping summit selfies, and padding our Strava stats. That’s why we followed…

Marissa Garcia describes her family as supportive, but mental health wasn’t something they discussed around the dinner table. So when she struggled with her emotional well-being in high school, she felt alone. “By overcoming that and piecing myself back together,” she says, “I just really became interested in the meaning behind what happened and the ‘whys.’ ” The now-24-year-old Thornton resident’s search for answers led her to the Youth Mental Health Corps (YMHC), an AmeriCorps initiative that launched in four states, including Colorado, in summer 2024. With 42 percent of high school students reporting persistent feelings of hopelessness and with suicide ranking as the second-leading cause of death among kids ages 10 to 14 in America, the youth mental health emergency isn’t burgeoning—it’s raging. To quell the epidemic, the YMHC…

Prior to 1963, catching measles was common. In fact, most kids in the United States would be infected before turning 15. More than 400 people died from the disease annually. That changed in the mid-1960s with the measles vaccine. The shot is 97 percent effective at preventing infection for those who have received both doses. But in order to achieve community immunity, around 95 percent of the population needs to be protected, either by vaccination or a previous infection. Although measles was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000, declining vaccination rates have led to outbreaks. In 2025, there were a total of 1,681 confirmed measles cases in the country, 31 of those in Colorado. We sat down with Dr. Ned Calonge, chief medical officer for the Colorado Department…