Perched atop a mountain 11,000 feet above ground, the cool, crisp air whips across your face as an almost blinding light is reflected off the snow. Six feet of powder swooshes beneath your feet as you ski down a 2,200-foot vertical drop. The wind rushes pass your ears as your body sways and floats to a beat of measured movement. Time is suspended while you meet the challenge at hand--conquering the mount.
Disagreement creates certain obligations on the part of the committee and the institution. Committee members who speak up should explain where their differences lie and why these exist without demeaning or discrediting their home base. The institution, for its part, has an obligation to allow committee members this freedom of expression in the public and corporate forum without the ominous shadow of adverse sanctions.Crystal Mountain, Mich., specializes in early- and late-season packages with families in mind. Midweek lift and lodging packages start at $39 a night before Dec. 13 and after March 21, and weekend packages cost $99 for two days and two nights. Children under 17 can lodge and ski free, except holidays, when traveling with parents who buy a midweek lift and lodging package. Call 800-968-7686, for information.Photo: Slats slide--and pivot open and closed--in track recessed in floorNestled in the glittering valley of the Eastern High Sierras lie the "alpine beaches" of Mammoth Lakes. Just 300 miles north of Los Angeles, Mammoth is known for its California sunshine, as having one of the nation's longest ski seasons (November to June), elevations as high as 11,053 feet and an average snowfall of 335 inches. A haven for both beginners and the more advanced, Mammoth offers a "Three Day Learn to Ski Package" for first-time skiers ($182) and an "Explore the Mountain" class for semi-experts with more challenging runs. Group rates for adult and children's lessons start at $94.50 for the three days, with daily lift tickets costing $35 for adults and $17 for children. Seniors and children under 7 years old ski free.Ethics committees must weigh the administrative threat to their effectiveness should they engage in open discussion against the moral threat to their effectiveness should they fail to provide a voice in the larger forum on pressing ethical issues affecting patient care. Committees that draw back from their responsibility to patients need not be concerned about being destroyed by an anxious administration. They will back into their own moral death.Southwestern RetreatsHeading EastThis sheer thrill and exhilaration sends millions of skiers back to the slopes each winter. "No buildings, no smog. You can't think about anything else," says Ben Finley, co-founder and former president of the National Brotherhood of Skiers (NBS), the official federation of African-American skiers.Northern ExposureWhey ethics committees? Don't we have enough individual ethicists, state commissions, and private groups advocating ethical approaches to patient care? Ethics committees can serve a distinctive function because they are familiar with the wrenching anxieties of making medical choices, the kinds of decisions that patients at their institution tend to make, the roles of health care professionals, and the ways in which institutional infrastructures function. They can offer public and corporate policy makers some sense of the institutional realities at stake when ethical issues affecting patient care arise.When walls are too confining, sliding partitions might do the trick. San Francisco architect William Stout designed this upstairs master suite to be as flexible as possible. It contains separate areas for sleeping, conversation, and deskwork. Thanks to two sets of vertical blinds mounted on metal tracks in the floor and ceiling, the owners can keep each area separate for privacy, or combine them all into one spacious, light-filled room.Ethics committees are already beginning to move outside their institutions as their members enter the halls of Congress to acquaint legislators with the Patient Self-Determination Act. They are venturing into courtrooms to provide advisory opinions about difficult patient care cases, meeting in regional networks to exchange methods for resolving common problems, and sitting at corporate boardroom tables to assist in health care planning, financing, and delivery.Skiing In The MidwestAs the interests of some patients are adversely affected by policies that lead to skimming and dumping, mandated care by protocol, and triage by wallet, ethics committees, the "conscience" of their institutions, will have to speak out. They cannot meet their charge of eliciting, developing, and upholding a value structure for their institutions if they remain silent about extra-institutional policies that work to the detriment of patients. Committees with experience at in-house education will be especially well geared to serve as advocates in the corporate and public forums, for they will have well-developed ideas, information, and arguments to provide to policy makers. (Of course, they will have an obligation to check with the in-house body to which they report about possible legal restrictions on their promotion of particular legislation.)Eighteen miles from Yellowstone National Park are the gentle, rolling hills of Big Sky, Mont. With a vertical rise of 3,030 feet, 65 miles of skiing on 50 runs spread across two mountains, Big Sky caters to skiers and snowboarders of every level.Each Big Snow resort lies within 12 miles of the other, and skiing in the four areas is allowed with an interchangeable lift ticket. A three-day ticket runs $58.50 for adults, $45 for juniors (13-17) and $33 for children. For more information, call 906-932-4850.Hundreds of African-Americans will try skiing for the first time this year. And if you fall into this category, don't feel threatened. Almost every mountain has beginner, intermediate and advanced runs, and assuredly you won't be the only novice. "Let's face it," says Finley, "skiing is not taught in the community. Everyone has to go through that period of just learning to stand up or stop."Ethics committees, however, are not moral blank slates. The purpose of bringing a multidisciplinary group of clinicians and laypeople together on an ethics committee is to explore the options available, to assess which fall(s) within the range of the ethically acceptable, and, when one stands out as ethically optimal--even from disparate perspectives--to state this. As they gain experience, ethics committees reach shared conclusions and develop consistent policies about bioethical issues that can be instructive at the boardroom table and in legislatures.Whether a beginner or an expert, practice makes perfect. While attending an NBS Summit is big fun and a good way to put in slope time, you can only become a proficient skier by donning your skis regularly. Not only do most resorts offer skiing for every level, but you'll find more than just snowy peaks and trails of champagne powder. Enjoy snowmobiling, bobsledding, hot-air ballooning and horseback riding. Feast on fine cuisine, visit nearby historic sites, or go shopping, but most of all, ski, ski, ski! Here is a sample of resorts in regions around the country.
Whiteface, N.Y., was the site of the 1991 Freestyle World Ski Championships and the 1980 Winter Olympics. Strong on advanced terrain and just eight miles outside Lake Placid in the Adirondack Mountains, Whiteface houses the longest vertical drop ski trail on the east coast--3,216 feet. Its 17 miles of steep trails are served by nine lifts with daily tickets starting at $28.
Author: Karen L. Johnson
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