Business Briefs

Young Professionals, Forty and Under, a committee of the Lakewood Chamber of Commerce, and a support group for professionals and college graduates, will hold its monthly meeting at the 507 Main restaurant, 507 Main St., Belmar, Oct. 25 from 6-8:30 p.m. The cost is $10 at the door and includes unlimited pizza and networking opportunities.

Chris Ruisi, a business coach for Action International, will present "The 30-Second Commercial, Part II - Intro-ducing Yourself to a Group."

To register for the October meeting, contact Laurie Romano at Barbara Davis Employment Services, (732) 219-9552.

The Saint Barnabas Health Care System Women and Children's Specialty Center in Lakewood celebrated its one-year anniversary Sept. 6. The center offers children who require specialty care and expectant mothers with high-risk pregnancies convenient access to specialists in pediatrics, urogynecology and maternal-fetal medicine.

Located at 1 Route 70 west, the Women and Children's Specialty Center is staffed by physicians from Monmouth Medical Center, an affiliate of the Saint Barnabas Health Care System.

Vickie Buczynski of Toms River, branch manager of Provident Bank's Jackson branch, has completed the four-part branch manager certification program offered by the New Jersey League of Community Bankers. The program presents modern techniques and tips for managing the human resource personnel responsibilities of bank branch operations. The curriculum is specifically designed to teach branch managers and branch supervisors how to identify critical measures of performance and ways to positively influence their branch staff to achieve increased productivity and better customer service.

Kevin J. Eldridge, a former Marlboro resident, has been appointed by the Board of Harbor Commissioners to the newly created position of deputy executive director and chief operating officer for the Port of Long Beach, Calif. As deputy executive director, Eldridge will be the port's No. 2 executive.

Eldridge retired from the U.S. Coast Guard as a rear admiral on June 30 after 32 years, culminating his national service as commander of the 11th Coast Guard District. Based at the San Fran-cisco Bay city of Alameda, the district covers California, Arizona, Nevada and Utah, and also includes the offshore waters from the California/Oregon border to South America.

Eldridge, who is the son of Teresa R. Eldridge of Plumsted and the late Harold C. Eldridge, grew up in Marlboro and attended the district's schools, graduating in 1970 from Marlboro High School. His wife, the former Karen Janwich, is also a former Marlboro resident. The Eldridges have two sons and a daughter, U.S. Air Force Capt. Patrick Eldridge, stationed in Pensacola, Fla., Kyle Eldridge, a civil engineer in Austin, Texas, and Kara Eldridge, a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force, who is stationed at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.

A free workshop on business planning and financing designed to familiarize new and aspiring small-business owners with the popular Entrepreneurial Training Institute (ETI) curriculum and what it takes to start, grow and operate a successful company, will be held Oct. 24 from 6-8 p.m. in the first-floor meeting room at the Jackson Library, 2 Jackson Drive.

Representatives from several lending organizations will present information at the workshop about the broad technical assistance services and resources available to entrepreneurs. To reserve a seat at the workshop, call the ETI program at (609) 292-9279.

The ETI program, which is sponsored by the state Economic Development Authority (EDA), supports state initiatives to foster the growth of small businesses, particularly woman-owned and minority-owned enterprises.

It is offered in two segments. In ETI I, "Get Set for Entrepreneurship," students focus on small-business feasibility, examining their business ideas, evaluating skills and risks, and identifying the resources necessary to move forward. The two-session program will be offered Nov. 21 and Nov. 28, at the Jackson Library. ETI II, "Business Planning," includes four highly structured three-hour sessions that help students develop a formal business plan with feedback and coaching.

Dr. Errol Rummel, an optometric physician from Jackson, was recently presented with the Brain Injury Assoc-iation of New Jersey's Volunteer Excel-lence Award.

Rummel, a member of the New Jersey Society of Optometric Physicians, has lectured extensively to brain injury support groups and to occupational and physical therapists on the diagnosis and treatment of brain injury-related visual/ocular and postural problems.

Rummel is the only eye doctor in New Jersey and one of only four in the United States who is clinical skills-certified in neuro-optometric rehabilitation. He is also board certified in vision therapy/vision development.

Rummel maintains a private practice at the Low Vision Center in Jackson for the visual rehabilitation of patients with impaired sight due to stroke or brain injury, other neurological diseases and macular degeneration.

Monmouth Ocean Medical Services for Women announced that it is the first obstetrics-gynecology practice in New Jersey to offer a new type of early detection scanning procedure using a device called the Sentinel Breast Scan.

Monmouth Ocean Medical Services for Women is headquartered in Brick, with an office in Neptune and a new office opening soon in Howell.

According to Dr. E. David Morgan, of Monmouth Ocean Medical Services for Women, the procedure is safe for women of any age, painless, noninvasive and does not use radiation.

Using infrared technology, Sentinel analyzes the physiological features of breasts, blood flow and vascularization as well as dynamic temperature changes that can occur during the first stage of breast cancer development

Sentinel measures the infrared energy naturally emitted by the body and uses computer imaging to identify potential regions of interest in the breast tissue. There are no chemicals or contrast agents administered. The procedure takes less than five minutes. Results are available immediately.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.