State Highlights: As STD Rates Hit Record High In California, Stillbirths Also Climb; Texas Asks For Federal Funding For Women’s Health Program

The Associated Press: Report Finds Cases Of STDs Reach All-Time High In California
The number of cases of sexually transmitted diseases in California reached a record high last year and officials are particularly concerned by a spike in stillbirths due to congenital syphilis, state health authorities said Monday. More than 300,000 cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis were reported in 2017, a 45 percent increase from five years ago, according to data released by the California Department of Public Health. (Weber, 5/14)

Austin American-Statesman: Paxton Requests Federal Funding For Women’s Health Program
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton last week asked two federal agencies to move quickly to fund the state’s Healthy Texas Women program. The program was cut off from Medicaid funding by the Obama administration in 2012 after the Texas Legislature enacted a law preventing taxpayer money from going to abortion providers. (Sterling, 5/14)

WBUR: Dr. Gawande: Mass. Is Seeing 'First Signs Of Real Change' In End-Of-Life Planning
Three years into a campaign to shift attitudes about end-of-life planning in Massachusetts and to make sure residents get the care they want, there are a few signs of improvement — and lots of room for more. WBUR's Bob Oakes spoke to Dr. Atul Gawande, author of "Being Mortal," about the initiative his book helped launch and the third annual end-of-life care survey, conducted by UMass Medical School. (Oakes and Bebinger, 5/15)

Houston Chronicle: Memorial Hermann To Pay Nearly $2 Million To Settle Improper Billing Allegations 
Memorial Hermann Health System, the largest health care system in southeast Texas, has agreed to pay $1.9 million to resolve allegations over billing Medicare for patient care, the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District of Texas announced Monday. The allegations include billing the federal government for in-patient services for scheduled surgeries that should have been handled as less expensive out-patient treatment or with observation, U.S. Attorney Ryan Patrick said in a statement. (Deam, 5/14)

Nashville Tennessean: Three Nashville Hospitals To Grow In $500M TriStar Expansion
TriStar Health is planning more than $500 million of expansion projects at six Middle Tennessee hospitals over the next three years, including adding beds and entire floors to one of the Nashville's largest medical facilities. The additions are a direct result of Nashville’s dramatic growth, which is projected to continue both in the city and surrounding communities like Mt. Juliet and Smyrna, said Heather Rohan, TriStar CEO. (Kelman, 5/14)

Georgia Health News: Emory Goes Down Under To Deliver Nighttime Intensive Care Here
Through the technology of telehealth, the health system’s personnel based at a center in Perth, Australia, are delivering intensive care services over a distance of 11,000 miles – to Emory patients back in Atlanta. ... So while Emory doctors and nurses stationed in Perth are working during the day, they are monitoring ICU patients in Atlanta, where it’s late at night or in the “wee hours” of the morning. (Miller, 5/14)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Visa Review Puts Rural America At Risk Of Losing Doctors Amid A Shortage 
Without foreign doctors, proponents of the H-1B program worry patient care, research and medical education could suffer — especially in rural states like Missouri. America has faced a doctor shortage for many years, they say, and immigration has allowed the U.S. to collaborate with top physicians all over the world, ensuring it remains a global leader in medical research. According to a 2017 report by the Missouri Department of Insurance, Financial Institutions and Professional Registration, there are 507 licensed doctors in the state who graduated from foreign medical schools, including an unknown number of H-1B visa holders. (Mai, Maity and Saha, 5/12)

PBS NewsHour: ‘Portraits Of Resilience’ Destigmatize Depression At One Of The World’s Top Universities
Students at MIT are now part of a project to give a face and voice to a growing crisis across U.S. campuses. When a computer science professor noticed more and more students were coming to discuss their mental health issues, he turned to photography to bring the stigmatized problem of depression into the open. (Brown, 5/14)

Minnesota Public Radio: Minneapolis Set To Prohibit Tobacco Sales To Those Under 21
It may soon be illegal in Minneapolis to sell tobacco to anyone under the age of 21. Council members are expected to vote next week on a measure that would make the city the latest in Minnesota to treat smoking like drinking in the eyes of the law. (Sepic, 5/15)

Miami Herald: Nicklaus Children's Hospital Challenges Trauma Law
Nicklaus Children's Hospital, the only pediatric trauma center in Miami-Dade County, is suing the state to challenge a law that would permanently allow another hospital to operate a competing trauma center without having to undergo the same kind of scrutiny, saying that the competition could functionally put Nicklaus' facility out of business. (Koh, 5/15)

New Hampshire Public Radio: N.H. Senators Want EPA To Allow Release Of PFC Health Risk Data
New Hampshire’s U.S. senators are criticizing the Trump administration for reportedly blocking the release of new data about chemicals called PFCs, which have raised contamination concerns in the state. Emails obtained by Politico reportedly show White House and Environmental Protection Agency officials citing public relations fears in delaying publication of a PFC study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Ropeik, 5/14)

Sacramento Bee: California Air Resources Board Looks To Spend Volkswagen Pollution Money
The California Air Resources Board is finalizing a plan to spend $423 million of Volkswagen's money on financial incentives to persuade trucking companies, mass-transit agencies, tugboat operators and other major polluters to upgrade their fleets and buy greener vehicles. The idea is to eventually take as much pollution out of California's air as Volkswagen's dirty cars put in — especially the heavy volume of smog-forming nitrogen oxide, or NOx, caused by the VW vehicles. (Kasler, 5/14)

KCUR: Children's Mercy Taps Kansas City Art Institute To Explain Science To Kids And Parents
[Consent] and paperwork are meaningless if no one understands the concepts she’s trying to impart. So, [Susan] Abdel-Rahman, who is also a professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, decided to try something unconventional in her world of 20-page, text-heavy parental consent and child assent forms: pictures. Her initial idea, in 2014, was simple: work with the Kansas City Art Institute to create graphics that explain medical procedures; no language needed. Now in the fourth year of their partnership, and at the end of a National Endowment for the Arts grant with hundreds of graphics in a database, Rahman and her counterpart at the Art Institute know these graphics are anything but simple. (Kniggendorf, 5/14)