State Highlights: Nursing Home Industry Caught Up In Louisiana’s Loose Conflict Of Interest Rules; Medical Staffing Shortage Plagues Detention Center

ProPublica: Louisiana Lawmakers Are Pushing Bills That Benefit Their Businesses. And It's Perfectly Legal.
Louisiana’s ethics laws, written by the Legislature, allow lawmakers to author, advocate for and cast votes on bills that would enrich themselves, their relatives and their clients, as long as others in the same affected industry would benefit similarly. Regardless of the law, political watchdogs say, such advocacy is troubling. (Allen, 6/6)

Reveal: Staff Describe Georgia Immigrant Detention Center As ‘Ticking Bomb’
One of the country’s largest immigration detention centers had no psychiatrist on staff, “chronic shortages” of almost all medical positions and was described by its own staff as a “ticking bomb” because noncriminal detainees were mixed with high-security offenders. Federal records obtained by Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting and Atlanta NPR station WABE show the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General found widespread problems at Stewart Detention Center in southwest Georgia, including drug smuggling and staffing shortages that employees said endangered detention officers and detainees. (Yu, 6/5)

The Associated Press: Transgender Librarian Files Suit Over Alaska Health Policy
A transgender woman filed a discrimination lawsuit Tuesday against the state of Alaska, saying she was denied coverage for medically necessary surgical treatment. The federal lawsuit, filed on behalf of Jennifer Fletcher, claimed the state health insurance plan excludes coverage for surgical treatment for gender dysphoria. (6/5)

Austin American-Statesman: State Spends $30M On Overtime, Staffing At Disabled Care Homes
Texas Health and Human Services spent almost $30 million in seven months on overtime and contract labor at its institutions for people with disabilities because the state can’t find enough people to work at them. The cost of overtime pay and contract labor will likely hit $50 million this fiscal year, for the third year in a row. (Ball, 6/5)

KCUR: Soon-To-Be Mothers In Missouri’s Bootheel Scramble To Find Care After Hospital Announces Closure 
The surprise announcement on April 30 that the hospital here in Kennett, Missouri is closing has left this rural part of southeast Missouri without an OB-GYN. That’s left expectant mothers like Welton scrambling to change their birth plans at the last minute, a dangerous proposition in an area with the worst birth outcomes in the state and one of the highest infant mortality rates in the country. The hospital in Kennett, Twin Rivers Regional Medical Center, is just the latest (84th) rural hospital in the U.S. to close from dwindling financial margins. Locally, it’s sparked an unprecedented 60 days in this poor, rural region known as the Bootheel. Now five soon-to-be displaced physicians, the State of Missouri and a hospital in a neighboring county are all banding together to keep vital health care services in the area. (Sable-Smith, 6/5)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: 10 Days At A St. Louis Hotel With Catered Meals And A $3,500 Payday? All You Have To Do Is Get The Flu Virus At 'Hotel Influenza' 
Plenty of room at the “hotel influenza.” Any time of year, you can catch it here. Call it a “sickation” — a 10- to 12-day hotel stay to help St. Louis University researchers test the effectiveness of flu vaccines. Volunteers will get a flu shot or a placebo, and then they’ll get a dose of a flu virus delivered through a nasal spray. The participants will be watched around the clock for symptoms of the flu — fever, runny nose, sneezing, cough. Their blood and mucus will be repeatedly tested for signs of the virus, and those who do come down with the flu must test negative for two consecutive days before checking out. (Bernhard, 6/6)

The Associated Press: Mom Who Starved Autistic Son Sentenced To 11 Years In Prison
A Connecticut mother who withheld food from her autistic teenage son until he died weighing just 84 pounds was sentenced Tuesday to 11 years in prison. Katiria Tirado, 34, of Hartford, was also sentenced to five years of probation by a judge who said the mother "failed to provide her son with the basics necessary for life." (6/5)

New Hampshire Union Leader: New Eye Care Center's Dual Focus: Uninsured Patients, Health Students 
A new eye care center will help people see more clearly and serve as a training ground for nearby optometry students. Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences University (MCPHS) has teamed up with Manchester Community Health Center (MCHC) across the street to open The Eye Care Center at MCHC at 1245 Elm St. The clinic hopes to treat those who have difficulty going to the eye doctor because of transportation, language or income limitations, said Kris McCracken, president and CEO at the health center. (Cousineau, 6/5)

Health News Florida: Puerto Rico's Push For Food Independence Intertwined With Statehood Debate
Hurricane Maria has reignited a small movement in Puerto Rico aimed at strengthening the local food system so the island can survive and thrive without dependence on the mainland U.S. Before the hurricane struck in September 2017, Puerto Rico imported about 85 percent of its food. (Miller, 6/5)

The Washington Post: Windell Boutté: Georgia Doctor Who Rapped And Danced During Plastic Surgeries Was Negligent, Lawsuits Say
Icilma Cornelius was weeks away from her wedding in 2016 when she visited a gleaming brick medical office atop a hill in suburban Atlanta, home of the practice of Windell Davis Boutté, a dermatologist who describes herself as a “nationally and internationally known” cosmetic surgeon. Cornelius, then 54, had gone in to inquire about Botox and other anti-aging facial fillers, according to court documents. But while there, Boutté and the staff reportedly persuaded Cornelius to return for several cosmetic surgeries before her nuptials: A standard panniculectomy would remove fat and skin from her lower abdomen, and “SmartLipo,” a type of laser liposuction, would remove fat from her upper abdomen, love handles, bra roll, lower back and upper third of her buttocks. (Wang, 6/5)

KQED: Caring For The Unidentified Dead At The Orange County Coroner's Office
In 2017, at least 195 homeless people -- and probably over 200 -- died in Orange County. While most were claimed by their families, at least 17 were not. These are the people who the county classifies as "indigent," meaning their families could not afford or refused to claim their bodies. (Wiley, 6/5)

Houston Chronicle: Cost Of ER Visits Nearly Doubled As Fees Are Coded At Highest Level 
Even though the number of insured emergency room visits has stayed about the same in recent years, the cost to step inside the door has nearly doubled, according to new data released by a health care policy group. In 2016, the average amount spent nationally by insurers and patients for emergency room visits was $247 per insured person. In 2009 it was $125, the Health Care Cost Institute research shows. (Deam, 6/5)

The Associated Press: Florida Judge Lifts Stay On Smokable Medical Marijuana
Floridians allowed to use medical marijuana are one step closer to being able to smoke it. Leon County circuit court Judge Karen Gievers on Tuesday lifted a stay on her May 25 ruling that the Florida Legislature's provision banning smokable medical marijuana is unconstitutional. The state's Department of Health had filed an appeal of Gievers' ruling, which automatically put it on hold. Attorney John Morgan and two patients with terminal illnesses then filed an appeal of that stay. (6/5)

St. Louis Public Radio: Mobile Health Clinic Will Help Metro Passengers Find Insurance, Treatment
A mobile health unit will be making weekly stops at select Metro Transit stations to provide screenings, insurance help and other health care needs. ...The mobile unit is part of an effort to bring health care to people who live in transit-dependent areas in St. Louis. (Fentem, 6/5)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: New Test: 10.7 Million Asbestos Fibers On Floor At Philadelphia Elementary School
Shortly after the School District of Philadelphia learned of alarming levels of asbestos fibers on the floor of a highly traveled hallway inside Olney Elementary School, officials said, they sent an environmental team to fix the problem. But four months later, the hazard is not gone. (Ruderman, Laker and Purcell, 6/6)

Dallas Morning News: Ellis County Authorities Say Staff Not At Fault In Death Of Baby Born In Jail 
A baby born in jail to an Ellis County inmate who admitted using meth while she was pregnant has died, and county officials say they are not to blame. "We are confident there was no fault by Ellis County jail staff or medical staff," the county Sheriff's Department said in a prepared statement Tuesday. In March, deputies arrested Shaye Marie Bear and charged her with possession of a controlled substance, some of which authorities say she hid in her vagina. (Ramirez, 6/5)

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Bethel Park Grad Is Behind A Balloon-In-Belly Device That Treats Obesity
Seventeen years ago, Shantanu Gaur, a freshman at Bethel Park High School, sat in his former middle school principal’s office to be nominated for an outstanding leadership award. Upon entering the office, he noticed that Nancy Aloi, his former principal, was wearing a hand brace for carpal tunnel syndrome. He asked to examine her wrist and inquired about her treatments while suggesting his own ideas to alleviate pain, she said. (Benninghoff, 6/5)

Tampa Bay Times: High Rate Of MRSA Infections Reported At Bayfront Health Brooksville
Bayfront Health Brooksville and Bayfront Health Spring Hill are among a handful of Florida hospitals that saw a sharp rise in the number of MRSA infections, which can be deadly to patients if not treated, according to federal officials. The trend is one of the takeaways from a body of new data compiled by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, which studied a number of conditions patients often develop before and after surgery or during other hospitalized treatment. (Griffin, 6/5)

Kansas City Star: Cannabis Extract CBD Now Legal In Kansas With Zero THC
The Kansas Legislature voted at the end of April to exclude CBD with no THC from the the state's definition of marijuana, effectively making it an unrestricted substance. The state's decision to dip its toe into the shallowest end of the medical marijuana pool came with surprisingly little resistance. (Marso, 6/6)