Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Any Kind Of Exercise Can Help With Mental Health, But Playing Team Sports Can Amplify That Boost
NPR: To Boost Mental Health, Try Team Sports Or Group Exercise
Ryan "China" McCarney has played sports his entire life, but sometimes he has to force himself to show up on the field to play pick-up soccer with his friends. "I'm dreading and I'm anticipating the worst. But I do it anyway. And then, it's a euphoric sensation when you're done with it because you end up having a great time," says McCarney. McCarney was just 22 when he had his first panic attack. As a college and professional baseball player, he says getting help was stigmatized. (Woodruff, 10/22)
NPR: Fixing Your Hearing And Vision Loss Can Keep Your Memory Sharper
By age 40, about one in 10 adults will experience some hearing loss. It happens so slowly and gradually, says audiologist Dina Rollins, "you don't realize what you're missing." And even as it worsens, many people are in denial. By the time someone is convinced they have a hearing problem, age-related memory loss may have already set in. But, here's the good news: Restoring hearing with hearing aids can help slow down cognitive decline. (Aubrey, 10/22)
Dallas Morning News: Cases Of Polio-Like Illness May Have Peaked, Says UT Southwestern Doctor
Every two years since 2014, small clusters of children across the U.S. have developed sudden paralysis, and experts still don’t know why. Since August, Children’s Medical Center Dallas has admitted eight patients ages 18 months to 13 years with symptoms ranging from poor muscle tone in an arm to total paralysis. Nationally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed 62 cases in 22 states. In 2014, the year the outbreaks started, the CDC tracked 120 cases of the condition, called acute flaccid myelitis, or AFM. In 2016, there were 149 cases. CDC experts believe the 2018 numbers will be similar to previous years. In 2014 and 2016, cases peaked in September. (Kuchment, 10/20)
Concord (N.H.) Monitor: Finding Hope: Giving Students A Voice In Suicide Prevention
In Exeter, the district implemented a similar program, training student youth leaders like Siegfried to go into health classes during a week-long section on mental health and teach suicide prevention. The district now uses Signs of Suicide (SOS) training into its middle school, paid for by the Connor’s Climb Foundation. Connor’s Climb was founded by Tara Ball, whose 14-year-old son, Connor, died by suicide while he was a student at Exeter High School in 2011. (Willingham, 10/21)
San Francisco Chronicle: Older HIV Patients Struggle With Loneliness And Depression — And Lack Of Services
Older people with HIV are frequently lonely and depressed, many of them face serious housing and financial hardships, and they have high rates of physical ailments — such as chronic pain, heart disease, diabetes and fatigue — that can diminish their quality of life. All of that’s been known for several years. But services to meet their needs still fall short, say people with HIV and the groups that support them, and simply quantifying their mental and physical health problems has been a challenge. (Allday, 10/20)
Kaiser Health News: Primary Care Doctors ‘Not Doing Enough’ To Curb STDs
Julie Lopez, 21, has been tested regularly for sexually transmitted diseases since she was a teenager. But when Lopez first asked her primary care doctor about screening, he reacted with surprise, she said. “He said people don’t usually ask. But I did,” said Lopez, a college student in Pasadena, Calif. “It’s really important.” (Gorman, 10/22)
Politico Pro: POLITICO Pro Q&A: Mark Rosenberg, Former Head Of Research On Gun Violence At CDC
Mark Rosenberg, founding director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention center that does research on violence, warns that failing to embrace the original intent of the so-called Dickey Amendment would only intensify partisan strife on the hot-button issue of gun control, setting back the small progress made this year to restart research on how to reduce shooting deaths. (Scholtes, 10/19)
