State Highlights: Doctors Roll Out Patients Colorful Artwork To Humanize Waiting Room In New York City; Improper Dental Tool Cleaning Might Have Exposed Patients To HIV In Tennessee

Reuters: Clinic Waiting Room In Harlem Becomes Experiment In Humanizing Medicine
Brightly-colored artwork by patients adorns the walls of the waiting room at a small community healthcare center in New York City, the result of a project by two young doctors on a mission to humanize medicine. The two, who met in medical school, felt the decor of the waiting room at the Charles B. Rangel Community Health Center in Harlem did not reflect the identities and experiences of the patients it serves, who are mainly low-income African-American and Hispanic families dependent on Medicaid for healthcare costs. (12/17)

The Associated Press: Dental Patients Advised To Get Tested For HIV, Hepatitis
Some patients treated by a Tennessee dentist have been advised to get tested for HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C. The Tennessee Department of Health issued the recommendation after finding that Knoxville dentist Clarence “Buzz” Nabers did not ensure proper sterilization of dental equipment, news outlets reported. The recommendation was included in a letter Nabers sent to patients who visited his practice between Sept. 15, 2016, and Sept. 15, 2019. (12/17)

The Wall Street Journal: PG&E Wins Court Approval Of $13.5 Billion Deal With Wildfire Victims
PG&E Corp. won court approval for a $13.5 billion settlement with victims of fires linked to its equipment but the utility said it expects talks to continue with California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who last week said its bankruptcy-exit plan falls short of needed reforms. The pact with fire victims is the third and largest in a series of settlements aimed at putting a lid on damage claims from a series of blazes in recent years that left people dead, destroyed homes and businesses and plunged PG&E into bankruptcy in January. (12/17)

Los Angeles Times: Regulators Reach $1.6 Billion Proposed Settlement With PG&E
The California Public Utilities Commission filed the proposed settlement after investigating the role of PG&E’s equipment in igniting wildfires in 2017 in Butte, Calaveras, Lake, Mendocino, Napa, Nevada, Sonoma and Yuba counties, and the deadly 2018 Camp fire. Under the terms of the proposed settlement, PG&E would also be required to spend $50 million in shareholder money on system enhancements that regulators hope will lessen the risk of the utility’s equipment causing further disastrous wildfires. (Cosgrove, 12/17)

Boston Globe: As Labor Crunch Tightens, Employers Offer More Flexibility To Those Serving As Family Caregivers
With the state’s unemployment rate dipping below 3 percent, many employers are now seeking to accommodate working caregivers through more family-friendly leave benefits and increased flexibility about when and where employees work. Business leaders joined with their health care, education, and government counterparts last month to launch a Massachusetts Caregiver Coalition aimed at finding ways to support employees. (Weisman, 12/17)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Measles Outbreak 2019: Possible Exposure To Virus At Two Airports
If you were traveling to Denver or Los Angeles last week, or even changed planes at their airports, you might have been exposed to measles, officials say. Three infectious nonresidents with measles traveled through LAX on Dec. 11, the L.A. County Department of Public Health said in a statement. Visitors to the airport may have come in contact with an infectious person between 6:50 a.m. and noon that day at Terminals 4 and 5. (Clanton, 12/17)

The Washington Post: Radford Freshman Aris Lobo-Perez Died In A Virginia Jail Cell Of Drug Overdose, Asthma
A college freshman found dead in his Virginia jail cell this summer died of opioid toxicity compounded by asthma, according to the state medical examiner’s office. Aris Lobo-Perez, who had attended Radford University for three weeks, was found dead at New River Valley Regional Jail on Sept. 12 after his arrest by campus police the night before for public intoxication. (Miller, 12/17)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City Death Certificates Will Now Include Male, Female Or ‘X’
The New York City Board of Health on Tuesday moved to allow death certificates to be issued with the gender designation of “X” for decedents who didn’t identify as male or female. The change follows a city law that went into effect on Jan. 1, 2019, that permits people born in New York City to apply to the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene for a corrected birth certificate with an X designation for a gender marker. (West, 12/17)

Chicago Tribune: Top Chicago Facilities Left Off List Of 120 Best U.S. Hospitals 
Eight Illinois hospitals have been named among the best 120 in the nation for safety and quality, but some of Chicago’s most prestigious institutions didn’t make the list. ...Four prominent Chicago hospitals aren’t on the list — Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Rush University Medical Center, University of Chicago Medical Center and Lurie Children’s Hospital. Two of those hospitals — Northwestern Memorial and University of Chicago Medical Center — made last year’s list. Altogether, seven Illinois hospitals made the cut in 2018. (Schencker, 12/17)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Mayor Orders Budget Cuts As City Takes On Homelessness, Mental Illness
Slowing revenue growth and rising costs have prompted San Francisco Mayor London Breed to mandate belt-tightening in an effort to stave off a budget deficit as the city steps up spending on homelessness and mental health. Breed issued instructions Monday calling on city departments to find ways to shrink their budgets by 3.5% in each of the next two fiscal years to deal with a projected $420 million budget shortfall over those fiscal years. (Fracassa, 12/17)

St. Louis Public Radio: SLU Hospital Nurses Union Ratifies Contract That Allows Nurses To Weigh In On Staffing
Nurses at SSM St. Louis University Hospital have reached a contract agreement with management that raises their pay and ensures they have a say in staffing levels. SSM Health and the National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses United, which represents the more than 600 nurses at the hospital, ratified the contract late last week. The agreement ends a six-month dispute over the contract. (Fentem, 12/17)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘The City Needs To Be Pushed’: SF Supe Wants Law To Open More Homeless Shelters
As San Francisco prepares to open 200 Navigation Center beds on the Embarcadero, Supervisor Matt Haney is trying — again — to force the city to open shelters in every part of the city, even those without large numbers of homeless people. Haney wants to encourage the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing to open a Navigation Center within 30 months in every supervisorial district that doesn’t have one. (Thadani, 12/17)

Columbus Dispatch: DeWine Tours Columbus Psychiatric Hospital As He Pushes Strong Ohio Bill 
In an effort to re-evaluate Ohio’s mental health care system, Gov. Mike DeWine on Tuesday visited a state psychiatric hospital on the West Side. Twin Valley Behavioral Healthcare on West Broad Street hosted DeWine and Lori Criss, director of the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services. ...DeWine’s decision to review Ohio’s six psychiatric facilities came in the wake of the Aug. 4 mass shooting in Dayton’s Oregon District, where a gunman killed nine people in around 30 seconds. (Filby, 12/17)

The Oregonian: Oregon State Hospital Halts Civil Admissions 
The Oregon State Hospital, overburdened with patients from the criminal justice system, won’t accept people with a mental illness who are a danger to themselves or others for at least 10 days, state health officials said Monday. Patients who haven’t been charged with a crime but need treatment at the state hospital will have to wait in community hospitals until beds become available, no earlier than Dec. 27, according to a letter the Oregon Health Authority sent to advocacy and health care groups. (Zarkhin, 12/17)

The Star Tribune: Minnesota Pediatrician, Equity Advocate Named As Medical Director For Medicaid 
Dr. Nathan Chomilo, a respected Twin Cities pediatrician and internist, has been named the state's new Medicaid medical director by the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS). It is the latest hire by Human Services Commissioner Jodi Harpstead, who took the helm at DHS in September, as she fills out her leadership team at an agency racked by turmoil earlier this year. (Howatt, 12/17)

North Carolina Health News: After NC Prison Officers Die, Solitary Use Rises
The year after five prison officers were killed by inmates in 2017, the state prison system almost doubled the number of inmates with mental illness held in solitary confinement. Previously, North Carolina’s prison system made significant strides to reduce the number of prisoners with mental illness who are held in isolation for up to 23 hours a day. Prison officials were also meeting regularly with mental health advocates. (Knopf, 12/18)

Miami Herald: Hialeah Doctor Sentenced For Pill Mill Medicare Fraud Scam
Yet another South Florida pain-pills-and-Medicare-fraud scheme, this one perpetrated in Hialeah by a doctor, his wife and two other people who worked for his practice, ended Monday with the doctor’s sentencing in federal court. The Justice Department said Dr. Rodolfo Gonzalez Garcia called himself the “El Chapo of Oxycodone” while running his scam. Now, after getting an eight-year sentence for conspiring to distribute a controlled substance, Gonzalez Garcia can call himself “U.S. federal prison inmate,” which is the same life status as the infamous drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. (Neal ,12/17)

The Baltimore Sun: Gardening Therapy Is Growing At This Maryland Mental Health Hospital — And In Corrections Systems Nationwide
Research shows that just being around plants can make people feel good, and mental health providers now believe working with greenery specifically offers benefits such as stress relief, anxiety reduction and aggression control. There is growing evidence that learning to care for plants also can boost self-esteem while providing work experience. Perkins isn’t a prison; rather it’s a hospital run by the Maryland Department of Health. It offers mental evaluations to assess detainees’ fitness for trial or treatment after they are found not criminally responsible, the state’s version of an insanity defense. The hospital has gotten some of the state’s toughest cases. (Cohn, 12/17)

Health News Florida: Federal Pot Law Key In Florida License Fight
Pointing to a federal law that makes marijuana illegal, a U.S. district judge has tossed out a lawsuit filed by a Tampa firm that argues Florida health officials violated its due-process rights in a long-running dispute about a medical-marijuana license. Louis Del Favero Orchids, Inc., filed a notice that it is appealing U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle’s decision to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The firm contends Florida Department of Health officials violated its federal constitutional rights in not granting a potentially lucrative medical-marijuana license after Florida voters broadly legalized marijuana for patients in 2016. (Saunders, 12/17)