State Highlights: Flint Crisis Continues To Shape Residents’ Lives; Rikers Embraces Telemedicine For Inmates

The Washington Post: ‘If I Could Afford To Leave, I Would.’ In Flint, A Water Crisis With No End In Sight.
Even now, the people of Flint, Mich., cannot trust what flows from their taps. More than one year after government officials finally acknowledged that an entire city’s water system was contaminated by lead, many residents still rely on bottled water for drinking, cooking and bathing. Parents still worry about their kids. Promised aid has yet to arrive. In ways large and small, the crisis continues to shape daily life. (Dennis, 10/22)

Modern Healthcare: Telemedicine Goes Behind Bars To Help Jail Inmates At Rikers 
Inmates can spend six to eight hours shackled in holding pens and sitting in traffic as they travel to NYC Health & Hospitals' Bellevue campus for five minutes with a doctor...[Dr. Vinh] Pham and his colleagues came up with a solution. Earlier this year, they introduced telemedicine to Rikers Island, which has some 55,000 inmates come through its doors annually. Since the initiative began in May, 52 inmate patients have had virtual checkups and information visits with Bellevue's infectious disease, gastroenterology and urology specialists. They allow Pham and others to spend up to 30 minutes with a patient answering questions and ordering treatment when necessary. (Teichert, 10/22)

The Baltimore Sun: Drug To Protect Against HIV Not Reaching Those Most At Risk
Many of the people most at risk of contracting HIV in Baltimore know nothing about a drug that is 92 percent effective in preventing the infection, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Only about 40 percent of gay and bisexual men with no HIV diagnosis had heard of pre-exposure prophylaxis medication, or PrEP, according to findings published this month in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. (McDaniels, 10/21)

NH Union Leader: GOP Lodges Right-To-Know Suit, Claims Hassan Holding Back Hitchcock Contract Info 
The New Hampshire Republican State Committee will launch a Right-to-Know lawsuit today, charging that Gov. Maggie Hassan and key state agency heads refused to turn over damaging information about the controversial, Dartmouth-Hitchcock contract to staff the state psychiatric hospital. The suit being filed in Merrimack County Superior Court comes after the Hassan administration answered Right-to-Know requests from GOP State Chairman Jennifer Horn about the $37 million contract for New Hampshire Hospital. (Landrigan, 10/23)

Nashville Tennessean: Business, Health Care Execs To Steer Frist's Health Initiative
Nashville health care and business leaders — from HCA, Bridgestone Americas and Bank of America, among others — have joined the board of former Sen. Bill Frist's initiative to not only make the city healthier but a model for other cities trying to tackle bad health. NashvilleHealth, Frist's one-year-old organization, is trying to tackle the gulf between the health care expertise in Davidson County and the health of residents, which lags many of its metro peers. The state, too, is struggling with years of residents with poor health and chronic disease despite being home to many top health care companies. (Fletcher, 10/23)

Columbus Dispatch: Grief, Questions Linger In Infection Death After Heart Transplant 
The room at UPMC Presbyterian, known as a negative-pressure room, is intended to house patients with an infectious disease so any air they might infect does not flow to other areas. The ventilation system, which is designed to pull outside air into a room, could increase infection probability for a transplant patient taking immunosuppressant drugs. A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report in December advised UPMC not to house transplant patients with compromised immune systems in negative-pressure rooms... The report was issued after three transplant patients who contracted fungal infections at Montefiore or Presbyterian died within a year. (Schmitt, 10/24)

Seattle Times: Seattle Pain Centers Director Denies State’s Claims In Patients’ Deaths 
The former medical director of a shuttered chain of Washington pain clinics is forcefully denying allegations he failed to properly monitor Medicaid patients’ opiate use, possibly contributing to 18 deaths since 2010. In a 19-page response to charges by the state Medical Commission, Dr. Frank Li contends he never saw five of the patients himself, treated eight of the 18 only one or two times and shouldn’t be held liable for the acts of providers he supervised at Seattle Pain Centers. In addition, Li, 48, denied that his business model focused on hiring newly licensed practitioners with little pain-management experience or that he ordered excessive numbers of urine screenings and unnecessary medical equipment to boost fees. (Aleccia, 10/21)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: DaVita Encouraged Some Low-Income Patients To Enroll In Commercial Plans
Internal emails from DaVita HealthCare Partners Inc. show the Denver-based company targeted some patients in a campaign to get them to buy insurance they didn’t necessarily need, saying their monthly premiums would be paid by a nonprofit foundation. DaVita, one of the nation’s largest dialysis providers, with a major presence in St. Louis, had a financial incentive to get certain Medicaid-eligible dialysis patients to enroll in private insurance. Medicaid, the government-run health insurance program for low-income Americans, pays significantly less than traditional commercial insurance for dialysis treatment. (Liss,10/23)

Richmond Times Dispatch: Care Of Preemies: VCU Health Operates Two Of HCA's Neonatal Intensive Care Units
For the past three years, HCA Virginia has contracted with VCU to operate the NICUs at HCA Virginia’s Johnston-Willis and Chippenham hospitals and bring its neonatologists and specialists to those hospitals. Officials with both health systems describe the relationship as a partnership — an example of an academic medical institution partnering with community hospitals to bring evidence-based practices and the newest research advances to the general public faster. The cooperation comes despite the hesitancy among Richmond’s three major health systems in recent years to join together for children’s issues, particularly in the development of an independent children’s hospital in the area. (Demeria, 10/22)

Detroit Free Press: Fraud Case Against Port Huron Doctor Grows
Dr. Demian Naguib was charged in December 2015 following an investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Michigan Attorney General's Office and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. Naguib, who was employed through Physician HealthCare Network, is charged by the Attorney General's office with conducting a criminal enterprise, a 20-year felony; nine counts of Medicaid fraud, 4-year felonies; and nine counts of health care fraud, also 4-year felonies. He is alleged to have billed Medicaid, Medicare and Blue Cross Blue Shield for pricey procedures that were not actually completed or providing unnecessary procedures to patients to result in higher pay. (Smith, 10/22)

Health News Florida: EMT Working Group Takes A 'Balance' Approach
Consumer advocates are heralding a new Florida law that bans most balance billing. But legislators left ambulance services out of the legislation, largely because local governments play such a big role. Insurance Consumer Advocate Sha Ron James says it’s too early to say whether the group will recommend expanding a balance billing ban to cover ambulances. (Ash, 10/23)

Miami Herald: Patient’s Mangled Penis Gets South Florida Doctor In Trouble Again
One of South Florida’s most notorious plastic surgeons — linked to a string of high-profile botched surgeries and two patient deaths over the years — pleaded not guilty Friday to allegations he mangled a man’s penis during an illegal cosmetic surgery in Hialeah. A Miami-Dade judge also ordered that Mark Schreiber must post a $250,000 bond and remain on house arrest while he awaits trial for what a prosecutor called the “butchery of a human being.” (Ovalle, 10/21)

New Hampshire Union Leader: Suit Alleges Perm At Hampton Nursing Facility Led To Elderly Woman's Death
A Portsmouth woman is suing a Hampton nursing facility, claiming a chemical reaction from a perm that her mother was given in a hair salon eventually led to her death.Betty Ann Fraser filed suit earlier this month against Genesis Health Care LLC, which operates Oceanside Center. The facility provides short-stay rehabilitation and long-term care, skilled nursing and dementia services. According to the suit in Rockingham County Superior Court, Fraser’s mother, Betty M. Pettigrew, suffered a reaction after getting her hair done while she was a resident of the facility in November 2014. (Schreiber, 10/23)

California Healthline: California Releases Latest ‘Report Cards’ On Health Plans, Doctor Groups
California’s Office of the Patient Advocate Friday released its annual report cards on health plans and medical groups — tools meant to help guide consumers and employers as they shop for coverage during the upcoming open enrollment season. The report cards assign ratings to the 10 largest HMOs and five largest PPOs in the state, based on quality of care and patient experience. It also rates more than 200 physician groups. Quality of care measures include ensuring that heart patients’ blood pressure is well managed and that children get their immunizations. (Ibarra, 10/24)

Health News Florida: Campaign Against Marijuana Measure Puts A Cloud Over Existing Businesses 
After nearly four decades of a war on drugs, Americans’ opinion of marijuana appears to be changing dramatically. This month Pew Research found 57 percent of Americans support full legalization. A June Quinnipiac Poll returned a slight majority in favor of legalization as well. But it’s the narrower question of medical cannabis where the numbers are truly striking. The same nationwide Quinnipiac poll showed 89 percent favor medical use—with strong majorities in all categories whether political party, age, race, or education. (Evans, 10/23)