Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
State Highlights: Opponents to Calif. Child Vaccination Law Launch New Challenge; In Ohio, Columbus City Council Approves Increase In Employee Health Spending
San Jose Mercury News: California's Child Vaccination Law Faces Another Legal Challenge
Opponents of a new California state law requiring nearly all schoolchildren to be fully vaccinated have mounted another legal challenge — this time, setting the science of immunization aside and focusing on constitutional rights. Under California’s child vaccine law, one of the strictest in the nation, parents are no longer allowed to skip required immunizations for their children based on personal or religious beliefs. The new rules, the plaintiffs argue, force families to choose between three constitutionally protected rights: making medical decisions for their children; bodily autonomy, and a public education. (Murphy, 12/12)
Columbus Dispatch: Columbus City Council Approves $195 Million For Health Costs In 2017
The cost to insure Columbus city workers will grow again next year, as health-care expenses continue to rise. The City Council approved $195 million in appropriations Monday night to pay for coverage for about 8,300 employees expected to be on the city payroll next year. That’s about 6.5 percent more than for this year. (Rouan, 12/13)
The New York Times: Hack Of Quest Diagnostics App Exposes Data Of 34,000 Patients
A medical laboratory company based in New Jersey said Monday that it was investigating a recent hack that exposed the personal health information of about 34,000 people. (Chokshi, 12/12)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: New Health Care Model Makes House Calls
Aamir Siddiqi and Danish Siddiqui, former associate professors with the Aurora University of Wisconsin Medical Group, have seen firsthand the shortcomings of the U.S. health care system. Like many doctors and other clinicians, they have long been frustrated by the fragmentation of care, the lack of coordination and the limited time allotted for patient visits. (Boulton, 12/10)
Chicago Sun Times: Tinley Park Doctor Convicted Of Medicare Fraud Gets 40 Months
A Tinley Park doctor convicted earlier this year of defrauding Medicare has been sentenced to 40 months in prison and ordered to pay $1.5 million in restitution. In January, Dr. Banio Koroma, 66, was found guilty by a federal jury of two counts of health care fraud and two counts of making false statements related to health care matters, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office. (12/12)
Miami Herald: Former South Miami Hospital Heart Doctor Denies Fraud Charges, In Settlement Talks With Whistle Blowers
A heart specialist accused of performing medically unnecessary and costly cardiac procedures on thousands of patients at South Miami Hospital is negotiating a settlement in a whistleblower lawsuit alleging years of healthcare fraud. In a court order filed last week, U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro instructed one of the whistleblowers in the case, James A. Burks, to file a status report by Dec. 16 or risk dismissal of the case. (Chang, 12/12)
Nashville Tennessean: ICU Rooms Get Pen, Paper To Spur Family To Ask Questions
Patients in the intensive care unit at TriStar Skyline Medical Center will find a journal and pen in the room as the unit tries to get more people to ask questions. Paper and pens are found at any roadside motel, but have been largely absent from hospital rooms. And since most of Skyline's ICU patients come through the emergency room they haven't packed for an extended stay, said Christine Lunger, a nurse and director of the critical care unit. Nurses encouraged families, or patients when they were able, to write down their questions and notes for the next time the physician rounded, or as a follow-up to ask the nurses. (Fletcher, 12/12)
Richmond Times Dispatch: DOJ Opens Investigation Into Hampton Roads Regional Jail
The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a federal civil rights investigation into Hampton Roads Regional Jail in Portsmouth over concerns about inmates’ access to medical and mental health care. The probe, announced Monday, will focus on whether inmates’ constitutional rights have been violated — particularly those with mental illness — by “secluding them in isolation for prolonged time periods” and “denying them access to services, programs and activities because of their disability,” the Justice Department said in a release. (Burnell-Evans and Kleiner, 12/12)
Sacramento Bee: How Ebola Aid From The Sacramento Region Was Used In Liberia
As the Ebola virus spread through Liberia with frightful speed in the fall of 2014, Roseville resident Shelley Spurlock was up at 4 a.m. daily, hoping she wouldn’t find news about another dead student or health worker in the war-torn country where she’s focused her work for the last decade. Spurlock has been helping the coastal African nation rebuild since its destructive civil wars in the 1990s and 2000s, mostly through her scholarship distribution nonprofit Raise Your Hand Foundation, which launched in 2007. With her help, Mercy General Hospital in Sacramento and other groups sent tons of syringes, lab coats, stethoscopes and latex gloves in 2014 to aid in the fight against Ebola. (Caiola, 12/12)
