Weekly Edition: August 23, 2019
After A Rural Hospital Closes, Delays In Emergency Care Cost Patients Dearly
By Sarah Jane Tribble and Christopher Smith
The loss of the longtime hospital in Fort Scott, Kan., forces trauma patients to deal with changing services and expectations.
Dealing With Hospital Closure, Pioneer Kansas Town Asks: What Comes Next?
By Sarah Jane Tribble and Christopher Smith
After depending on the local hospital for more than a century, Fort Scott residents now are trying to cope with life without it.
Have Cancer, Must Travel: Patients Left In Lurch After Hospital Closes
By Sarah Jane Tribble and Christopher Smith
As the rural town of Fort Scott, Kan., grapples with the closure of its hospital, cancer patients face new challenges as they try to continue their treatments in different locations.
The Collapse Of A Hospital Empire — And Towns Left In The Wreckage
By Barbara Feder Ostrov and Lauren Weber and Heidi de Marco
Jorge A. Perez and his management company, EmpowerHMS, helped run an empire of rural hospitals. Now, in a staggering implosion, 12 of them have entered bankruptcy and eight have closed their doors, leaving hundreds of residents without jobs and their communities without lifesaving emergency medical care. So, what happened?
Feds Pave The Way To Expand Home Dialysis — But Patients Hit Roadblocks
By Judith Graham
What changes are needed to bring home dialysis to more patients — especially older adults, the fastest-growing group of patients with serious, irreversible kidney disease? We asked nephrologists, patient advocates and dialysis company officials for their thoughts.
Addiction Clinics Market Pricey, Unproven Treatments To Desperate Patients
By Jake Harper, Side Effects Public Media
An amino acid infusion called NAD is not approved by the FDA to treat addiction. Yet patients with addiction can be desperate enough to try it, at prices as high as $15,000.
Dialysis Industry Spends Big To Protect Profits
By Harriet Blair Rowan
Dialysis companies are fighting a bill in the California legislature that could disrupt their business model. Their weapons: campaign cash and a sophisticated public relations campaign.
Years Ago, This Doctor Linked A Mysterious Lung Disease To Vaping
By Victoria Knight
In an exclusive interview, a West Virginia physician says that back in 2015 he had a sense a patient’s illness “probably wasn't the first case ever seen nor would it be the last.” Was it a sentinel event?
A Brush With A Notorious Cat, My Rabies Education And The Big Bill That Followed
By Caitlin Hillyard
An encounter with a cat led to rabies shots and provided yet another illustration of how confusing, contrary and expensive the American health care system is.
Joe Camel Was Forced Out Of Ads. So Why Is Juul Allowed On TV?
By Michelle Andrews
For nearly 50 years, cigarette advertising has been banned from TV and radio. But the marketing of electronic cigarettes isn’t constrained by that law.
KHN’s ‘What The Health?’: All About Medicare
Before “Medicare for All,” there was just Medicare, the federal program that provides insurance to 60 million Americans. This week, KHN’s Julie Rovner talks to Tricia Neuman of the Kaiser Family Foundation about how Medicare works and whom it serves. Then, Joanne Kenen of Politico, Paige Winfield Cunningham of The Washington Post and Kimberly Leonard of the Washington Examiner join Rovner to talk about some current Medicare issues being debated in Washington, D.C.
Democrats’ Different Takes On Tackling Health Care
KHN reporter Emmarie Huetteman joined Connecticut Public Radio’s Lucy Nalpathanchil on the “Where We Live” program Tuesday to talk about the variety of options that Democratic presidential candidates are proposing for voters.
Shopping Abroad For Cheaper Medication? Here’s What You Need To Know
By Bernard J. Wolfson
Americans routinely skirt federal law by crossing into Canada and Mexico or tapping online pharmacies abroad to purchase prescription medications at a fraction of the price they would pay at home. Is it safe? Not necessarily. Here’s some advice.
DIY Tech Gives People More Freedom In Managing Diabetes
By Heidi de Marco
People with diabetes say they’ve been waiting for years for better technology to manage their chronic condition. Tired of waiting, some tech-savvy, do-it-yourselfers are constructing their own devices using open-source programming instructions.
MDMA, Or Ecstasy, Shows Promise As A PTSD Treatment
By Will Stone, KJZZ
MDMA, the psychoactive ingredient in the club drug known as molly or ecstasy, is being tested in combination with therapy as a treatment for severe trauma.
Watch: Trump-Pence Policy Shift Makes Birth Control Harder To Get
The Trump administration's policy shift on Title X family planning funds is likely to make birth control harder to get and more expensive for low-income women. It will also shift funds from organizations like Planned Parenthood to the Obria Group, which does not give women hormonal contraceptives or condoms in its clinics.
Readers And Tweeters Take Dialysis Providers To Task: Nowhere But In The USA
Kaiser Health News gives readers a chance to comment on a recent batch of stories.