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State and local governments will receive a windfall of more than $50 billion over 18 years from settlements with companies that made, sold, or distributed opioid painkillers. Using the funds for law enforcement has triggered important questions about what the money was meant for.
A KFF survey of employer health benefits shows that 28% of large U.S. companies have limited or no access to abortion under company health insurance.
Michigan is one of the few remaining abortion havens in the Midwest. But getting an abortion in that state is still more difficult than it should be, providers say.
School nurses treat children daily for a wide range of illnesses and injuries, and sometimes serve as a young patient’s only health provider. They also function as a point person for critical public health interventions. Yet many states don’t require them, and school districts struggle to hire them.
The American College of Emergency Physicians agreed to withdraw its 2009 white paper on excited delirium, removing the only official medical pillar of support left for the theory that has played a key role in absolving police of culpability for in-custody deaths.
A new rule sets specific treatment metrics for suspected sepsis cases in an effort to reduce deaths, but some experts say the measures could add to antibiotic overuse and need to be more flexible.
Software sifts through millions of medical records to match patients with similar diagnoses and characteristics and then predicts what kind of care an individual will need and for how long. New federal rules will ensure human experts are part of the process.
Increasingly, hospitals are merging across separate markets within states. It’s a move that health economists and the Federal Trade Commission have been closely watching, as evidence shows such mergers raise prices for patients with no improvement in care.
“People want covid-19 to be in the rearview mirror,” one nursing home official says. Faced with a slow rollout of the updated covid vaccines, and without state mandates for workers to get vaccinated, most skilled nursing facilities are relying on persuasion to boost vaccination rates among staff and residents.
Parents, educators, and elected officials agree that investing in school-based prevention efforts could help curb the rising rate of youth drug overdoses. The well-known D.A.R.E. program is one likely choice, but its effectiveness is in question.
Beneficiaries in five states described what happened when they received letters calling on them to return overpayments that can reach tens of thousands of dollars or more.
The Biden administration says a recently proposed minimum staffing standard would help ensure quality care, but nursing home leaders predict many rural facilities would struggle to meet it.
High-risk patients from states that heavily restrict abortion are coming to hospitals in states such as Illinois that protect abortion rights. The journey can mean more medical risks and higher bills.
Doctors say billing for email consultations reduces message volume and gives them more free time. The increasingly prevalent practice has also raised fears about negative impacts to patient care.
Residential addiction treatment programs that allow parents to bring their children along have been recognized for their success. But a mix of logistical challenges and low reimbursement rates mean they struggle to stay afloat.
Federal research linking “forever chemicals” to testicular cancer confirms what U.S. military personnel long suspected. But as they seek testing for PFAS exposure, many wonder what to do with the results. There’s no medical treatment yet.
For rural Americans, who live in areas often short of mental health services and die by suicide at a far higher rate than urbanites, the federally mandated crisis phone line is one of the few options to connect with a crisis counselor.
Unsafe sleep environments are among the main reasons accidental suffocation or strangulation is a hard-to-solve public health problem.
The medical dangers of heat are real. But people often ignore public heat alerts or don't realize how vulnerable they are. A new alert system prompts clinicians to talk about heat with patients.
A widow encountered a perplexing reality in medical billing: Providers can come after patients to collect well after a bill has been paid.
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