Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Fulton State Hospital In Mo. Marks 'Milestone' In Reconstruction Project
Efforts to rebuild Fulton State Hospital have reached a "milestone," in the words of Gov. Jay Nixon. The first new building in the reconstruction project is complete and expected to become fully operational next month. The Energy Control Center and Services Building will house several functions, including the emergency command post, power supply, computer services, maintenance and food preparation for patients. (Griffin, 6/23)
A San Fernando Valley hospital has agreed to pay $1 million in civil penalties to settle allegations that it put a mentally ill woman in a taxi and lost track of her for three days, Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer announced Thursday. Under the terms of the settlement, Pacifica Hospital of the Valley admitted no wrongdoing but agreed to revamp its protocols for discharging homeless patients. It is the second time in two years that the hospital — a 231-bed facility in Sun Valley — has settled with the city attorney’s office in patient-dumping cases. (Branson-Potts, 6/23)
Meanwhile, hospitals in some developing countries face daily challenges that, in the United States, would be considered catastrophic -
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health looked at studies on 430 hospitals in 19 low- and middle-income countries. In an article published online in the Journal of Surgical Research, they reported that a third of the hospitals surveyed — a total of 147 — did not have continuous running water. The most startling statistics come from Liberia, where 80 percent of the hospitals did not have running water all the time, and Sierra Leone, where the figure was 81 percent. (Silver, 6/23)
