Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
State Highlights: Communities' Mental Health Failures; Medicaid And EHRs
The USA could dramatically improve the lives of the 10 million Americans with serious mental illness if it would make wider use of proven programs. "We know what to do," says Ron Honberg, national director of policy and legal affairs at the National Alliance on Mental Illness. "We just don't do it." Most communities ignore mental health until there's a crisis, such as the school shootings in Newtown, Conn., two years ago. ... Studies show that supported housing, which provides a variety of services beyond low-cost apartments, not only reduces homelessness but also helps participants spend less time in shelters, hospitals and jail. (Szabo, 12/22)
The vast majority of states and the federal government have little data on how many doctors seeing the nation’s poorest patients are using electronic health records, although nearly $9 billion has been disbursed by the program that gives incentives for the technology’s adoption. (Pittman, 12/22)
More than a century ago, Alabama enshrined a basic protection in the state’s constitution shielding its poorest citizens from being forced to pay debts they couldn’t afford. But a public hospital in the mostly rural southeast corner of the state has found a way around the law. ... ProPublica and NPR reported last week that nonprofit hospitals, which are legally required to offer discounted care to the poor, often sue low-income patients and garnish hefty portions of their pay. But ProPublica found similar tactics are wielded by public facilities that often serve as hospitals of last resort. (Kiel, 12/22)
Pasquale Vaglio, a retired New York City policeman and Korean War veteran, was on the cruise of a lifetime with 18 family members in the summer of 2001 ... Then, the accident happened. Vaglio, 82, fell and hit his head ... a nurse did a cursory examination and said Vaglio should rest in his cabin. What she didn't know — and a doctor wouldn't discover until hours later — was that Vaglio had suffered a brain injury that would kill him within days. For more than 100 years, people such as Vaglio's survivors couldn't win medical malpractice lawsuits against cruise lines. (Anderson, 12/23)
