healthcare | The Pump Handle

Affordable Care Act Study: ACA-backed efforts to reduce hospital readmissions also reduced mortality

July 22, 2017 Kim Krisberg

With the future of the Affordable Care Act still up in the air, most of the news coverage has gone to insurance coverage, premiums and Medicaid. And rightly so. But also included in the massive health reform law were a number of innovative measures to improve the quality and value of the medical care we actually get in the doctor’s office. With repeal still on the table, those measures are at risk too.

Affordable Care Act GOP health care bills would cripple public health opioid response: ‘We’d essentially be putting up the white flag’

June 30, 2017 Kim Krisberg

In Cuyahoga County, Ohio, nearly 200 people have died from opioid-related overdoses in the first five months of this year. That means that this one U.S. county is on pace to lose more than 700 people to fatal overdoses by the end of 2017.

Affordable Care Act Zika remains a serious threat. Federal funding cuts will make the problem even worse.

June 13, 2017 Kim Krisberg 1Comment

Last year’s emergency Zika funding is about to run out and there’s no new money in the pipeline. It’s emblematic of the kind of short-term, reactive policymaking that public health officials have been warning us about for years. Now, as we head into summer, public health again faces a dangerous, highly complex threat along with an enormous funding gap.

Affordable Care Act Trump’s budget is a disaster for public health: ‘If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu’

June 6, 2017 Kim Krisberg 1Comment

When you ask public health advocates about President Trump’s recent budget proposal, you typically get a bewildered pause. Public health people don’t like to exaggerate — they follow the science, they stay calm, they face off against dangerous threats on a regular basis. Exaggerating doesn’t help contain diseases, it only makes it harder. So it’s concerning when you hear words like this about Trump’s budget: “devastating,” “not serious,” “ludicrous,” “unfathomable.”

Affordable Care Act More research that defunding Planned Parenthood simply leaves women without needed health care

May 26, 2017 Kim Krisberg

To the surprise of literally no one, President Trump’s 2018 budget proposed stripping all federal funds, including Medicaid dollars, from Planned Parenthood. Proponents of this argue that if Planned Parenthood clinics end up shuttered, women can simply access care elsewhere. But growing research shows that’s the opposite of what actually happens.

Environmental Health The PRIDE Study is open for enrollment: People are ‘hungry to be heard and represented’

May 23, 2017 Kim Krisberg 4Comment

Last week, researchers officially opened enrollment in the nation’s first decades-long study of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer health — an effort they hope will transform our understanding of the health challenges LGBTQ people face and begin narrowing a giant data gap on their physical, mental and social well-being.

Environmental Health Study: U.S. Zika burden could cost billions in medical care, lost productivity

May 18, 2017 Kim Krisberg 1Comment

A Zika attack rate of just 1 percent across the six states most at risk for the mosquito-borne disease could result in $1.2 billion in medical costs and lost productivity, a new study finds. That’s more than the $1.1 billion in emergency Zika funding that Congress approved last year after months of delay and which is expected to run out this summer.

California Study: One-third of U.S. children with harmful lead exposures going unidentified

May 5, 2017 Kim Krisberg

Right now, according to public health officials, about half a million U.S. kids have blood lead levels that could harm their health. However, new research finds many more children — hundreds of thousands more — are likely going unidentified.

Government Study: Training parents as immunization advocates a promising approach to vaccine hesitancy

May 1, 2017 Kim Krisberg 4Comment

Protecting babies and children against dangerous — sometimes fatal — diseases is a core mission of public health. Everyday, in health departments across the nation, someone is working on maintaining and improving childhood vaccination rates and keeping diseases like measles and mumps from regaining a foothold in the U.S.

Affordable Care Act Study: Kids with chronic health problems will face greater financial burdens if forced out of CHIP

April 25, 2017 Kim Krisberg

More than 8 million U.S. children depend on the Children’s Health Insurance Program for access to timely medical care. The program is authorized through 2019, but its federal funding expires in September and it’s unclear what Congress will do.

Liz Borkowski, MPH	Celeste Monforton, DrPH,
Kim Krisberg	Garrett Brown