November 13, 2014 | 3:02 PM | By

Counties Expand Mental Health Services with New State Funds

Hope House, a residential treatment program in Martinez, helps people in a mental health crisis make the transition back to the community. (Elaine Korry/KQED)

Hope House, a residential treatment program in Martinez, helps people in a mental health crisis make the transition back to the community. (Elaine Korry/KQED)

By Elaine Korry

It’s lunchtime at Hope House, a new 16-bed residential facility in Martinez, east of San Francisco. People who live here are busy preparing lunch in what looks like a big country kitchen.

“We’ve designed it as much as possible to have a homelike atmosphere,” says program director Christopher Roach. “We want people to be thinking, this is a transition to the community.”

Many of the residents here have arrived directly from a hospital. Among them are young adults facing a psychotic break, chronically-ill homeless men or mothers battling mental illness and addiction. After an average two-weeks of intense counseling, Roach says they’ll leave with hope for recovery.

“What you’re able to accomplish in 14 days is huge if you know what you’re looking for,” he says. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, Mental Health, News
November 13, 2014 | 8:45 AM | By

Through Photos, Oakland Youth Focus On Neighborhood Health (Video)

By Jeremy Raff

Fifteen students stand facing an imaginary line bisecting the room.

“If someone in your family has diabetes, cross the line,” said Sidra Bonner, the UCSF medical student leading the session on community health. Twelve of the 15 students cross the line. “If you have been affected by gun violence, cross the line.” Every student shuffles across.

The game is called “cross the line.” The students playing have all returned to school here at Civicorps, an Oakland-based non-profit that helps high-risk young adults get a high school diploma and job training. The school is right next to the Port of Oakland. Outside, trains whistle and trucks rumble down the freeway.


Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, News
November 12, 2014 | 9:41 AM | By

PriceCheck: Insurer Payments for IUDs Vary by $800 in California

(Getty Images)

(Getty Images)

Earlier this year, KQED launched PriceCheck, our crowdsourcing project on health costs. We’re working in collaboration with KPCC public media in Los Angeles and ClearHealthCosts.com, a New York City startup looking at health costs.

On PriceCheck we’re shining a light on the opaque world of health care costs. We’ve asked what you, the members of our audience, have been charged for common medical tests and services, including mammograms and lower-back MRIs.

Now a PriceCheck update on IUDs, the long-acting contraceptive. (And it’s really long-acting — up to seven years for the hormonal type; up to 12 years for the copper IUD). You told us what you were charged and what your insurers paid for an IUD.

Like all FDA-approved methods of birth control, IUDs are supposed to be available at no co-pay to consumers under a requirement of the Affordable Care Act. Were they? The device alone generally costs several hundred dollars; a doctor’s charge to insert the device can be hundreds more.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Tests & Treatments, Birth Control, Health Costs, IUD, News, PriceCheck
November 11, 2014 | 11:05 AM | By

Study: Transgender Men Who Become Pregnant Face Social Challenges

(Getty Images)

(Getty Images)

By Robin Marantz Henig, NPR

“Pregnancy and childbirth were very male experiences for me,” said a 29-year-old respondent in a study reported Friday in Obstetrics and Gynecology. “When I birthed my children, I was born into fatherhood.”

If this statement at first seems perplexing, it’s less so when you realize the person talking is a transgender man – someone who has transitioned from a female identity to a male or masculine identity.

He is one of 41 participants in a study of how it feels to be male and pregnant, a study the authors think may be the first of its kind.

Pregnancy as a transgender man is unlike any other kind. No one expects a man to be pregnant, and the study participants said they were often greeted with double-takes, suspicion and even hostility from strangers and health care providers. “Child Protective Services was alerted to the fact that a ‘tranny’ had a baby,” one participant reported. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, News, Pregnancy, Trans Health, Transgender
November 10, 2014 | 7:19 AM | By

UCSF Initiative Links ‘Sugar Science’ to Your Health

(Getty Images)

(Getty Images)

These days, sugar is pretty close to everywhere in the American diet. You probably know that too much sugar is probably not great for your health.

Now, a new initiative from UC San Francisco is spelling out the health dangers in clear terms. The  project is called “sugar science,” and science there is.

A team of researchers distilled 8,000 studies and research papers, and found strong evidence showing overconsumption of added sugar overloads vital organs and contributes to three major chronic illnesses: heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and liver disease. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, Living Healthy, Diabetes, Heart Disease, News, Science, Sugar
November 9, 2014 | 10:00 PM | By

Kaiser Nurses Plan 2-Day Strike: Premature Move or Strategic Step?

Kaiser Permanente's newly opened medical center in Oakland. (Lisa Aliferis/KQED)

Kaiser’s Oakland Medical Center. (Lisa Aliferis/KQED)

As many as 18,000 Kaiser Permanente nurses are preparing for a two-day strike that will start Tuesday. Nurses plan to leave their posts at 7 a.m. and picket outside 21 medical centers and clinics across Northern California.

The placards nurses carry and the chants they repeat will say little about salaries or pensions. No economic proposals have even been put on the bargaining table yet.

“This seems awfully quick to go to a strike,” says Joanne Spetz, an economics professor at the UC San Francisco School of Nursing. “I can’t recall a situation where a strike has come up where there has not been some kind of disagreement about wages and benefits as part of the package.” Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Policy, California Nurses Association, Kaiser, News
November 7, 2014 | 10:50 AM | By

‘Village’ Movement for Aging Seniors Faces Some Challenges

(Patrick/Flickr)

(Patrick/Flickr)

“It takes a village” is a common refrain.

Now “Villages” — yes, with a capital V — are sweeping the U.S., looking to redefine how people age in their communities.

The Village movement brings together older adults who want to age in their homes independently, but believe it will be too hard to do so, unless they have some support. These virtual villages link independent living seniors together. Members offer support to each other as they are able, and ask for support when they need it through an organized system.

Half of all villages in the U.S. started in the last three years. Because they are such a recent phenomenon, there have not been many studies about their outcomes. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, Policy, Aging, Senior Health
November 7, 2014 | 5:40 AM | By

New State Funding Improves County Mental Health Services

(Getty Images)

(Getty Images)

By Elaine Korry

The Joslyn Center in Burbank is a place where older adults come for low-cost healthy meals and activities ranging from fitness and computer classes to music lessons.

But several times lately, the normally placid environment of the center has been disrupted. One client who uses the services was showing signs of mental illness. Renee Crawford coordinates social services at the Center.

“She gets very loud, very aggressive and very anxious,” Crawford said, in reference to the troubled client. “And then we have to go in and tell her, ‘Calm down, relax, you can’t be this loud,’ Then she gets very upset and very irate.”

The woman seemed to be suffering from paranoid delusions, and Crawford says the workers here aren’t trained to help her. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, Policy, Mental Health, News
November 6, 2014 | 10:07 AM | By

Study Shows Childhood Trauma a ‘Hidden Crisis’ Across California

(Getty Images)

(Getty Images)

By Sara Hossaini

A first-of-its kind report released Wednesday suggests Californians are facing a hidden public health crisis that stems from childhood trauma.

“People sometimes assume this is a low-income issue. This is everybody’s burden.”   

Researchers from the San Francisco-based Center for Youth Wellness and Public Health Institute in Oakland aim to shed light on how early adverse experiences, such as abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction — including divorce and parental incarceration — might impact a child’s health for a lifetime.

Dr. Nadine Burke Harris is a pediatrician and founder of the Center for Youth Wellness. She says the study looked at data from more than 27,000 surveys conducted by the California Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System over four years between 2008 and 2013.  Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community Health, Children's Health, News
November 5, 2014 | 12:47 AM | By

Prop. 45 Defeated by Health Insurance Industry

The law would require health insurers to publicly disclose and justify their rates. (Getty Images)

The law would require health insurers to publicly disclose and justify their rates. (Getty Images)

Update, 12:30 a.m.
At first glance, Proposition 45 seemed like a no-brainer for consumers. The measure would have given the state’s insurance commissioner the authority to reject excessive rate hikes in health insurance sold on the individual and small-business markets.

Consumers who had seen their premiums go up by double digits year after year clung to Prop. 45 as the savior.

“I felt like a frog in hot water that got hotter and hotter until it was boiling,” says Josh Libresco, a market researcher who has bought health insurance for his family on the individual market for 20 years.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Obamacare, Policy, News, Proposition 45