Barbara Feder Ostrov

<p>Who knew that the <a href="http://www.dartmouthatlas.org/">Dartmouth Atlas</a> could arouse such passion? Many journalists have been trained to see the influential dataset as one of their most reliable sources for reporting on health care costs and regional differences in how health care is delivered in the United States.

<p>Is geography destiny? At today’s <a href="../../../../../../../../blogs/different-kind-health-summit">Community Health and the Blogosphere</a> conference (Twitter hashtag <a href="http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23uscbloggercon">#uscbloggercon</a&gt;), participants wanted to know more about the ways in which where you live affects your health. If you’re interested in learning more for your reporting or blogging, here are some resources from ReportingonHealth and beyond.</p>

<p>A new <a href="http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_1801-1850/ab_1802_bill_… bill</a> allowing school employees to provide insulin injections to schoolchildren with diabetes is worth watching as it makes its way through the California legislature. AB1802 was introduced Feb. 10 by Assemblyman Isadore Hall (D—Compton). Advocates for children with diabetes <a href="http://www.diabetesincaschools.com/hall-introduces-ab1802.html">are rallying behind it</a>.</p>

<p>We’re Number 6! Hurray!</p> <p>There has been quite a flurry of quick-hit news stories about the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s <a href="http://www.countyhealthrankings.org/">health rankings of the nation’s counties</a>. Apparently, at one point on the day they were released, “county health rankings” was the top search term in Google News.</p> <p>Too bad a number of these stories were boosterish (or defensive) pieces, devoid of context, about where individual counties ranked in comparison to the one next door.</p>

<p>Veteran journalist Dan Weintraub today launches <a href="http://www.healthycal.org/">a new website</a> dedicated to helping Californians better understand and talk about public health and community health, broadly defined. Supported by <a href="http://www.calendow.org/">The California Endowment</a>, the state’s largest health philanthropy (which also supports ReportingonHealth), <a href="http://www.healthycal.org/">HealthyCal.org</a&gt; will also examine land use, transportation, poverty, food and criminal justice issues as they relate to health.

<p>Could medical marijuana really become a government-approved treatment for workers injured on the job?</p> <p>Now that <a href="http://www.businessinsurance.com/article/20100125/BLOGS02/100129967">a California court has left the door open</a> for that possibility, some experts think it’s only a matter of time. Which raises the specter of all kinds of interesting dilemmas for workers and employers: what if an injured employee uses medical marijuana approved by his or her worker’s comp doctor – and then fails a drug test?</p>

<p>To most reporters, <a href="http://content.hcpro.com/pdf/content/245957.pdf">a recent lawsuit</a> filed by California doctors to stop nurse specialists from administering unsupervised anesthesia looks like a yawn-worthy turf war over who gets to do what in medicine.</p> <p>As far as I can tell, no mainstream California media outlet picked up the story. I can just see the thought bubbles (having been guilty of it myself in the past). <em>That’s inside baseball. It’s not a local story, right?</em></p> <p>Think again.</p>

<p>A <a href="http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/full/29/2/318?ijkey=i.LSSR… Health Affairs interview</a> with California HealthCare Foundation CEO <a href="http://www.chcf.org/aboutchcf/view.cfm?itemID=108866">Dr. Mark Smith</a> caught my eye because if you read closely, you can find some intriguing new story ideas for journalists interested in health.</p>

<p>Many journalists trying to cover their county’s safety-net health care system find it confusing at first, what with its alphabet soup of DSH payments, FQHC and CHC clinics, SNCP funds and MISP programs.</p>

<p>One question that’s getting lost in all the chatter after Scott Brown’s historic election and Nancy Pelosi ‘s <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/21/AR20100… comments on health reform</a> today is what’s going to happen to the concessions that the insurance and pharmaceutical industries offered last year as serious reform discussions were just getting underway. &nbsp;The Wall St.