Top of the Morning: Trudy Lieberman Edition

Here we check in with prominent health journalists and experts to see what sites, newsletters and social media feeds they turn to first every morning. This week, we caught up with Trudy Lieberman, contributing editor to the Center for Health Journalism and Columbia Journalism Review. Here are her top morning reads:

There's just so much stuff out there and it can be hard to separate the wheat from the chaff.

 I always go to Politico. I get the health stuff pretty quickly from them and I can generally read between the lines. I consider them essential reading every day.

Modern Healthcare is really good for a lot of the business stuff.

The Hill: I can generally read between the lines. They may have a very different take than, say, Politico, but I do want to see what they're talking about.

 The one that's becoming really important me is the Morning Read, a digest that's fairly new from the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, an advocacy group. Because I cover Medicare, Medicaid, social security, and drug issues as they affect seniors and everyone else, it's a really nice digest. They give it to you pretty crisply, without much of a slant.

I get story ideas sometimes from Twitter, several times a day. I come from the old school where you just go out and report, which I still feel is the best way, but that's harder for people to do these days. Twitter is a pretty good summary that I find very useful as a story-idea generator. If I see something I want to pursue, I start digging. It can be a real time suck, though.

As a young journalist in Detroit doing consumer reporting, I was always reading the Wall Street Journal to become more knowledgeable. The reporting is good and they know how to really report and connect the dots.

Not regularly, but sometimes if I'm looking for a business story on the hospital industry I turn to Becker's Hospital Review. Trade publications are often overlooked, but you can find a lot in them. These are some of the best places to get stuff. I really suggest - especially for the young journalists - that you start looking at these publications.

There's a lot places where people can learn and get information that I didn't have as a young journalist. But I think reporters need to be skeptical of sources and read studies and health policy very carefully. 

I've been working for the Columbia Journalism Review for 20-plus years, and I've always felt like I'm having a conversation with my profession. I'm not a newbie anymore, but I'm really enjoying this ability to have this conversation.