Insights

You learn a lot when you spend months reporting on a given issue or community, as our fellows can attest. Whether you’re embarking on a big new story or seeking to go deeper on a given issue, it pays to learn from those who’ve already put in the shoe leather and crunched the data. In these essays and columns, our community of journalists steps back from the notebooks and tape to reflect on key lessons, highlight urgent themes, and offer sage advice on the essential health stories of the day. 

Lack of National Reporting Mandate for Hospital Infections Hurts Consumers

By Gergana Koleva

Hospitals across the country are using near-total discretion in the way they disclose infections that occur as a result of surgeries, cause over 8,000 deaths annually in the U.S., and cost an additional $10 billion per year to the healthcare system, a new study underscoring the need for public reporting standards has found.

Vote for FastForward Health on GOOD Maker Challenge!

By Andre Blackman

<p>We are now on the GOOD Maker Challenge to win $2,500 to keep the venture going. For those of you unfamiliar with GOOD magazine, it is dedicated to covering innovative concepts, people and initiatives shaping our world for the better. They have launched this Challenge to bring together great ideas in which the ones with the most votes will get this stipend. Would you all be so kind to vote for us?</p>

Join the Conversation on How We Can Improve Reporting on Health

By Michelle Levander

<p>We figure that Reporting on Health can stay innovative and relevant to you by constantly adapting to your ideas and the enormous changes reshaping the media and health landscape around us. Please answer our survey to help with our next steps.&nbsp;</p>

TV networks' drug ad dependency: who's the stooge?

By Gary Schwitzer

CBS rejects 3 Stooges movie promo because it makes fun of TV drug ads. As Curly said in "Dizzy Doctors": "Brighto! Brighto! It makes old bodies new! We'll sell a million bottles, Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo!"