Insights

<p>Most unaccompanied refugee minors arrive in the U.S. with basic health issues that need to be addressed. Many are malnourished, having nearly starved on their journey to the States - and many have untreated and/or undiagnosed illnesses. These children also come with severe psychological scars that need addressing. A minority of the refugee minors arriving in Northern California are formally diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.<br />

<p>We have a guest post today from <a href="http://www.healthjournalism.org/secondarypage-details.php?id=377">Felice Freyer</a>, veteran medical writer for the Providence Journal, member of the <a href="http://www.healthjournalism.org/">Association of Health Care Journalists</a> Board of Directors and chair of AHCJ's Right to Know Committee.

<p>For Mark Campano’s entire career as an anesthesiologist, other doctors worried that he was a bomb waiting to go off. They saw him showing up for work drowsy and agitated from weeks of caffeinated days and alcohol-soaked nights. They counseled him about his drug abuse and urged him to stop.</p>

<p>Putting together a scientific research paper should be a different process than building a <a href="http://www.fordvehicles.com/cars/taurus/?searchid=426441%7C28115800%7C2… Taurus</a> or <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xedkk1xvgeo">making a Big Mac</a>.</p> <p>For the drug companies and their ghostwriting partners, it isn’t.</p>

<p>A loophole in California law means that insurers could require you to take a genetic test to qualify for long-term care insurance – and potentially deny coverage based on the results.</p>

<p>Do you know how many hours there are in a week?</p> <p>For doctors, the answer is on the tips of their tongues: 168 hours. As one medical resident recently put it to me, “When you are in residency, you start with the hours in the week and then subtract the few hours that you are <em>not</em> at the hospital. It’s not uncommon to work 120 hours a week. It’s the reverse human schedule.”</p>

<p>In the heated debate over the new routine <a href="http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/USpstf/uspsbrca.htm">mammogram screening recommendations</a> from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, not enough coverage has focused on our perception of risk.</p> <p>It’s important context for all reporting on medical screening.</p> <p>Journalist Merrill Goozner, who blogs at <a href="http://www.gooznews.com/">GoozNews</a&gt;, has a great <a href="http://www.gooznews.com/node/3174">post</a&gt; on this topic, and on the costs of our misperception of risk. He writes:</p>

<p>Blogs, twitters and daily print help keep us abreast of breaking news. But there's nothing like an old-fashioned book to get inside a big sweeping tale. In the summer of 2007, when I was a fellow here, I had little more than a vision for a book that explored Big Pharma. Well, I also had some solid sources, a blockbuster drug, and a dramatic plot that spanned some 20 years. The hard part was finding a place to adequately tell the tale.

<p>Diabetic children are in jeopardy of dying in the classroom due to a severe shortage of California registered school nurses. There are 15,000 school districts in California and less than 50 percent of those districts have a registered nurse on campus. Current law in California requires only a reg

<p>Have you ever worked on a story where you knew that you were just one source away from a blockbuster? But you could never find that one great document that spelled out the connections or that one repentant insider willing to walk you through the corporate crime, government malfeasance or law enforcement deceit.</p>