William Heisel
Contributing Editor
Contributing Editor
I have reported on health for most of my career. My work as an investigative reporter at the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register exposed problems with the fertility industry, the trade in human body parts and the use of illegal drugs in sports. I helped create a first-of-its-kind report card judging hospitals on a wide array of measures for a story that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. I was one of the lead reporters on a series of stories about lead in candy, a series that also was a finalist for the Pulitzer.For the Center for Health Journalism (previously known as Reporting on Health), I have written about investigative health reporting and occasionally broke news on my column, Antidote. I also was the project editor on the Just One Breath collaborative reporting series. These days, for the University of Washington, I now work as the Executive Director for Insitutue for Health Metrics and Evaluation's Client Services, a social enterprise. You can follow me on Twitter @wheisel.
<p>Why is the Vermont Department of Health hiding behind the HIPAA privacy law to keep secret the autopsy of a hiker who froze to death?</p>
<p>It shouldn't be easier to map where cows live in the United States than where superbugs live, so here's a new effort to crowdsource a Google map of MRSA and other superbug infections nationwide.</p>
<p>Bioethicist Leigh Turner describes how the stem cell company Celltex tried to intimidate him and his university when he asked the FDA to investigate the company.</p>
<p>Bioethicist Leigh Turner talks about why he sicced the FDA on Celltex and about academic rivalries in the world of bioethics.</p>
<p>Bioethicist Leigh Turner, recently under fire from a stem cell company he criticized for ethical problems, talks about his research on medical tourism.</p>
<p>Reporters sometimes treat medicine as if newer is always better. It's not. Here's how to accurately report on the potential harms of a new treatment.</p>
<p>Check out a Consumer's Union Twitter chat today on the safety (or not) of medical devices.</p>
<p>Tracie McMillan talks about reporting undercover for her new book exploring how and why Americans eat the way they do.</p>
<p>We know more about cows at remote ranches than drug-resistant infections in thousands of healthcare facilities nationwide. So what should be done? Here are some ideas from Health Watch USA and the CDC.</p>
<p>Why do people in Montana know more about their cows than their healthcare-acquired infections like MRSA? And what does that mean for patient safety?</p>