A new report shows U.S. teen birth rates at an all-time low, but Texas still records some of the highest rates in the country. Matt Largey of KUT News reports.
Department of State Health Services
Posted in
State Government
Mental Math
Texas sheriffs fear that the looming budget shortfall will turn the growing shortage of bed space for their psychologically disturbed inmates at state mental hospitals into a crisis.
Posted in
State Government
TribBlog: Baby Blood Battle Continues [Updated]
The baby blood battle continues with a second lawsuit against the Department of State Health Services for not only storing but allegedly selling, distributing and bartering baby blood samples.
Posted in
Health care
A “B” for Effort
One in 10 Asian-Americans has hepatitis B, a rate that is 20 times higher than the rest of the population — and is surely pronounced in Houston, which has the fourth-largest Asian population of any U.S. metropolitan area. But state public health officials struggle to get funding for vaccinations and outreach.
Posted in
Demographics
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
M. Smith and Butrymowicz of the Hechinger Institute on charter schools and public schools making nice in the Valley, Ramsey’s interview with House Speaker candidate Ken Paxton and column on the coming budget carnage, Hu on the Legislature’s disappearing white Democratic women, Grissom on the sheriff who busted Willie Nelson, Hamilton talks higher ed accountability with the chair of the Governor’s Business Council, Aguilar on the arrest of a cartel kingpin, Ramshaw on the explosive growth in the number of adult Texans with diabetes, Philpott on state incentive funding under fire and Galbraith on the greening of Houston: The best of our best from November 29 to December 3, 2010.
Posted in
Health care
TribBlog: Report: Texas In No-Win Situation With Medicaid [Updated]
The effects of Texas dropping out of the federal Medicaid program would be sweeping and to some populations devastating. But that doesn’t mean the current system is workable for Texas, according to a long-awaited report released today by the state’s Health and Human Services Commission.
Posted in
Health care
Diabetic Shock
The number of adult Texans with diabetes is expected to quadruple over the next three decades, a massive spike that demographers and health care experts attribute to the state’s aging population and obesity epidemic.
Posted in
Health care
A Conflict in Care?
For years, the state paid private providers who care for people with disabilities to handle their clients’ case management. But an 11th-hour change inserted into the budget last session stripped them of that responsibility, giving it instead to quasi-governmental Mental Retardation Authorities — and potentially creating a conflict of interest.
Posted in
Economy
There Will Be Blood
Ask House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jim Pitts, R-Waxahachie, and he’ll tell you: The budget he and his fellow finance types will put forward in a few weeks confirms fears that carnage is looming. “We’re making huge cuts,” he told a Tea Party group last week.
Posted in
Health care
Deborah Peel: The TT Interview
The patient privacy advocate on why our electronic medical records are in grave danger, how they could be used to discriminate against us and what Facebook can teach health care professionals about informed consent.
