Medicare coverage for outpatient mental health care is now in line with medical coverage, thanks to a law that closed the gap as of Jan. 1. Experts say it’s a step in dispelling long-standing disparities between the two, but the change addresses only one of many hurdles in providing seniors with adequate mental health care.
The billboards are impossible to miss along the freeways running through Oakland. “Being a prostituted teen isn’t a choice. It’s slavery,” reads one. They are the most visible part of the new Protect Oakland Kids campaign.
When Sara Wysuph of Santa Cruz learned that her brother-in-law Jason Jones had been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, she was determined to help him and his family get the financial and emotional support they needed.
About 9,000 Medi-Cal applications from newly eligible Sonoma County residents have not been processed yet, due to the deluge of applications under Obamacare, said Joy Thomas, communications and outreach manager for the Sonoma County Human Services Department.
In many ways, Jude Ehrlich is the face of federal health reform on the northern California coast. The good face, anyway. The 44-year-old McKinleyville man never used to have much trouble getting health insurance. He had employee-offered plans until 2000, when he started his own small business and purchased his own policy, which helped cover his treatments for psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis, migraines and other health problems.
Matru peered out from our perch high above the Ganges and looked down at the spectacle below – five separate fires burning near the river’s edge. His family had overseen this site for generations, and over five decades he’d seen this ritual repeated thousands of times.
California’s innovative concept in skilled nursing care, The Green House Project, is intended to foster an environment for older adults to thrive. As described by Green House founder Dr. Bill Thomas, the difference in these new facilities is simple: “Love matters.”
A Missouri marketing company has applied for permits to sell tobacco at dozens of bars and clubs around San Francisco, a move that surprised both public health officials and bar owners who said they had no idea someone was applying to sell tobacco at their establishments without permission.
When Paula Pilecki approached 26 assisted living facilities in Marin County about making their facilities more receptive to all sexual orientations, she was shocked at the response. “Almost all of them said ‘There are no gay people in our facilities so we don’t have to do that.”
One of California’s most deeply embedded community aging organizations is responding to the crisis of at-home caregivers with an intriguing model for stressed out, isolated family members. At the heart of this effort is the new Mobile Caregiver Support Center – a small bus loaded with educational materials and staff experts who provide insulated caregivers with answers and hope.