Disabled children have a right to a free and appropriate public education.
I’m making an intentional choice to use the word “disabled” to talk about children who need care during the school day. Many families use words like “special needs” to talk about children with disabilities. But disability is a word that is defined by state and federals laws that comes with rights.
There’s no denying it — many men are struggling. Wages are stagnant. Housing is unaffordable. Suicide and addiction rates are climbing. Loneliness is everywhere. The institutions that once gave men a sense of place — unions, community centers, stable jobs — have disappeared.
But the reactionary masculinity solution of toughening up, dominating, and grinding harder is not the answer.
Obesity is still widely misunderstood. It is not a cosmetic issue or a failure of willpower. It is a chronic disease driven by biology, environment, genetics, stress, sleep medications and socioeconomic conditions.
As physicians, we are trained to prevent disease before it spirals into irreversible complications. That is exactly what GLP-1 medications can help us do.
Some children encounter cancer long before they take a biology class. A parent, grandparent, sibling, teacher or friend can be diagnosed, and suddenly kids hear unfamiliar words while also watching someone they love change physically and emotionally.
Trying to protect children by saying very little can leave them to fill in the blanks themselves.
Children need adults willing to explain hard things honestly, in ways they can understand.
For an older adult who has spent a lifetime making decisions about where to go, when to get up and how to live, entering a skilled nursing facility should not mean that every decision involving mobility suddenly becomes someone else’s.
As California physical therapists who work in nursing-homes, we confront this tension every day.
Another summer of extreme heat is sending many Californians to hospitals and emergency rooms in growing numbers.
Behind the numbers are people without access to cool places, workers laboring in unsafe conditions, children attending schools without enough shade and residents managing chronic health conditions in homes that trap heat. In too many cases, we can only infer their stories.
Two years ago, my son James was invited to speak at the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. at an event celebrating the 25th anniversary of Olmstead v. L.C.
The 1999 Supreme Court case said people with disabilities have a right to receive care in their own homes and live in the community, rather than being forced to live in segregated institutional care facilities.
Large hospital systems in California — and the rest of the country — have been buying up independent physician offices under the guise of streamlined care. In reality, these acquisitions drive up fees and costs for patients without improving care at all.
The math does not work — not for physicians, and not for patients — until policymakers can fix the significant dangers associated with vertical integration.
Many doctors don’t see or don’t want to see Medi-Cal patients. It’s all about pay. In fact, the latest federal government adjustment reduced physician fees by 2.8 percent, exacerbating the problem. California voters passed Proposition 35 in November 2024, to increase pay to doctors treating Medi-Cal patients, but it hasn’t been implemented yet.
The payment pressure doesn’t just affect who gets seen, it also shapes how they’re seen.
It strikes me that embarrassment is a huge barrier to participation in physical activity for aging people, and it’s not even the most substantial one. Other obstacles include lack of money or transportation to attend an age-appropriate exercise class. In some cases, older adults are hobbled by arthritis or are wheelchair-bound. And sometimes taking a walk isn’t a viable option when a neighborhood doesn’t feel safe or the sidewalk is cracked and pitted.