Our house lost power a few nights ago, during one of 2023’s record-setting storms. For our family, losing power is a medical emergency.
But on this occasion, for the first time, I had access to a portable power station. Portable power stations are rechargeable batteries that can provide hours of backup electricity, which is especially important for people who use medical devices or assistive technology.
Too many families must fight health plans to get mental health care for their children. The process to get care is often time-consuming, confusing and burdensome.
That is why we are sponsoring Senate Bill 238. Under this bill, parents will no longer have to appeal health plan decisions through the arduous Department of Managed Health Care process.
This winter, the U.S. experienced a dramatic increase in the number of children needing emergency medical care for respiratory infections.
These events should renew attention to factors we can control to keep demand for routine pediatric emergency medical care to a minimum, such as food access.
A woman dies every minute of heart disease in America. Yet the stereotypes about heart disease tend to suggest it is something that only affects men.
Think back to the last time you saw a heart disease-related commercial in a glossy magazine. It featured a white man in his 60s, right? It’s not a coincidence. After all, older men still run the country, when you look at the numbers in Congress.
As a physician, when a patient comes to me with an issue or illness that can be treated or even cured, my priority is to make sure they receive the correct and most effective treatment or medication.
Unfortunately, I am often forced to include another consideration in what I prescribe: a patient’s ability to afford the medication.
Health systems must acknowledge racism’s role in patient harm and medical errors.
That starts with more systematically collecting race, ethnicity and other data on both patient health and patient safety — which, incredibly, is not required today.
As of October, the most recent month for which data is available, more than 300,000 older immigrant adults who lack legal residency had enrolled in full Medi-Cal benefits, 30 percent more than the state’s original projection.
State health officials, who had based their estimate on the number of people enrolled in a limited form of Medi-Cal that covers only emergency medical services, don’t know how many additional older Californians are eligible.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, finding nurses to care for medically fragile children at home has become extremely difficult, according to parents of children with disabilities and home health agencies.
The shortage has prompted calls for California’s governor and legislature to increase Medi-Cal reimbursement rates for home nurses by 40 percent.
A new law will compel creditors to recognize coerced debt if a survivor can provide proof such as a police report, a court order specifying financial abuse, identity theft report or letter from a professional such as a domestic violence advocate. Creditors can also seek repayment of the debt from the person responsible for it.
Research suggests financial abuse occurs in 99 percent of domestic violence cases. More than half of domestic violence survivors experience coerced or fraudulent debt of over $10,000 a year.
Even in California, a state where voters overwhelmingly decided to protect the right to reproductive freedom in the constitution this November, many rural residents struggle to access abortion services.
These residents sometimes live hundreds of miles away from the nearest abortion clinic and lack the resources to trek to another part of the state.