The national Public Health Prevention Plan was released last week, with a clear emphasis on the critical contributors to health. The 4 broad strategic directions for the plan are: Building healthy and safe community environments, Expanding quality preventive services in both clinical and community settings, Empowering people to make healthy choices, and Eliminating health disparities. This [...]
There’ve been 3 lawsuits filed against the Department in the last few days. On June 10th, the Arizona Biomedical Research Commission filed suit against the state (including me) to stop the enactment of the portion of SB1615, which transfers the Commission to ADHS next month. We have someone from the Attorney General’s office working on [...]
The center of gravity for the public health responses to the fires shifted South this week toward the new Monument fire. Early this week folks were allowed to go back to Springerville and Eagar, which meant that it was show-time for Licensing again. We sent a team of surveyors to re-open the licensed facilities that were evacuated last week. [...]
Men’s Health Week focuses on male specific diseases such as prostate cancer and men's wellness in general, including mental health issues and accident prevention. Many people think of their fathers this time of year - but men should at least make a commitment to themselves and their families to pay better attention to health and [...]
We kicked off Step 1 of our long-awaited overhaul of the behavioral health facility licensing requirements this week. A new law passed last legislative session charges us with facilitating “licensure of integrated health programs that provide both behavioral and physical health services." The new law tells us to adopt rules relating to construction, equipment, sanitation, [...]
Today I was served with a lawsuit that challenges the State (and the Department) for not implementing the dispensary portion of the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act. The case, filed in the AZ Court of Appeals, asks a judge to order us to follow the rules that we published on April 14 and begin accepting dispensary [...]
More than 1,100 Arizonans died from drug poisoning, which is more than the number of Arizonans that die in car accidents every year. This isn’t just an Arizona public health crisis, it’s a national one. Last week the federal government released a new plan to address the national prescription drug abuse epidemic and announced new [...]
Have you heard about Mental Health First Aid? It’s designed to quickly help folks with a behavioral health need. It’s a lot like CPR or other forms of first aid for physical health conditions in that anyone can learn and apply the concepts soon after going through the short certification training. Mental Health First Aid [...]
We recently extended our contract with the Regional Behavioral Health Authority in Maricopa County through September 30, 2013. We authorized the contract extension (which will be the 6th year of the contract) so that we can better serve our members and families while we hammer out the details of several new initiatives designed to improve [...]
One of the budget bills that passed and was signed last legislative session (Laws 2011, Chapter 31, § 7) allows our Office of Vital Records to set new fees for copies of registered certificates, certified copies, amendments, etc. Our Office of Vital Records will use the new fees to “self-fund” the program, meaning we’ll no longer receive State General [...]
