The Department of Administration made a decision about the Regional Behavioral Health Contract for Maricopa County this week. Deputy Director Cory Nelson explains more about the decision and its impact on the current behavioral health service in his blog.
Finding effective ways to guide kids can be a struggle- especially since each child responds so differently. From “time outs” to “spanking”, parents hope that discipline works to modify behavior. But what about the long-term impact of discipline like spanking? Is it effective in the long-run? A recent study completed and published in the journal [...]
There was good news this week about preconception health. A report just out from the EPA found that more women of childbearing age have been avoiding eating the kinds of ocean predators that typically contain mercury (Hg). This is important because mercury can affect the baby’s brain being developed during pregnancy. Mercury is found in [...]
Our Empower Program just launched its new and improved website. You’ll recall that Empower is our program that works with more than 2,400 licensed childcare facilities across the state of Arizona reaching more than 200,000 children. Each provider receives a discount on their licensing fees and in return commits to implementing 10 standards that empower kids to [...]
Like conflict and wars, typhoon Haiyan (local name Yolanda) destroyed basic services for food, water, health care and shelter in the Central Philippines. This disaster was declared a “Level 3” Emergency by the UN, meaning there’s substantial impact on the health of people and it can’t be managed by a country or region alone. The [...]
Thanks to all of you that made this year’s food drive a success again. We started off a little slow this year, but donations really picked up this week and we ended up collecting more than 1,000 Kg of food… with almost half coming in this week. We haven’t broken out the finals for [...]
One of the objectives in our Strategic Map is Building Awareness of Public Health Value. One of the ways we can do that is to educate community groups, students and other Stakeholders about the return on investment that public health provides and how the system works. Lucky for us the CDC recently published a PowerPoint [...]
The Arizona Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics recently updated their collection of hands-on tools that can be easily integrated into clinical practice. The tools are designed to help clinicians to incorporate clinical evidence-based recommendations for obesity prevention, assessment, treatment and referral into their practice. They’ve included a document that can be folded to [...]
The formal protest process regarding our award of the Regional Behavioral Health Authority contract in Maricopa County is finally winding down. The proceedings at the Office of Administrative Hearings (OAH) were completed a few weeks ago, and the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) issued her recommendation on Monday, concluding that: “Based on the foregoing, it is [...]
The CDC just developed a great new Cost Calculator that provides state-level annual medical expenditure and absenteeism estimates for 10 chronic conditions. The tool provides medical expenditures for all of AZ for all payers as well as specific payers Medicaid, Medicare, and commercial insurers. The 10 chronic conditions are arthritis; asthma; cancer; cardiovascular diseases (congestive [...]
