As I’ve mentioned in previous posts- we’re in the beginning phases of overhauling our regulations for licensing behavioral health facilities. This’ll be a long process- and the finish line is in mid-2013. We’re starting with a set of what we’ll call “straw-man” language that we can use as a way to start the discussions. We’ve [...]
It’s hard to believe- but our Smoke Free Arizona program turned 5 this month. Voters approved the Act back in November of ’06 by a few percentage points. The Initiative language gave us a super-short turn-around time (just like medical marijuana)… and we turned the key on the program by May of ’07. Implementation of the [...]
People get hurt because of unsafe acts and unsafe conditions. It’s always easier to deal with unsafe conditions- because you can often make a system change and have an impact. Changing unsafe acts (behaviors) is a lot harder. Anyway- a new report came out this week called The Facts Hurt: A State by State Injury [...]
It’s been a busy week for our medical marijuana team. Our 2-week dispensary application period ended a couple of hours ago… as did the hearing regarding adding new debilitating medical conditions. We received 484 dispensary applications over the last 2 weeks. As you know, we have 126 Community Health Analysis Areas (CHAAs) and a maximum [...]
About 500,000 times a year in Arizona a call goes out from someone that finds themselves in a medical crisis. Our pre-hospital and hospital providers step up to the plate to answer that call. All Arizonans are proud and appreciative of what you do for our citizens, friends, co-workers and families. You make a difference! [...]
Friday afternoon we’re holding a public comment session about whether or not to add four new debilitating conditions to the medical marijuana program. The comments should center on scientific studies done on how marijuana affects Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Migraines, Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. We're looking for peer-reviewed, published studies that show the benefit or the [...]
The First Lady’s Let’s Move! Child Care initiative recognized our Empower program for exceptional work to promote young children’s health and prevent childhood obesity in the early care and education setting last week. We were selected for recognition for carrying out exceptional work to promote and implement the goals of Let’s Move! Child Care, including using [...]
The CDC, along with HBO, The Institutes of Medicine and several private partners created a series of documentaries, called Weight of the Nation which aired last week, but you can still watch them all online. We wrote a feature about our own Matt Gainey- who made tremendous strides to change his health. Matt is just one [...]
Our Department plays a significant role in the response for major wildland fires… and we’re monitoring the current fires closely to make sure that we cover our bases. Our initial roles mostly include environmental health functions, especially surrounding health risks from smoke, sanitary conditions and food safety in shelters and ensuring that all of our licensed [...]
Most people think that when the weather warms up, we can stop worrying about the flu. But it’s still here. Recently, a young Gila County child died from influenza. It's the only pediatric death from flu in Arizona this year, last year 5 children under 18 died. Adult flu deaths are not tracked by the [...]
