Quitting Tobacco: A New You for New Year’s
Quitting smoking is one of the hardest addictions to break, but it’s not impossible . A new year brings a sense of renewal and that’s why so many smokers make the resolution to quit. For some it’s a second, third or even tenth chance at kicking the habit. That sense of failure, or even fear of failure, can [...]
Active School Neighborhood Checklist Gains National Attention
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently featured our Active School Neighborhood Checklist in their Physical Activity and Community Design Facilitated Peer Networking Call on December 15. The Arizona Nutrition Network's SNAP-Ed program from the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension, highlighted work done in Tucson using the checklist. The Active School Neighborhood Checklist is a tool we developed jointly [...]
Prescription Drug and Opiate Addiction Impact Newborns
Opioid abuse not only affects the user, but also others close to the user, especially, if the user is pregnant. Rural communities in the United States are seeing a rise in the number of babies born with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, according to JAMA Pediatrics. The syndrome consists of the complications and withdrawal symptoms that result when babies are no longer [...]
Work Continues on Breast Cancer Learning Collaborative
Our Office of Cancer Prevention and Control has been awarded a contract from the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) to continue exciting work on the Breast Cancer Learning Collaborative. In the first year, through some terrific research conducted by the Arizona Cancer Registry, we learned that African American, Native American, and Hispanic women experienced breast cancer differently than [...]
Testing Our Ability to Rapidly Respond to Public Health Emergencies
Our Bureau of Public Health Emergency Preparedness focuses on preparing for, responding to, and recovering from public health emergencies and disasters that are natural or human-caused. One of our preparedness strategies is to test our notification and alerting system, the Arizona Health Alert System (AzHAN) by initiating call down drills. Call down drills test the validity of ADHS's call down lists and their ability [...]
ADHS Making the Grade
Throughout the year, a multitude of agencies release annual reports that attempt to grade states on their preparedness to respond to public health emergencies. Some years these reports use similar indicators to assign state scores, but indicators often vary from year to year. These reports look at areas both within and outside of a health department’s control with indicators ranging [...]