Last month I bragged about how our newborn screening team beat the deadline I gave them to improve our system – a system that ensure blood spots taken from newborns are quickly screened for life-threatening diseases. Now that the actual deadline is past, it’s good to see the team and our licensed hospitals exceeded what [...]
The monsoon season marks the tick season here in Arizona, and one of most important tick-borne disease threats in the state is Rocky Mountain spotted fever. The symptoms usually start with a fever of two or more days and can lead to a nasty “spotted” rash (although the rash is not always present in the cases [...]
Our Office of Children with Special Healthcare Needs has been working with UnitedHealthcare Community Plans and AHCCCS to support an important free conference on Friday, July 25, to improve the care delivery system in Arizona for children and youth with special health care needs and disabilities and their families. The goal of the free conference is to [...]
Arizona law requires kids to get certain vaccines in order to attend school unless a doctor signs a medical exemption form or a parent signs a religious or personal belief exemption form. There’s been an increasing number of parents who are signing personal belief exemption forms- putting herd immunity at risk. Every year we examine [...]
Our Licensing, Preparedness and Healthcare-Associated Infections shops joined forces with APIC Consulting Inc. to provide a free day-long event to provide training to skilled nursing facilities about how to prevent healthcare-associated infections. The training will be based on the Infection Preventionist's Guide to Long-Term Care. The goals are to help healthcare providers to: 1) identify infection prevention [...]
This week we took a huge step forward in our efforts to keep kids safe on both sides of the border. Rural Metro was helping us transport child car seats to Mexico as part of our commitment to A Safe Ride Home. Last year during the Arizona Mexico Commission’s summer plenary session, we signed an [...]
A few months ago the Governor announced a final agreement had been reached in the 32 year old Arnold vs. Sarn case regarding care and services for individuals with serious mental illness. The Settlement is the foundation to end the lawsuit while establishing a blueprint for a successful community-based behavioral health system in Arizona. The Agreement [...]
Now that we have a new integrated behavioral health care model in Maricopa County, we’ve set our sights on implementing a similar integrated care model in the rest of the state. Our Procurement Team issued the Greater Arizona Behavioral Health RFP last week - which sets the course for integrating behavioral health and physical health for [...]
Arizona's Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) is moving from paper checks to an electronic system thanks to a $5M grant we received from USDA this week. WIC electronic benefit transfer (or EBT) will provide enhanced service and benefits to participants, clinic staff, and WIC vendors (grocery stores authorized to accept Arizona WIC benefits). Stores in Arizona that provide WIC services sell [...]
Our Office of Children with Special Healthcare Needs has been working with UnitedHealthcare Community Plans and the AHCCCS to support an important free Conference on July 25 to improve the care delivery system in Arizona for children and youth with special health care needs and disabilities and their families. The goal of the free Conference [...]
