Throughout human history, war and political unrest have been associated with the spread of disease, often called the “third army”. During the Napoleonic wars, 8 times more people in the British army died from disease than from battle wounds. In our Civil War, 66% of the 660,000 deaths among soldiers were caused by pneumonia, typhoid, [...]
Objective evaluation is critical to assessing and improving the performance of any public health system- including the behavioral health system that we manage. One of the ways we assess our behavioral health system is to conduct a “Quality Services Review”, which identifies strengths, service capacity gaps, and areas for improvement at a system-wide level. A [...]
To help meet the growing demand for health care administrators the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health at the U of A (in Phoenix) will begin offering a new accredited Master of Public Health in Health Services Administration program in fall 2014. The health services administration program will provide students with the knowledge [...]
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the basics of evaluating a trauma system and last week I posted about over & under triage. This week is about a tool we use to measure whether we’re striking the right balance- the “Z Statistic”. Back in 1990, there was a famous study published (Major Trauma [...]
 Investigators of a new study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association discovered another reason that some people may benefit from getting the flu shot. The study found that getting an annual flu vaccine puts the person at lower risk of having a heart attack, stroke, heart failure, or death [...]
 This past summer I blogged about Rural Metro failing to meet a bond payment and having some issues with an ambulance service contract in California. They subsequently filed for bankruptcy and are in the process of negotiating with their creditors. This is important- because they’re a big provider of 9-1-1 and hospital to hospital [...]
Arizona law requires kids to receive certain vaccines in order to attend school unless a doctor signs a medical exemption form or a parent signs a religious or personal beliefs exemption form. There has been an increasing number of parents who are signing exemption forms- putting herd immunity at risk in some parts of the [...]
The formal protest process regarding our award of the Regional Behavioral Health Authority contract in Maricopa County is finally winding down. The oral part of the hearing in front of the Administrative Law Judge was completed a couple of weeks ago. The final legal filings are due next week and the responses to those filings [...]
Our new Public Health Blog is now live!  The goal of the blog is for our Prevention Services to promote our work with the public and with our partners through better use of social media.  We’ll also be adding some new features, such as an interactive info-graphic tool and video clips highlighting selected blog posts. [...]
This week is International Infection Prevention Week (IIPW), which started in 1986 under a proclamation from President Reagan. For the 4th year in a row, October 20-26, 2013 is Arizona Infection Prevention Week. Since it started, the week has been used to spread awareness about interventions that promote safe healthcare practices and prevention of healthcare-associated infections [...]
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