Patient Confidentiality: A Cornerstone of Public Health Practice

Patient Confidentiality: A Cornerstone of Public Health Practice

When we think about holding things in confidence- several relationships come to mind that have a long history built on trust and the sharing of deeply private information.  Most of us can name these relationships with ease… husband and wife… lawyer and client… health care providers, public health officials and patients.  These relationships exist for [...]

By |2017-02-10T09:51:25-07:00December 8th, 2011|General|Comments Off on Patient Confidentiality: A Cornerstone of Public Health Practice

Forging a New Trauma Tool

Kudos to our EMS and Trauma System team for forging some new tools to improve trauma care in AZ.  Our Data and Quality Assurance team  developed an innovative benchmarking tool that’s shared with each of AZ’s trauma centers.  The tool shows each facility their injury specific survival rates and compares those rates to the (blinded) other [...]

By |2011-12-07T08:12:41-07:00December 7th, 2011|General, Prevention|Comments Off on Forging a New Trauma Tool

Home Birth Protest

Those of you that were working at our downtown campus last Wednesday afternoon may have seen the 100 or so folks carrying placards in front of our 150 Building.  They were asking us to make it easier to have a home-birth in AZ.  How can we do that, you ask?  Many of you probably didn’t [...]

By |2011-12-06T08:14:45-07:00December 6th, 2011|General, Licensing|40 Comments

A Virus is Born

The CDC confirmed the birth of a new influenza virus in this week’s MMWR Weekly Report.  The newborn is named “Swine-origin Triple Reassortant Influenza A (H3N2) (S-OtrH3N2)”.  The hybrid virus was found in a handful of school-age kids in Iowa recently- and luckily the kids recovered and none were hospitalized.  Nobody outside the initial cluster has been infected [...]

By |2017-02-10T09:51:25-07:00December 5th, 2011|General, Preparedness|Comments Off on A Virus is Born

HIV Becomes a Chronic Disease

Chronic disease often calls up bad images for people because it means living with the disease for a long time.  But…  there was a time when cancer wasn’t chronic disease because people got sick and died pretty quickly.  The same goes for HIV.  When it was first discovered in the early 80s people quickly transitioned [...]

By |2017-02-10T09:51:25-07:00December 1st, 2011|General|3 Comments

Integration Licensing Forums

Earlier this year the Governor signed HB 2634 which directs us to develop new rules for licensing places that can provide both behavioral and physical health services. We’re excited about this rulemaking because it supports our efforts to establish coordination and collaboration between all behavioral health and physical health providers. We’ve developed a preliminary plan [...]

By |2017-02-10T09:51:25-07:00November 30th, 2011|General|Comments Off on Integration Licensing Forums

The Health Care/Public Health Continuum

In the world of health care- the clinician works with patients individually.  They examine various indicators of health for their patient including direct observations and laboratory or other diagnostic tests and implement interventions to help their patient improve their health.  Providers also encourage their patients to live healthy lifestyles and take safety precautions- and help [...]

By |2011-11-29T09:08:31-07:00November 29th, 2011|General, Prevention|Comments Off on The Health Care/Public Health Continuum

RSV Ramping Up in AZ

Respiratory syncytial virus (or RSV) is a respiratory virus that mainly affects little kids- and circulates around this time of year. There’s no vaccine- but clinicians can give a preventive antibody treatment to folks at greatest risk (e.g. premature infants).   It spreads mostly in the winter (like influenza) but flu and RSV don’t usually peak at [...]

By |2011-11-28T08:23:19-07:00November 28th, 2011|General|1 Comment

Annual US Mexico Border Health Commission Meeting

I was fortunate to be able to attend the US-México Border Health Commission Annual Meeting in Ensenada this month.  Mary Wakefield(Administrator for HRSA) and Víctor Hugo López Aranda (General Director of the National Commission of  Social Health Protection) attended some of the meetings (and social events) and co-chaired the Plenary Session.  Victor was representing the new Secretary of [...]

By |2017-02-10T09:51:25-07:00November 25th, 2011|General|1 Comment
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