California state lawmakers this year are continuing their progressive tilt on health policy, debating bills banning an ingredient in Froot Loops and offering free condoms for high schoolers.
To reduce recidivism, some rural counties are hiring community health workers or peer support specialists to connect people leaving custody to mental health resources, substance use treatment, medical services, and jobs.
Most Medicare enrollees have two or more chronic health conditions, making them eligible for a federal program that rewards physicians for doing more to manage their care. It shows promise in reducing costs. But not many doctors have joined.
Celebrity hotel heiress Paris Hilton is expanding her campaign for more public reporting on residential therapeutic centers’ use of restraints and seclusion rooms in disciplining teens, setting her sights on legislation in Sacramento and Washington, D.C.
For more than 20 years, children in Arkansas have been measured in school as part of a statewide effort to reduce childhood obesity. But the letters have had no impact on weight loss — and obesity rates have risen. Still, the practice of sending letters has spread to other states.
The surge in overdose deaths among teens is opening a new path to treatment: pediatricians. A doctor in Massachusetts shows how it works with a 17-year-old patient.
State institutions and community hospitals have closed inpatient mental health units, often citing staffing and financial challenges. Now, for-profit companies are opening psychiatric hospitals to fill the void.
A California law that takes effect this summer will grant minors on public insurance the ability to get mental health treatment without their parents’ consent, a privilege that their peers with private insurance have had for years. But the law has become a flashpoint in the state’s culture wars.