Resources: Contest Entries

Jonathan Lapook

This story profiled a New Orleans grandma with advanced Alzheimer's, her 50 year-old daughter with early onset, and her 30 year-old daughter, about to become pregnant and haunted by the question - should she get a gene test, and would she really want to know if she was its next victim?

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This story follows one man as he becomes the first person to test an artificial heart in a clinical trial as he searches for a suitable heart donor.

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In the months following Katrina, the devastation -- teamed with a culture that doesn't seek help for their anxieties -- led to mental health issues nearly doubling. Officials also saw a spike in alcohol and drug abuse as well as reports of domestic violence. The statistics following the oil spill are very similar. Mental health professionals have found their biggest challenge is finding a way to treat uncertainty. In PBS NewsHour's piece entitled "How is the Gulf Coast Mentally Coping with Devastation of Two Disasters?," Health Correspondent Betty Ann Bowser and Producer Bridget DeSimone present an in depth look at the toll Hurricane Katrina and the BP oil spill are taking on the mental health of Gulf residents.

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In June 2010, the former director of surgery at Australia's Bundaberg Base Hospital was convicted of manslaughter, in connection with the deaths of three patients. A fourth patient was found to have suffered grievous bodily harm. But that was just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Australian authorities had linked Dr. Jayat Patel to many more deaths, accusing him of hundreds of botched procedures, unnecessary operations, misdiagnoses and conducting surgeries he wasn't even qualified to perform. And perhaps most notably, he was accused of hiding his long history of similar complaints in the United States. He had been reprimanded, sued and accused of harming and carelessly killing patients long before he ever got to Australia. World's Untold Stories follows the long trail that took Dr. Jayant Patel from the operating room to an Australian prison cell.

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Jennifer Ashton

CBS News Medical Correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton spoke to Harry Smith about the effect of repeated concussions on both student and professional football players and what can be done to prevent permanent damage to the brain.

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To celebrate the release of her book, "The Body Scoop for Girls: A Straight-Talk Guide to a Healthy, Beautiful You," CBS News Medical Correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton sat down with some typical teenagers from the New York area to give them the scoop on their health on everything from body image to contraception.

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Marilyn Werber Serafini

This story is about how The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act could spur big changes in the way that physicians are organized and eliminate solo practices.

Elizabeth Svoboda & Patrick Perry

The article addressed breakthroughs in stem cell technology and explained why their research is worth keeping an eye on, including its impact in type 1 diabetes, bone fractures and cardiomyopathy. The reporters interviewed Dr. Zannos Grekos in person about his use of stem cells and how the experimental procedure helped an individual patient. The Saturday Evening Post also provided their readership basic information to provide a framework for the otherwise controversial field.

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Noelle Robbins

This article addresses a global public and environmental health issue that impacts millions around the world on a daily basis: the production and use of toilet paper. There are organizations that correlate the use of toilet paper with access to improved sanitation in developing countries. The consumption of toilet paper - whether manufactured from virgin pulp or recycled paper content - will be a continuing global need as population growth adds to the more than 2 billion world citizens currently estimated to be lacking access to sanitation.

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David Whelan

This story examines chelation, a medial treatment that's purpose is to remove poisonous metals from patients such as ones who've been in industrial accidents or otherwise exposed. Yet the therapy has been promoted by some doctors to heart patients, autistic kids and just as a general detoxification therapy--without any medical evidence that it works.

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Katie Drummond; Additional credit Sophia Banay Moura and Ying Chu.

The Hunger Diaries expose a new and subtle type of eating disorder support: the "healthy living" community. This community of young female bloggers is led by a group known as the "big six." These six twenty-something professional women have hundreds of thousands of readers for their personal sites, where they post photos and descriptions of every meal they eat and share every nuance of their intense workouts. They run regular races, including marathons, or complete athletic feats like 100-mile bike races, despite recurring injuries. Though they present themselves as advocates for health and "balance," the bloggers' extreme approach to food and exercise is alarming.

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Six months after the devastating earthquake, the PBS NewsHour's global health team returned to Haiti to highlight the country's on-going challenges, as well as the resilience of its people. One of the most urgent concerns for medical officials immediately after the quake was caring for the thousands who needed amputations. Six months later emergency care was largely over, but as NewsHour Producer Merrill Schwerin and Senior Correspondent Ray Suarez describe, a long journey of recovery was just beginning for many who lost limbs.

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Part 2

Beatrice Politi

Energy drinks are a 5-billion dollar industry. They promise to charge you up, but are they safe? This investigation put energy drinks to the test and examined the emerging research around the drinks which suggests even low levels of caffeine can potentially lead to heart attacks. We also revealed the aggressive nature of marketing in this industry and the gaping holes in Health Canada's policy and enforcement.

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In the year of concussion awareness relating to professional sports and athlete injuries, the reporters went in-depth to explain concussion, separate fact from myth and show who's most at risk. The goal was to give parents, coaches and the athletes themselves valuable news they could use.

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One in ten Asian Americans have chronic hepatitis B, but few are aware of it. The disease can cause liver cancer which is rarely detected until it's too late. As many as 2 billion people worldwide may be infected, and yet there is little public awareness about hep B and not much media attention. The PBS NewsHour, as part of its commitment to global health reporting, delved into the large numbers of Asians in the Bay Area who have hep B.

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The story was part of an ongoing series "Where America Stands." The goal was to provide a look at the state of the science, without the politics, speak to the leaders in the field, while at the same time talk about the potential impact on patients.

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This series analyzed: who would get the Medicare rebate checks, why they were needed, and showed opposing perspectives as to whether this would help fix the Medicare issue; who the North Carolina state-run high-risk insurance pool would help and how it would work; and why dozens of North Carolina doctors were opting out of Medicare and not accepting new Medicare patients.

Lynne Friedmann

Pathologists, lab managers, administrators, and technologists are taking to heart lessons learned during the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic as they prepare for the forthcoming 2010-11 influenza season in North America. Among those lessons: The need for better surveillance, improved rapid testing, enhanced molecular testing methods, and to invest in planning for the unexpected.

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Acting on a tip from inside the government, this story exposed the fact that the only office responsible for investigating fraud in federally funded research had been leaderless for more than a year. This important office was being neglected. As a result of this story, HHS finally advertised the job.

Hospital trustees are meant to represent their communities, yet most boards don't bear much of a resemblance to their patient base. This can diminish the trust patients have in the institution and hinder the board's decision-making and planning. This story uses data and interviews to explain the value of trustees that represent minority groups and offers tips on ways to recruit them.

The Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act of 1938 and the Amendments of 1962 charged the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) with approving drugs that are safe and effective. Many medications being sold before the Act are still available, although unapproved. One, of these unapproved medications, colchicine, had been available for years and used in the treatment of for acute gout and Familial Mediterranean Fever (FMF) among others. In June of 2006, the FDA and its Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) undertook the Unapproved Drugs Initiative to bring more medications into compliance. Under the provisions of the Act the FDA in July of 2009, awarded URL Pharma of Philadelphia approval to market a form of colchicine for acute gout and Familial Mediterranean Fever (FMF). They were given three-year marketing exclusivity for gout and a 7-year term for FMF as an orphan drug. As a result of the exclusivity, the branded version called Colcrys ® sells for about $5.00 a tablet or roughly 50 times the price of the unapproved version. In addition, all other versions of colchicine being marketed were pulled off the market, leaving Colcrys as the only available option. The article reported on the firestorm of protest from the Rheumatologists and patients using colchicine who were now required to pay these higher prices. It looked into the UDI program, what were the insurance implications, the views of URL on the controversy, what programs were put in place by URL and others to help patients pay the higher prices, and the legal underpinnings behind the approval and subsequent removal of other forms of colchicine from the market.

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Joanne Che, Martha McPhee, Judith Newman, Gale Konop Baker and Carmen Peleaz

The package, which appeared on the heels of the heated debate over new mammogram guidelines, explored the multitude of ways women, men, and society in general have viewed breasts over the centuries, with the goal of putting the revised mammogram controversy into perspective. It pulled from sociology, psychology, history, law and pop culture.

Sophia Banay Moura; Additional credit: Ying Chu and Anne Fulenwider

The Savvy Girl's Guide to Contraception condenses countless doctor interviews and academic reports into a comprehensive but fun-to-read guide to modern birth control. The Big Bang takes on female sexual pleasure in the wake of the controversy around Flibanserin, or "female Viagra."

Lane DeGregory; Additional credit: Suzanne Riss

When the Rolling Stones sang about "mother's little helper" in 1967, the anti-anxiety drug Valium had just hit the market: "And it helps her on her way, gets her through her busy day." Today, Xanax and cabernet are the new Valium, and working moms increasingly depend on them to cope with mounting stresses. The rise is unmistakable: Alcohol abuse among women 30 to 44 has doubled over the past decade, while prescription drug abuse has quadrupled.

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Mark Fuerst

Bobby Brown was not only a great ballplayer and role model, but left his mark on the game even after he hung up his cleats when he banned Minor League players from using smokeless tobacco as President of the American League. Just as this cover story was going to press, Major League Baseball announced it would consider a smokeless tobacco ban when players' contracts are renegotiated this year. Thanks to Brown, ballplayers and the youngsters who idolize them no longer think baseball and tobacco go together like peanut butter and jelly.

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Joshua Kor; Additional credit Roane Carey

After Sergeant Chuck Luther was seriously wounded by mortar fire while serving in Iraq, doctors pressed him to sign fraudulent documents saying his blindness was caused by a pre-existing condition, making him ineligible for disability and medical benefits. When Luther refused to sign, Army doctors put him in a closet and held him there for over a month, with armed guards enforcing sleeping deprivation -- keeping the lights on all night, blasting heavy metal music at him all through the night.

When Luther tried to escape, he was pinned down, injected with sleeping medication and dragged back to the closet. Finally, after over a month, the sergeant was willing to sign anything -- and he did, signing his name to discharge documents saying he had a pre-existing illness.

Luther's case was by no means an isolated incident. Military doctors have pressed thousands of other soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan into signing phony discharge papers for a "pre-existing" condition, saving the military billions of dollars in disability and medical benefits.

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Jason Roberson

Baylor Health Care System, a Dallas-based not-for-profit hospital system, is working to become an accountable care organization by 2015. Reaching that goal will not be easy. Like others exploring ACOs, Baylor must contend with decades-old federal and state laws once written to protect patients but now outdated for new-age payment models. Internally Baylor still must manage an imminent cultural shock of physicians' wages being determined by stacks of quality data.

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Michael Schroeder

One in 50 health care providers are practicing without a license. The majority of Angie's List members -- 91 percent -- who took our online poll say it's crucial their providers be licensed, yet half never check. Those who practice without a license either never had one, had it suspended or revoked or allowed it to lapse. While the latter is most common, consumer experts recommend not taking a health care provider's word. One report reveals two-thirds of doctors who made 10 or more malpractice payments between 1990 and 2005 faced no serious consequences, such as losing their license. Others just went to another state to practice.

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Michael Schroeder; Additional credit Kristy Broering and Sue Wiltz

Twenty percent, or roughly 60 million people, sleep fewer than six hours a night, up from 12 percent in 1998. Lack of sleep is attributed to 100,000 car accidents and 1,500 deaths on the road each year, but researchers say you're also at increased risk of heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes or stroke if you regularly get less than seven to nine hours a night.

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Jordan Lite

Accumulating research demonstrates that information users post on social-networking sites accurately reflects their real-life behaviors, such as sexual activity and possibly mood, violence, alcohol and substance abuse. The findings raise ethical dilemmas about whether and how that information should be utilized by health-care providers.

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Rhonda Koulermos

Richard Groat, executive at a TV station in Columbus, Ohio, developed early-onset Alzheimer's at age 52. His wife Gloria served as his primary caregiver while running a small business and caring for their aging parents. This is the story of their 16-year journey with Alzheimer's.

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Rebecca Adams

This article examined three central questions of comparative effectiveness research for the health care debate: How will the results factor in coverage decisions by insurance companies and government health programs?, how will the results of broad-based studies of large populations sort with the movement toward personalized medicine?, and will doctors and patients, and the political establishment, accept the research?

Peter Aldhous, Jim Giles & Brad Stenger

They are billed as "healthcare professionals who spend years building expertise in their fields." Using materials grounded in science, they educate their peers in the risks and benefits of drugs. This is how Pfizer, the pharmaceuticals giant, describes the experts it hires to lead forums in which doctors are lectured on the use of its products. Research found that some of Pfizer's experts have been disciplined by state medical boards for deficiencies in patient care, while others have been reprimanded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for how they conducted drug research trials. These findings added to a growing controversy surrounding the pharmaceutical industry's efforts to market drugs by influencing patterns of prescribing.

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This story examined and analyzed the compensation of more than 100 CEOs of not-for-profit hospitals in California. The total average compensation was more than $730,000 a year, raising questions as to whether pay was excessive and whether the institutions were providing enough charity care to the surrounding communities.

This Special Report looks at the potential and current use of fraud-fighting technologies such as predictive modeling and analytical software by the Medicare program to root out Medicare billing fraud and stop payment before claims are filed. Health care fraud in the Medicare and Medicaid programs is a multi-billion dollar a year problem and James Swann spoke with industry experts about why such techniques are important, what is being used today by the Department of Health and Human Services, what can be expected in the future, and outlines congressional interest in the matter.

Respiratory care professionals are well-versed in ventilator care in the acute setting, but few are fully aware of the serious challenges that families of children who need long-term mechanical ventilation face once they transition to home care. This article describes the clinical, emotional, and logistical difficulties of home care and gives dramatic personal examples of life-threatening situations that families have encountered. More families than ever before must confront these issues as technological advances allow more medically complex infants to survive. It offers possible solutions that include thorough patient education and professional training. It also describes a legislative initiative that would empower respiratory therapists to contribute their unique combination of knowledge, technical skills, and compassion to fill significant gaps in skilled staffing in the home care setting.

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A review of state laws and regulations by the Investigative Reporting Workshop found that 12 states and the District of Columbia do not require medical X-ray operators to be credentialed or to meet specific competency standards. Of the 38 states that do license or accredit technologists, requirements vary greatly - from a mere 12 hours of operator training to a two-year accredited radiography program. The Workshop's survey also found that some states do not conduct routine inspections of medical imaging machines. The lack of standardization increases a patient's risk of misdiagnosis and excess exposure to radiation, at a time when regulators struggle to keep up with new types of imaging equipment.

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This article provides a discussion of five best practices for the successful employment of physicians: 1) maintain the culture of private practice, 2) involve physicians in governance, 3) productivity-based compensation, 4) dedicated management team and 5) clear and transparent objectives.

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For years, "live case demonstrations" have been signature features of certain medical meetings. In a live-case, a real-live patients, with real, often life-threatening disease, undergo procedures with the cameras rolling, a remote panel of expert 'moderators' asking questions of the operators or providing suggestions, and an audience of physicians, sometimes thousands, watching everything unfold in real time. In recent years, the American College of Surgeons (ACS) has banned live cases from its meetings, and the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS) issued a statement prohibiting live case broadcasts to the general public and discouraging the use of live demonstrations to audiences of any kind when taped cases could be used instead. By contrast, interventional cardiology meetings are relying even more heavily on what I call the "technological, logistical, and medical wizardry" that are live-case demos and for the first time have issued a set of controversial guidelines. This story explore the pros and cons of live-case demos.

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"Homeless with Cancer" reveals stories about living with a life-threatening disease on the streets of Birmingham, Alabama. The reporter sought to give voice to men and women in Birmingham who find themselves facing yet one more challenge with far fewer resources than most of us have within our reach. The result was a year-long immersion in a community few people are aware of.

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A review of state laws and regulations by the Investigative Reporting Workshop found that 12 states and the District of Columbia do not require medical X-ray operators to be credentialed or to meet specific competency standards. Of the 38 states that do license or accredit technologists, requirements vary greatly - from a mere 12 hours of operator training to a two-year accredited radiography program. The Workshop's survey also found that some states do not conduct routine inspections of medical imaging machines. The lack of standardization increases a patient's risk of misdiagnosis and excess exposure to radiation, at a time when regulators struggle to keep up with new types of imaging equipment.

See the story on the web.

At a time of national concern over health care costs, hospitals are becoming marketplace powerhouses that dictate higher prices to insurers and employers. This phenomenon is especially evident in northern California. Prominent hospitals and networks, especially those in the San Francisco Bay Area, can keep raising prices beyond inflation because their sizes or reputations give them clout in negotiating rates with insurers, researchers say. Yet high prices don't always equate with superior care. Through new construction and expanding its doctors' groups, Sutter Health is enhancing its position as one of the most dominant hospital systems in California. In addition, Sutter is further ahead of many competitors in fashioning itself into a so-called accountable care organization, responsible for coordinating care between hospitals, specialists and primary doctors. KHN extensively analyzed California hospital prices and interviewed dozens of experts and hospital executives to illustrate the impact of Sutter Health, the priciest chain. Working with public radio station KQED, KHN had several text stories, photos, a radio story and an interactive chart that compared hospital prices and quality by hospital system, location and year.

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When the ground shook in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on Jan. 12, the magnitude-7 earthquake left behind up to 4,000 instant amputees in a land where there's little mercy for disability. The tragedy there highlighted a grim global reality: In the United States and around the world, the number of amputees is rising dramatically, driven by war, disease and natural disaster. In the iterative blog Haiti's Amputees: Building A Life Worth Living, a team of msnbc.com journalists - medical reporter JoNel Aleccia and multimedia producers John Brecher and Carissa Ray - explored a unique community forged out of tragedy in the rural heart of Haiti.

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The Affordable Care Act "the new law that overhauls the way health insurance is provided in the U.S." has surfaced as an issue in the Kansas gubernatorial race. Republican nominee Sam Brownback has been critical of the plan, but the documentation he uses to support his position has come under fire.

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Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

This piece investigates why an ever-increasing number of Kansas children are being prescribed psychotropic medications intended for adults.

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Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

Hospitals are reporting sharp increases in uncompensated care, and some report that the stereotype of uncompensated care patients being mostly homeless no longer applies. A more accurate description would be "A 30- or 35-year-old without health insurance who two months ago worked at Sprint," according to a Kansas City hospital official. This two-story package explores the trend in uncompensated care, and focuses on one patient who fits that new description.

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Part 1
Part 2

Sandra Fryhofe, M.D., discusses legalizing medical marijuana from a historical, pharmacological and legal perspective.

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Sandra Fryhofer, M.D., addresses a recent study on NSAIDs and cardiovascular risk, she discusses the efficacy of e-cigarettes in smoking cessation, and reports on a study that links nuts to cholesterol and triglyceride levels.

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Jennifer Wolff Perrine; Additional credit: Lucy S. Danziger, Sara Austin

Half of all Americans, at some point in their lives, will experience a life-altering trauma -- a debilitating injury, a tragic loss, a brush with death. How one addresses a tragedy can make an enormous difference in how one recovers. Researchers now describe the aftermath of such events as "post-traumatic growth," and say that the majority of people who live through such traumas actually report that their lives become richer and more meaningful. Major findings include that the most common form of life-altering incidents - traffic accidents - actually injures more women than men every year. Two-thirds of people who live through a traumatic event report that their lives are actually improved by the experience.

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Fernanda Moore; Additional credit: Kristen Dold and Sascha de Gersdorff.

This story delves into the rising rates of medical misdiagnoses, statistics that come at frightening costs: Up to 40 percent of patients are misdiagnosed every year and, of those, some 100,000 will die as a direct result. In "Survive Your Doctor," Fernanda Moore investigates why young women are at particular risk and examines how a perfect storm of fixable factors -- outdated medical school teaching, lazy patients, a focus on specialists, doctor fatigue -- is endangering their lives. Through a series of anecdotes and analysis, Moore shows readers how to be their own health advocates. A series of four service sidebars hits home the story's overall message: The smartest patients enter the exam room prepared.

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Gretchen Voss; Additional credit: Lisa Bain

In late 2009, Women's Health identified and began reporting on a disturbing sexual health trend: the reemergence and rise of casual, unprotected sex among young adults. The carefree, "don't' ask, don't tell" attitude seemed particularly jarring in light of the statistics -- STD rates were skyrocketing (thanks, in part, to this ill-advised blasé behavior), with human papillomavirus (HPV), gonorrhea, and herpes infections at modern highs. "I don't ask questions that I don't want to know the answer to," says one of the sources interviewed for the piece. By digging into psychology, biology, and social norms, Voss paints a clear, crucial picture of a major health threat, and arms women with what they need to know to stay safe.

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Gretchen Voss; Additional credit: Lisa Bain

In "How Stress Messes With Memory," Gretchen Voss explains how tension tampers with the inner workings of the brain, in a way that's both intricately riveting and easy to understand. The article delves into research proving that gender plays a major role in how people deal with pressure -- groundbreaking, up-to-the minute information that even many neuroscientists didn't know at the time the article was reported. Inventive graphic sidebars enhance the overall service, with clear strategies for how to better remember things when your nerves are jangled (even all those computer passwords!), and ways to find the sweet spot between mellow and meltdown when our brains are able function at optimum capacity.

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Bob Drury; Additional credit: Leah Flickinger

The U.S. Defense Department specifically prohibits women from direct combat missions. But in the Iraq and Afghanistan combat zones, there are no front lines, and as Bob Drury writes in Invisible Soldiers, "the piece of ground you occupy can, at any moment, turn into a battlefield." Thus for the first time in U.S. history, women soldiers are facing the same dangers as men -- but unlike their male counterparts, they come home to a society that can't comprehend what they've been through and an outdated veterans' support system that's scrambling to meet their needs. With vivid scenes and scathing personal stories from three women who served, this article describes the alarming affects of post-traumatic stress disorder on female soldiers (and how it's been under-studied by the military). It also discusses serious mental-health issues and sexual trauma.

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Susan Crandell, Ginny Graves, and Emily G. W. Chau and Julie Bain

In Part 1 of the series, top dermatologists helped readers learn the signs of basal cell, squamous cell and melanoma skin cancers, what the lesions look like and what the latest treatments are. In Part 2, experts talk about what's so seductive about the perfect tan even though it's dangerous. They acknowledged the pleasure factor and body-image aspects of tanning, but also provided good reasons why you should let it go, plus advice on how to do that. In Part 3 the focus was on prevention, with advice on how to examine your own skin between yearly appointments with your dermatologist. The piece used a model's body and included tips sprinkled over the appropriate body parts. It also showed how to spot a pre-cancer.

Habiba Nosheen and Hilke Shellmann; Additional credit: Cindi Leive

This piece shows a little-known yet explosive corner of the practice: the growing phenomenon of military wives serving as surrogate mothers. (Even though active-duty armed forces members are less than one percent of the U.S. population, military wives constitute roughly 19 percent of all surrogate moms, according to one survey.) And as "The Most Wanted Surrogates in the World" revealed, such mothers are hotly in demand. While civilian insurance companies generally don't cover surrogate births, the taxpayer-funded insurance provided to all military families does often pay for surrogacy -- making military wives a low-cost alternative for would-be parents.

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Lorenzo Benet; Additional credit: Nancy Jeffrey

If there is a single heartbreaking reminder of the costs of war, it lies in the burned and maimed faces of the young men and women injured in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 2007 Dr. Timothy Miller, a prominent plastic surgeon at UCLA Medical Center, has devoted his skills to helping these soldiers heal, physically and emotionally, by restoring their faces -- often feature by feature over multiple surgeries. As co-founder of the nonprofit Operation Mend, Dr. Miller and his team have performed some 150 operations on more than 30 wounded warriors, with impressive results that his patients say helped them start their lives anew.

Amanda Williamson; Additional credit: Nancy Jeffrey, Lorenzo Benet

How do adolescents with autism manage in high school, where youngsters can be subject to ridicule and exclusion for the most trivial of reasons? That question led us to Joey Hersholt, a 17-year-old California teen with mild autism and obsessive-compulsive disorder, enrolled by his parents in a promising program at UCLA. Its goal: To teach teens with autism the building blocks of friendship. Following Joey and his family through four-months of classes, reporter Lorenzo Benet and photographer David Butow gained unusual access to the hopes, dreams and struggles of a boy who is different -- and chronicled his gradual social awakening.

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Linda Marsa

Many Americans anxious and confused when the Affordable Care Act -- President Barack Obama's health care reform law -- was enacted in March 2010. This story explained the major implications of the law so that Family Circle readers could learn what the changes mean for them and their families.

Marina Khidekel; Additional credit: Cindi Leive, Wendy Naugle.

"I Sued My Ex for Giving Me an STD -- and I Won" tells the story of a young woman, Karly Rossiter, who filed a groundbreaking and highly controversial civil lawsuit against her ex-boyfriend for infecting her with human papillomavirus. HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection. This piece raised important questions about trust, integrity, personal responsibility and how far women should go to protect their sexual health. Rossiter took her case all the way to the Iowa Supreme Court, which upheld that her ex Alan Evans, a dentist, had been negligent and acted in willful and wanton disregard for her health. Evans was ordered to pay Rossiter $1.5 million in damages -- one of the largest known monetary awards in an STD case.

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Jennifer Wolff Perrine; Additional Credit: Lucy S. Danziger and Sara Austin

"This woman has a secret" details the vastness of the infertility industry and explains the consequences of its ongoing secrecy: without openness, there is little financial or political support for research that can improve couples' chances of conception, and a lack of emotional support structures that can salve the consequences of an expensive and emotionally wrenching medical process. Research for the story found 1.1 million American women undergo fertility treatment each year, and 12 percent of couples will experience fertility problems. Insurance companies refuse to cover infertility, classifying as an elective procedure akin to cosmetic surgery. Fifty-seven percent of in vitro fertilization cycles fail. Pregnancy rates at one clinic increased after several mind/body sessions helped ease depression and anxiety.

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Roxanne Patel Shepelavy; Additional credit: Lucy S. Danziger and Sara Austin

Kirby Brown, a healthy, athletic, 41-year-old woman, turned to self-help guru James Arthur Ray to help her find spiritual, financial and relationship fulfillment. Instead, she--and two other followers--wound up dying during a deliberately intense sweat lodge ceremony at a Ray retreat in October 2009. "When Self-Help Harms" explores the events that led to Brown's frightening death, and exposes the follies of the unregulated, unfettered self-help industry, where a charismatic leader like Ray can make millions off the faith of his followers, with increasingly little regard to their mental or physical well-being.

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Taffy Brodesser-Akner; Additional credit: Lucy S. Danziger, Sara Austin

Following the author's first childbirth delivery, which was life-threatening and psychically traumatic, she explored the line between holistic and medical births in preparation for my second delivery. She wanted to know how much control she could have over the birth of her child  --  how much any mothers can have  --  and how much to cede to my caregivers and to fate. Research found extremists on both ends of the spectrum  --  vigilant homebirthers and women who were grateful for the technology that allowed them a safe and healthy delivery.

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Molly Triffin

In the piece, Cosmo gives readers an insider look at the female-unfriendly field of cosmetogynecology. It explains the type of cosmetic (and often totally medically unnecessary) procedures doctors perform, like tightening the walls of the vagina or shortening the labia and/or skin around the clitoris. 

Cheryl Platzman Weinstock

This story also pulls together new research about factors influencing the rise of depression in menopausal and perimenopausal women's age brackets, including a cultural shift in midlife women reflecting on their life and, if that doesn't measure up to some standard, they feel like they failed. Also, the extent to which genetics and other temporary health issues, such as postpartum depression, can predispose someone to midlife depression is evaluated. Most importantly, many midlife women don't realize they're depressed because many symptoms of menopause and depression look and feel the same and can confuse women. This story gives readers the tools to help distinguish between the two and get the medical attention that could change their life.

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Marina Khidekel; Additional credit: Cindi Leive, Wendy Naugle

This story introduced readers to the new and little-reported phenomenon of kidney transplant chains. It tells the story of Christina Do, a young woman who decided to donate a kidney to a complete stranger and ended up saving 11 people's lives -- and of the 22 people whose lives she touched forever. Christina Do sparked the longest kidney chain ever started by a woman and the second longest ever at the time the March 2010 issue went to press.

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Katharine Davis Fishman

The article reports on whether and when bisphosphonates are safe to take. It describes the author's experience, explains osteoporosis (and osteopenia) for the lay reader and tells what bispohosphonates do to treat it, reports on the history of the drugs and their approval by the FDA, reports on studies that have been done on bisphosphonates and their risks, and in two sidebars explains the FRAX test and medicines now in the pipeline. It concludes that bisphosphonates should be used for osteoporosis, not osteopenia, unless the patient's FRAX score indicates high 10-year-risk of hip and or other osteoporotic fractures, and that if she then takes the bisphosphonates she should be checked at 3 to 5 years to determine whether she still needs it.

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This story explores LDL cholesterol, and points out that LDL cholesterol is actually an umbrella term for 11 different subtypes. Standard cholesterol blood tests do not distinguish between these subtypes, yet according to a series of recent findings, only three of these subtypes are associated with heart disease. This has profound implications for cholesterol control and diet. For instance, we are told to restrict our intake of saturated fat, advice which generally leads us to eat more carbohydrates. Yet while saturated fat from dairy and very likely red meat increases LDL, it essentially only increases the 8 largely benign forms of LDL. Conversely, carbohydrates in the diet increase the three forms which are dangerous, and lowers good cholesterol. Thus, "healthy eating" in the form of low fat foods that are comprised largely of carbohydrates, increases the risk of developing heart disease. Moreover, we are medicating millions of Americans with cholesterol reducing drugs despite the likelihood that many of them only have elevated forms of LDL that are benign.

See this story on the web.

Kevin Cook

"Sleep Is a Battlefield" is an account of the latest research and findings in sleep science, from military and law-enforcement applications to news to help readers sleep better.

Tim Darragh

Based on a vague tip, Darragh, who was assigned the Business of Healthcare beat in August, began probing reports of a CMS investigation at Lehigh Valley Hospital. He found that the hospital was under fire for arming its security guards with Tasers. They used the weapons at least four times on patients. The hospital decided to disarm its security workers, but the news prompted an uproar among readers and health professionals.

See this story on the web. 

Julia Hunter; Additional credit: Elizabeth Lawyer, Jeffrey Aaron

After several drug companies made their first disclosures of the physicians on their payrolls -- many required to do so following government settlements -- 17 medical professional practicing locally showed up on the lists. Of the regional doctors, a physician speaking on Attention Deficit Disorder topped the list, bringing in $32,600 in a nine-month span. Doctors argued the practice was necessary, while opponents argued it created a conflict of interest.

Jennifer M Molin, Chip Hunt

The Healthy State Collaborative Local Journalism Center (LJC) is a two year project aimed at strengthening collaboration among six public broadcasting stations geographically centered in Florida. The partnership provides the opportunity to super serve the residents of this region with an intense journalistic commitment to the unifying topic of health care.

The primary goal of the Healthy State Collaborative is to grow the collective audience through the creation of high quality journalism locally delivered through multiple platforms. Significant attention will be directed to engaging a younger, well-educated audience (ages 20-45) in addition to the core public radio audience (ages 45-65) through compelling content and community engagement opportunities that include audio, video, text, photos, blogs, social networking, dynamic syndication, and mobile applications.

See this website.

Julia Hunter

Twenty-five babies in the region had died in the last five years unnecessarily. Although, historically, these type of deaths would have been attributed to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, a local medical examiner's scrutiny revealed that's actually almost never the case.

See this story on the web.

Julia Hunter

Three doctors in the local coverage area had been hired as spokesmen for national pharmaceutical companies despite previous black marks on their records. The doctors and their employers seemed unconcerned, asserting this wasn't an issue, even though one of the doctors was accused of fondling himself in front of a patient. Drug companies tout that they hire the best of the best, but these findings, show this is a questionable statement.

See this story on the web.

Jennifer Gordon

Thirty years ago, St. Joseph had two hospitals but has since gone down to only one. This article explores why St. Joseph decided to consolidate its medical facilities and the challenges a new hospital would have if it tried to come into the community. Ag new hospital would lower insurance premiums for residents but could not make enough of a profit off of a blue-collar, Medicare-heavy community.

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Erin Carlyle

Dan Buettner spent years exploring the world's "Blue Zones" -- hotspots of longevity, from Okinawa, Japan, to Nicoya, Costa Rica -- where people live to be 100 at astonishing rates. Now he's distilled the wisdom of these cultures into nine ways to prolong your life, spelled out in his best-selling book, "Blue Zones." But Buettner didn't stop there. His next step was to get an entire community to adopt the principles. Albert Lea, Minnesota, is the first intentionally created Blue Zone.

See this story on the web.

Chris Vogel

This story reveals that Houston residents are victim to industrial polluters located in residential areas and that state and local regulators routinely fail to protect citizens, instead leaving people with no recourse other than to seek protection from the courts on their own dime, effectively ensuring that most residents never receive relief from environmental and health hazards. Houston is unique in that the city does not have zoning laws, meaning that a strip club, convenience store or industrial plant is allowed to set up shop in residential neighborhoods. Vogel's story examines several examples of how citizens have tried to safeguard themselves and get the polluters to move from their neighborhood  --  mostly in vain.

See this story on the web.

Deborah Schoch and Danielle E. Gaines

The foreclosure of a home is more than a financial transaction. It also is a hidden human drama, with potentially devastating psychological consequences for those involved. For Ethelda Lopez, it ended her lifelong dream of a home to retire in. Her story is one of literally thousands in Merced County, which with 8,389 filings ranked first in California for foreclosures in 2009, and sixth among counties nationwide. Psychological problems, including anxiety, sleeplessness and depression, wreaked havoc during the foreclosure crisis.

See this story on the web.

Emily Bazar, Julie Lynem

Even in idyllic San Luis Obispo County, on California's Central Coast, the economic crisis has hit families hard, and children especially hard. As families become unmoored, their kids act up in school and at home, self-medicate with drugs and alcohol, and suffer mental health problems such as depression and anxiety. Meanwhile, institutions that serve families  --  schools, county agencies, churches and nonprofits  --  are grappling with budget cuts and unprecedented demand. This is what an 11-week partnership between the Center and the San Luis Obispo Tribune News uncovered.

See this story on the web.

John Gonzales and Tom Kisen

The nation's 75 million baby boomers are certainly not immune from the crisis in health care, and even those in relatively rich Ventura County are feeling the pressure of spiraling costs of both medical procedures and insurance. That is, if they still have insurance. Many Ventura County middle-class baby boomers have been pummeled by the economy, with jobs lost and health insurance disappeared, and the safety net they paid into during better times not designed to help them.

See this story on the web.

Jim Doyle

"Drugmaker's quick slide from the top" is a blow-by-blow account of KV Pharmaceutical Co. downfall, including its checkered history, family ownership interests and squabbles, executives' key mistakes, and a corporate ethic gone awry. "Hospitals tangled in owners' troubles" is an investigative story of a failing St. Louis area hospital, a rare glimpse into the hidden financial world of distressed hospital chains and a scandal involving the potential loss of $500 million in investor funds. "Area hospitals battle infections" is a close examination of the infection rates (surgical site and central line) of two dozen hospitals in the St. Louis area, based on five years of data. "Cases shed light on drug firm's tactics" offers the story-behind-the-story of Forest Laboratories' criminal guilty plea that resulted from its aggressive marketing of unapproved antidepressants that were prescribed by pediatricians to children.

Megan Ogilvie

In "Homeless and pregnant," Ogilvie writes about the people who care for society's most downtrodden and desperate after earning the trust of her sources. The story chronicles the Homeless At-Risk Prenatal Program, the only one of its kind in North America. For the story, "A young abortion doctor's dilemma," Ogilvie wanted to find out who were the young doctors of today taking up medicine's most controversial surgery. It took six months to research and write the story because so few doctors at first would speak to her about abortion training and practice. "An uncommon gift," tells readers about the people who agree to take part in transplant's most ethically precarious surgery. Toronto General Hospital has the only program in North America that allows people to donate half of their liver to a stranger. The story took a year to complete.

Guy Boulton

Six stories comprise this series that covers the Republican health care proposal, health insurance providers, bad hospital debt and more.

"GOP health plan takes small steps"
"Insurers alone can't be blamed for rates, economists say"
"Health care tries to figure out what works best"
"Research key in slowing health care spending"
"Providers of health care in recovery"
"No big increase in health charity with job losses"

Jordan Rau's pair of stories on surging California hospital prices explores the national discussion of rising health care spending. He spent weeks analyzing hospital data compiled by state regulators and interviewed a broad range of experts, hospital executives, employers and others. The stories reached state and national audiences when they were picked up by the Bay Area News Group chain of newspapers, KQED radio and NPR. In another story, Rau reported evidence that areas of the country widely praised for restraining medical spending were in fact becoming more expensive. This story cast doubt on the widely-held belief that lower-priced areas could be models for the rest of the country. In addition, Rau used his data-gathering skills to identify a significant problem among people who have insurance: balance billing. Then, he crafted a poignant story about one family facing the burdens balance billing imposes.

"California Hospitals: Prices Rising Rapidly, But Quality Varies"
"As Hospital System Expands, Patient Advocates Worry"
"Medical Spending Spiking In Once Thrifty Areas"
"The Price They Paid"

Jason Kane, Betty Ann Bowser, Bridget DeSimone

The PBS NewsHour's Health Beat explores some of the main health issues facing our country today: insurance coverage, food sources and mental health. Formerly financially nimble communities now lack goods and services for their residents, resulting in obesity, diabetes and high blood pressure. Bowser and DeSimone also went to Massachusetts to see what lessons that state could offer for the national debate on health care. Finally, a segment from New Orleans: After Hurricane Katrina, life for citizens in the Gulf became about tending to basic needs: food, shelter and the next paycheck. Processing heartache, frustration and the enormity of devastation would have to wait. Then the BP oil spill dealt Gulf residents another blow. These two catastrophes created a climate for depression and domestic violence. DeSimone and Bowser speak with survivors and question why so few mental health care services are available.

Find this story on the web.

Julie Rovner

These stories represent Rovner's in-depth coverage of the final debate, passage and early implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The first story points out that the most controversial element of the measure, the requirement that most individuals have health insurance, was an idea originally introduced by Republicans, not Democrats. The second story is one of several segments on All Things Considered where Rovner researched and answered specific listener questions about how the law could affect them. These segments proved highly popular with listeners and also provided an opportunity to highlight elements of the measure that might not have merited an entire radio piece. The third story is Part 3 of a series on how provisions of the law are aimed at improving the provision of primary care medicine. This piece looks at the role of mid-level health. Parts 1 and 2 of the series examined "medical homes" and solo practitioners. The final story was one of several examining the backlash against the law. This one pointed out that while Republicans were running on a platform urging repeal, many of their usual allies in the business community weren't necessarily on board.

See this story on the web.

Marilyn Serafini; Additional credit: Bara Vaida

These stories lead up to and follow the health care reform efforts in 2010 and highlight the numerous issues that important both to passage and to the effects on the various stakeholders.

Betsy Q. Cliff

This beat is primarily concerned with helping readers make decisions about their own health. Under that charge, the reporter concentrated on reporting on health trends, developments or issues that make a difference in the lives of readers.

This is a series of news stories about how salt intake is excessive in most countries around the world, and the keyrole that salt plays in hypertension, leading to higher risk of stroke, heart attack and premature death. It also covers attempts in different places to reduce sodium in the diet, and the cost-savings this would generate. And the series includes a feature article about whether the US will join other countries that have already successfully implemented population-wide salt reduction policies.

See the story on the web.

Women who are diagnosed with breast cancer may feel rushed to make decisions such as to have a lumpectomy or a mastectomy, or to have reconstructive surgery immediately, later or not at all. This feature looks at all these choices and gives helpful information about each of these procedures, as well as expert opinions on their pros and cons.

See the story on the web.

Certain osteoporosis drugs can put women at risk for other skeletal problems. This story looked at the benefits and often serious risks of bone preservers (biophosphates), bone stimulators (teriparatide), estrogen impersonators (such as raloxifene), calcium savers (calcotonin) and other osteoporosis drugs on the horizon.

See the story on the web.

An estimated 26 million Americans suffer from back pain. While doctors have treated back pain for decades with surgeries, research shows that this is no better, and sometimes worse, than low-tech treatments. On the flip side, research shows that many people who suffer from back pain do NOT receive treatment that does work. This feature takes a close look at simple treatments that do work to help.

See the story on the web.

Parija Kavilanz

"Kids caught in the Medicaid pay crossfire" brings to light a troubling trend of pediatricians and pediatric specialists who are either no longer taking new Medicaid patients or even dropping existing ones because they felt that the payment from the government program was not adequately covering their business costs. "Tylenol recall: Serious side effects investigated," "Tylenol plant: From bad to worse" and "Behind the ‘phantom recall' of Motrin" investigated a Johnson & Johnson's McNeil unit recall of more than 50 children's versions of these non-prescription Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other drugs on April 30, 2010, for serious quality and safety concerns The company remained tight-lipped about the specific problems with those drugs, manufacturing problems at the plant that made those recalled drugs and consumers complaints received about the recalled drugs.

Chronic inflammation is associated with an abundance of fat cells in the belly. Irritants spewed out by fat cells drive white blood cells and inflammatory chemicals to stay in high gear. This can trigger autoimmune diseases, cancer, heart disease and Alzheimers. By cutting back on sugar, keeping weight down and exercising regularly, women can avoid chronic inflammation and its consequences.

See the story on the web.

This story points out that even when family members are in agreement and even when end-of-life issues have been discussed long beforehand, difficult decisions remain.

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This investigation found that while the overall number of deaths of inmates in California state prisons decreased, the number of inmates whose deaths might have been prevented with better care actually increased. It also found that independent reviews of medical facilities conducted by California's inspector general for prisons revealed that California's prisons routinely violated medical policies and protocols, leading to delays and denials of treatment for inmates. Also, California officials' repeated refusal to fund the receiver's turnaround plan delayed construction of sanitary medical facilities, computerization of health records and hiring independent executives to oversee medical care at prisons. The report also found that the lack of infrastructure improvements and systemic change contributed to lapses in care for inmates that range from dangerous to deadly.

See the story on the web.

The story marks the 25th anniversary of the first heart transplant in Oklahoma, a night born of tragedy but propelled by hope and orchestrated by the charismatic Dr. Nazih Zuhdi.

See the story on the web.

This series examined issues surrounding the EPA and its regulation of toxic chemicals in the United States. 

See the story on the web.

Whether people were for or against the new health care law, one issue seemed universal: few people understood it. With that in mind, WebMD decided to tackle health care reform confusion through a variety of channels that included taking reader questions directly to the White House. Here are some highlights of what we did:

1. Got Health Insurance: What Health Reform Means. This story outlined in an easy-to-read fashion the changes that were already in affect from the new law and those that were upcoming.

2. Health Care Reform: Your Questions Answered. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius answers questions on video from WebMD readers about the changes to health care that took effect Sept. 23 of last year.

3. Health Insurance Navigator. Because health care questions are ongoing, we established this blog to help readers better understand how to get the most out of their health insurance along with changes from the new health care reform law. This particular post was the most popular from last year.

This story discussed the problem of the growing trend for Big Pharma to outsource clinical drug trials overseases and enroll in countries with poor oversight. Current Medicine also interviewed in July the author of the OIG report, Joyce Greenleaf, Regional Inspector General for the HHS. Subsequent to our coverage, Vanity Fair and other national sources issued their own stories.

Marilynn Preston

Four stories comprise this submission. "Dashboard Delirium" is based on the news coming out of the Consumer Electronics Show of 2010, and deals with an accelerating consumer health issue: driving while distracted. The column blends news, commentary and expert opinion, helping readers steer clear of a growing public safety problem. "When Haiti Hits Home" links the tragic news about the earthquake in Haiti to the stresses felt by people around the globe, even Americans. The column helps people frame the tragedy and cope with it, giving readers stress reduction skills they can use in their everyday life. "Bored With Health Care Reform?" calls attention to the need for more focus on prevention and wellness, and speaks to the importance of not only reducing costs of medical care but also reducing demand. In "Ride Your Bike to Work! Spin You Can Believe In," I call attention to National Bike to Work Day and month and encourage people to ride more, build strength, save fuel, lower stress.

Shuka Kalantari

Health Dialogues hears the story of a young Iraqi refugee and asks what services are made available to people fleeing conflict countries.

Listen to the story on the web.

Sue Pondrom

Four stories comprise this body of work. "Best Intentions Gone Awry" describes how Congress attempted to support experimental trials of islet transplantation for Type 1 diabetes, yet the unintended  consequences of their action are fewer islet recipients and increasingly fewer islet transplant centers in the U.S. In "Can Generics Be Trusted?," transplant physicians are concerned about the safety of generic versions of the mainstay immunosuppressant drugs organ recipients need to stay alive, but, concerns have been based on anecdotes, not published studies. The final story, "Survival Rates Increase in Bowel Transplantation," explores the field of bowel transplantation, which has remained relatively unknown by both the public and medical professionals who could potentially refer patients. "AMR: A Difficult Problem With No Easy Solution" explores Food and Drug Administration discussions on Acute Antibody-Mediated Rejection, the primary cause of organ rejection in transplant recipients.

Diane Suchetka

Brie Zeltner

Brie Zeltner's stories provide consumers information about the epidemic of vitamin D deficiency in the nation and the debate over changing the daily recommended allowance; told a moving, personal story of the difficulties of living with the chronic pain of migraines; warned readers about the link between sedentary time and early death; and identified the most commonly misdiagnosed illnesses and how to spot the signs before it's too late.

Molly Hennessy-Fiske

These beat entries investigate one of the Los Angeles area public hospitals, Olive View-UCLA Medical Center.

"Hospital put babies at risk, audit finds" and "Infant care at hospital probed" showed hospital staff not only endangered babies by running a makeshift beauty salon in the neonatal intensive care unit, they also violated state regulations by keeping babies in the unit rather than transfer them to better equipped hospitals. "Death spotlights gaps in surgery center oversight" highlights the case of Maria Garcia, a mother of five who died after she was operated on by two surgeons later investigated by the state medical board. In "A journey of risk, hope," the treatment of Dylan Catania, who was born with a rare brain defect that required radical surgery, is chronicled with a multimedia presentation including photographs, videos, graphics, a glossary and Q&A with Dylan's pediatric neurologist.

See these stories on the web.

William Heisel; Additional credit: Jenn Harris, Barbara Feder Ostrov

This entry takes a state-by-state analysis of how doctors are disciplined and how the public is informed. With the help of intern Jenn Harris, William Heisel found that medical boards from coast to coast are inconsistent, inefficient and ill equipped to monitor the hundreds of thousands of doctors licensed under their watch. There are some standouts, but overall they do not adequately protect patients and inform the public. The 51 doctors profiled were responsible for injuring or killing 290 patients. The majority of these doctors are still in practice and most have had licenses in more than one state. An interactive Google map created for the series shows people exactly where the doctors practice. This, we believe, is the first map of its kind. Because physician oversight is so fragmented, it is nearly impossible for patients to go to one spot and check to see if their doctor has been in trouble.

The beat | The Google map

JoNel Aleccia

At MSNBC.com, reporter JoNel Aleccia has crafted the consumer health beat to discover, analyze and explain pressing health issues with significant impact in readers' daily lives. In these four representative stories, Aleccia exposed the lack of regulation and accountability for veterinarians who make medical errors; revealed a little-known provision of the health reform law that exempts faith-based medical exchanges from 'play-or-pay' insurance mandates; reported on growing rates of infections transmitted by transplanted organs; and was the first national outlet to report on an alarming shortage of vital drugs in the United States.

See the beat on the web.

Kaiser Health News' occasional series of stories explores important trends transforming the hospital industry. For example, we've examined the struggles of community hospitals to remain independent, the acquisition of nonprofit hospitals by for-profit companies, the effect of the new health law on physician-owned hospitals and the failed attempts by regulators to make hospital prices transparent. And, most importantly, at a time of national concern over rising health care spending, hospitals are consolidating, often in concert with physician practices, and becoming marketplace powerhouses that dictate higher prices to insurers and employers. This phenomenon, a growing contributor to the upward spiral of health care spending, is especially evident in northern California. KHN extensively analyzed California hospital prices and interviewed dozens of experts and hospital executives to illustrate the impact of Sutter Health, the priciest chain. By year's end, KHN was far ahead of the media pack in reporting on changes in the biggest-spending component of the health system: America's hospitals.

See the story on the web.

The story was based on a research study in JAMA concerning women who may carry the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes, which increase their likelihood of breast and ovarian cancer. The study determined that preventive surgery to remove the ovaries, fallopian tubes, and breasts did save lives. But this story also had a personal side: an interview with a woman who had to decide whether to get tested, and then when she found out she carried the gene, what to do next. The study came down on the side of preventive surgery, as did the woman in DeNoon's story. But the use of the personal story amplified the study, and DeNoon also clearly laid out, through the personal interview and expert sources, a path towards a decision, and the best way for woman in this grueling position to make an informed decision.

See the story on the web.

The legend of New England Baptist Hospital physician Dr. A. Razzaque Ahmed, a specialist in rare blistering diseases, has been echoing around the Boston medical world for years, with some professionals dismissing him as a quack and many patients calling him their savior. To get to the bottom of the story, Robert Weisman interviewed dozens of patients, colleagues and former colleagues, Medicare and law enforcement officials, as well as Ahmed himself, and painted a portrait of a man who is both a convicted felon and is credited for saving the lives and sight of hundreds of people.

See the story on the web.

This feature story explores the effect that antidepressants can have in treating depression, in the wake of a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association suggesting that antidepressants work best for people with severe depression. The story also explores the expectations that some people have about what antidepressants will do for them, the reality that's more likely, and the lifestyle and therapy measures that are also needed.

See the story on the web.

Individual mandates, high-risk insurance pools, small business tax credits and cost-sharing subsidies. Those are just a few of the many provisions in the new federal health law and changes confronting - and confusing - consumers. After the enactment of the health care overhaul last March, Kaiser Health News began a weekly column - "Insuring Your Health" - that is dedicated to explaining insurance issues and the effects of the law. We felt it was important to get beyond the white-hot national political debate that surrounded the legislation and provide readers with a clear view of how insurance currently works and what issues would be addressed by the health law. The feature, written by Michelle Andrews, has dealt with major changes brought by the legislation - such as the establishment of insurance pools for people with medical problems and getting coverage for adult children. But she has also highlighted a number of lesser known problems, some of which may not be solved by the law. The column runs on the KHN website and is used by a number of our partners, including The Washington Post, the Tribune Co. websites and MSNBC.

See the story on the web:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

One of the mysteries of American medicine is why Americans pay twice as much for health care as consumers in other developed nations while getting outcomes that are no better, and often worse. Simple over-consumption does not explain the numbers: Americans have fewer doctor visits and shorter hospital stays, for example, than patients in many European countries. But, as a team of Star Tribune reporters found, the American health care system is riddled with perverse incentives that can lead doctors and hospitals to recommend too much of the wrong kind of medicine, often the most costly and technology-intensive medicine. The result drives up health care costs and often produces inferior care.

See the story on the web.

Maggie Fox, Julie Steenhuysen and Ben Hirschler Kate Kelland in London, videographer Kevin Fogarty, Lisa Richwine in Washington, Ransdell Pierson in New York and Tan Ee Lyn in Hong Kong also contributed.

This special report looked at the new science of whole genome sequencing and how it does -- and doesn't -- affect people's health.

See the story on the web.

Robert Weisman

Last March, The Boston Globe broke the story of the most significant change in the region's health care landscape in years: the sale of Caritas Christi Health Care, a Boston area chain of six Catholic community hospitals, to a New York buyout firm. The paper reported throughout the year on the man behind the deal, ambitious Caritas chief executive Ralph de la Torre, and the wide-ranging impact of the deal on the people and communities in the region. Among other things, the deal created an opening for the expansion of for-profit health care in a state long dominated by non-profit hospitals.

Less than a month after Johnson & Johnson's McNeil unit recalled more than 50 children's versions of these non-prescription Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other drugs on April 30, 2010 for serious quality and safety concerns, the company remained tightlipped about the specific problems with those drugs, manufacturing problems at the plant that made those recalled drugs and consumers complaints received about the recalled drugs. CNNMoney.com was the first to report the extent of the manufacturing problems at the McNeil's plant in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania where the recalled drugs were made. CNNMoney.com was the first to report that the recalled children's possibly contained small metal parts and that the Food and Drug Administration had received at least 775 consumer complaints about McNeil's recalled drugs. CNNMoney.com was also among the first to report how McNeil may have attempted a secret recall of some Motrin products in 2009 buy hiring a contractor to clandestinely remove the drugs from store shelves without fully disclosing its actions to the FDA.

See this story on the web.

There's no strong scientific evidence that chronic Lyme disease exists. Yet doctors are treating it with drugs that put patients and the public at risk. While Lyme disease is real, some doctors tell patients with symptoms as common as fatigue, eye twitching and pain that they have a chronic version of Lyme. These doctors then prescribe months, even years, of intravenous antibiotics, sometimes two or three or four at a time. Such treatment is dangerous and has killed some patients. Moreover, these drugs can cost tens of thousands of dollars a month and are not covered by insurance when used for this purpose, forcing some desperate patients to cash in retirement accounts and mortgage their homes to pay for treatment that four clinical trials have shown to be risky and ineffective for their conditions. This Tribune investigation exposed how some promoters of the chronic Lyme plague are criminals, and luminaries in this world have been disciplined by medical boards for harming patients. Yet the chronic Lyme movement has gained such traction with the public that advocates have raised millions of dollars to fight the condition and have succeeded in getting laws passed to shield chronic Lyme doctors from the actions of medical boards.

See the story on the web.

This is a letter of advice from one cancer survivor to future cancer survivors.

See the story on the web.

This entry is a personal column written by the reporter when she lost her hair to chemotherapy during cancer treatment.

See the story on the web.

A data analysis of Lobbying Disclosure Act filings by the Center for Public Integrity, "Lobbyists Swarm Capitol to Influence Health Reform," found that businesses, trade groups and other interests hired more than eight lobbyists for each member of Congress to influence health reform legislation. The list of organizations that worked to put their imprint on health reform bills ranged from health care interests and advocacy groups to giant corporations without apparent ties to the healthcare industry, small businesses, American Indian tribes, religious groups, and universities. Together, the businesses and organizations spent $1.2 billion on their lobbying efforts. The money, experts say, was well spent, with lobbyists winning massive concessions and bonuses for industry players in the final health reform law. The prolonged health reform battle was also a boon to Washington lobby firms, which recruited heavily from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services and other federal agencies and used their experts to draw down record profits, according to the Center report, "Washington Lobbying Giants Cash in on Health Reform Debate."

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McClatchy provided the most exhaustive and independent coverage of the Gulf oil spill and its effects in stories that warned of the devastating consequences; exposed BP's failures to measure the amount of oil spilled and the reasons for the disaster; and uncovered the Obama administration's inability to assess the damage, to halt drilling as the president ordered or to protect cleanup workers.

Through sources at UCLA hospital, the Los Angeles Times learned of a newborn baby who had been diagnosed with a seizure disorder that required radical brain surgery. Reporter Molly Hennessy-Fiske contacted his parents and doctors and persuaded them to allow her, a photographer and videographer to follow them before, during and after surgery to explain the science involved.

See the story on the web.

Internal searches of WebMD showed a sudden spike in people lookng for information for "K2." It didn't take long to find out that K2 was one of the "legal highs" offered for sale at head shops and internet sites. A check with NIDA's chemistry chief confirmed that the drug is one of several synthetic cannabinoids. So are these drugs merely marijuana in disguise? As it turned out, only recently had anyone determined exactly which compounds were in the drugs -- a German toxicologist who finally managed to tease out the active substance. In an astonishing interview, this scientist described to DeNoon his own experience testing the drug on himself. But how bad could a mere cannabis-drug be? To find out, DeNoon tracked down the chemist who created most of these compounds in his lab -- as reagents. Never intended for human consumption, they were based on carcinogenic compounds. And they were vastly more potent than marijuana. Formated as an FAQ, the story nevertheless carries a powerful narrative line. The article avoids ain't-it-awful moralizing while delivering a powerful safety message to potential users of these substances, which at the time of writing remained easily available. It was among the most-read WebMD articles of 2010.

See the story on the web.

It seemed to be the perfect antidote to heartburn - a harmless pill that you can pop once a day and keep misery at bay. That's how Prilosec and its cousins became blockbuster drugs, with over 100 million prescriptions a year in the U.S. alone. This story examines the flipside of that trend: the growing evidence that heartburn drugs are vastly overused, wasting billions of dollars and possibly doing more harm than good.

See the story on the web.

One of the mysteries of American medicine is why Americans pay twice as much for health care as consumers in other developed nations while getting outcomes that are no better, and often worse. Simple over-consumption does not explain the numbers: Americans have fewer doctor visits and shorter hospital stays, for example, than patients in many European countries. But, as a team of Star Tribune reporters found, the American health care system is riddled with perverse incentives that can lead doctors and hospitals to recommend too much of the wrong kind of medicine, often the most costly and technology-intensive medicine. The result drives up health care costs and often produces inferior care. These perverse incentives are well-known to health care analysts, but we wanted to make them plain to the general public while giving our readers the tools to be informed consumers in their own care. Star Tribune staff focused on three conditions and procedures that millions of Americans encounter each year, that have clear clinical evidence of overuse, and that are amenable to change at the behest of consumers or policymakers: childbirth, back pain and digestive distress.

See the story on the web.

One of the mysteries of American medicine is why Americans pay twice as much for health care as consumers in other developed nations while getting outcomes that are no better, and often worse. Simple over-consumption does not explain the numbers: Americans have fewer doctor visits and shorter hospital stays, for example, than patients in many European countries. But, as a team of Star Tribune reporters found, the American health care system is riddled with perverse incentives that can lead doctors and hospitals to recommend too much of the wrong kind of medicine, often the most costly and technology-intensive medicine. The result drives up health care costs and often produces inferior care.

See the story on the web:

Part 1

Part 2

The three stories that are part of the entry represent our coverage of medical issues related to the devastating earthquake in Haiti. In each case, they forge a link between the efforts of health professionals in New England and the survivors of the calamity.

See the story on the web.

This project was a partnership between the California HealthCare Foundation Center for Health Reporting and the Sacramento Bee. This story examines how California health care providers (and California patients) will respond when the leading edge of the Baby Boomers generation reaches the age of 65.

See the story online.

The Dallas Morning News completed a yearlong investigation into patient harm and doctor training. The investigation focused on lax supervision of doctors-in-training, patient harm and alleged billing fraud at Dallas' premier medical school complex and its primary teaching hospital, which are financed largely by taxpayers. We also examined more broadly questions about medical training, patient care and healthcare fraud at teaching hospitals around the United States.

See this story on the web.

This series contains three breaking news stories about FDA complaints against pharma giant Pfizer.

This project examined an often-overlooked type of health care provider - certified athletic trainers working in secondary schools. Only about a third of the nation's schools have professional athletic trainers regularly available to students. Beyond saving lives or careers, the report showed that sports medicine specialists ensure that injured athletes receive levels of care appropriate to their condition, utilizing data from a unique government surveillance system. Specifically, we found that in locations where there were high concentrations of athletic trainers, athletes were more likely to present to emergency departments with more severe injuries, like concussions and fractures, and less likely to show up for treatment of abrasions and sprains which the trainers can usually assess and treat on site. The reverse was true in locations that had a lighter concentration of athletic trainers among the schools -- places where coaches, EMTs handle injuries were more likely to refer lesser injuries and less likely to send along more serious cases to an ER. The stories also explored the role played by school athletic trainers in providing health services beyond sports, and the considerable savings in time and money the trainers bring by offering treatment and rehabilitation services in schools during and after class hours. In effect, athletic trainers serve as front-line community health providers in their schools and often in the surrounding community.

See the story on the web.

An investigation by The Dallas Morning News found that a criminal probe into two former workers accused of abusing seven residents in the Alzheimer's disease unit at a state-owned veterans home languished for more than two years because of confusion over who should investigate, and conflicts among local police, state officials, and veterans home administrators.

See the story on the web.

While much has been written and reported about the growing shortage of primary care doctors in the United States, this story highlights one important aspect of the problem that isn't well-known and hasn't received much attention: shortage of country doctors. Many of the nation's designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSA) are actually located in rural America. This story presents some eye-opening statistics. While 20% of the U.S. populations lives in rural areas, only 9% of the physician population practice in these area. The story profiles a country doctor - the only primary care internist for a community of 1,500 people - who shut his practice in a HPSA area after the recession further bruised his ability to stay competitive with the larger area hospitals. The story highlights the fact the U.S. has about 66 million people living in HPSA areas and close to 7,500 primary care physicians needed to bridge the physician shortfall in these doctor-starved areas.

See this story on the web.

The series follows Shannon and Kip Brooks, a young Charlotte-area couple who are devastated to learn their unborn baby has a fatal birth defect, anencephaly. They continue the pregnancy, instead of having an abortion, hoping to meet their baby Skylar and find some good in their tragedy by donating her organs. When the Brookses confront resistance from friends and the donor community, they persevere. The result: They spent 99 minutes with Skylar on the day of her birth, surrounded by loving relatives, friends and health-care providers. They call her birthday, Aug. 7, 2010, the "best day of our lives." And they persuaded the Charlotte-area donor procurement agency to accept Skylar's liver cells for donation. Shannon and Kip Brooks were chosen to represent other donor families on the "Donate Life" float in the Tournament of Roses Parade on Jan. 1, 2011.

See the story on the web.

This is a four-part series on the impact of concussions in high school athletics and beyond.

See the series on the web.

"The Vanishing Mind" tackled the subject of Alzheimer's, reporting about the worldwide struggle to find answers - the breakthroughs, frustrations and setbacks in diagnosis, care giving and treatment of this terrifying illness.The stories describe a watershed year in Alzheimer's disease research and in understanding the needs of people with the disease and their caregivers. They include a package of stories from a remote region of Colombia that is home to the world's largest family to experience Alzheimer's.

See the series on the web.

1. A Syracuse University professor overseeing efforts to rid the health insurance payment system of conflicts of interest had a conflict of her own -- she was a director of insurer Excellus BlueCross BlueShield.

2. A merger may be the best chance of survival for a Syracuse hospital in deteriorating financial health.

3. A look at Central New York doctors who get paid by drug companies to talk up their products.

4. New York rarely takes disciplinary action against dentists, even one deemed a public threat.

This story uncovered unfathomable sexual abuses that occurred against severely mentally disabled men at a number of Florida care facilities. St. Petersburg Times reporter Justin George delves deep into the issue in this investigative piece. 

See the story and the sidebar on the web.

This piece explores the psychological terrain of one family and their decisions regarding genetic testing to determine whether they have Huntington's Disease, an incurable brain disorder.

See this story on the web.

This series provides an intimate portrait of the family of infant Christopher Schroeder, who was born with a number of heart defects that made a heart transplant his only chance for survival. The reporter and photojournalist followed the family for more than six months, including the anxious months waiting for an organ donor and afterward. They witnessed the transplant surgery and chronicled the many highs and lows of the baby's long recovery. The series included several other stories to educate readers about different aspects of organ donation, associated laws and procedures.

See the series on the web: 

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

This Dallas Morning News story discusses the potential benefits of travel following a cancer diagnosis or during the treatment process.

See the story on the web.

This story and sidebar provided an in-depth look at the U.S. government's struggle to police pharmaceutical companies' increasingly aggressive efforts to market pills and other therapeutics to consumers. The story was inspired by a Food and Drug Administration letter that chided one company for throwing a Tupperware-like party pitch for an implanted birth-control device. The reporters revealed tactical, financial and technological problems that limit the FDA's ability to rein in misleading claims amid a swelling number of promotions.

See this story on the web.

This piece for the Bay Area pages of the New York Times investigated why - although dental disease is preventable - it is not unusual for California children to suffer crippling and disabling cases of it. By the age of 5, according to reports used for this article, more than 28 percent of California children have untreated tooth decay. Journalist Laurie A. Udesky reveals why in this investigative story.

See this story on the web.

In the Health and Wellness segment, "The Challenges of Breastfeeding," CBS News discusses the health benefits of breastfeeding and consults experts who provide tips on how to make the breast feeding process easier.

See this video on the web.

Less than a month after Johnson & Johnson's McNeil unit recalled more than 50 children's versions of these non-prescription Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other drugs on April 30, 2010 for serious quality and safety concerns, the company remained tight-lipped about the specific problems with those drugs, manufacturing problems at the plant that made those recalled drugs and consumers complaints received about the recalled drugs. CNNMoney.com was the first to report the extent of the manufacturing problems at the McNeil's plant in Fort Washington, Penn., where the recalled drugs were made. In the story, "Tylenol plant: From bad to worse," CNNMoney.com was the first to report that FDA inspection reports going back to 2003 chronicles a build up of problems at McNeil's plant in Fort Washington, Pa., at the center of the widespread recall of Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other over-the-counter drugs. CNNMoney.com was also the first to report that Government safety inspectors pushed for a recall of the children's medicines at least three months before Johnson & Johnson removed the products from store shelves.

See this story on the web.

Parija Kavilanz

Less than a month after Johnson & Johnson's McNeil unit recalled more than 50 children's versions of these non-prescription Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other drugs on April 30, 2010, for serious quality and safety concerns, the company remained tight-lipped about the specific problems with those drugs, manufacturing problems at the plant that made those recalled drugs and consumers complaints received about the recalled drugs. CNNMoney.com was the first to report the extent of the manufacturing problems at the McNeil's plant in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania where the recalled drugs were made. CNNMoney.com was also the first to report that the recalled children's possibly contained small metal parts. This story was the first to report that the Food and Drug Administration had received at least 775 consumer complaints about McNeil's recalled drugs from Jan. 1, 2008, through April 30, 2010. The story also revealed that the FDA had received several hundred more consumer complaints about the children_s drugs after it was recalled in April, 2010.

See this story on the web. 

Parija Kavilanz

This story brought to light a troubling trend of physicians - specifically pediatricians and pediatric specialists - who are either no longer taking new Medicaid patients or even dropping existing Medicaid patients because the felt that the payment from the government program was not adequately covering their business costs. The story illustrated the trend through the real life example of Dr. Jaquelin Gotlieb, an Atlanta-area pediatrician who still accepts Medicaid patients while many of her peers no longer do. Her frustration as a doctor is the difficulty she faces in finding specialists for her young Medicaid patients because many specialists in her area also no longer accept Medicaid. This story is being played out nationally, with many young children being caught in the reimbursement crossfire between doctors and the government-run healthcare programs.

See the story on the web.

Timothy  Noah

1) "How Insurers Reject You" used a confidential document from BlueCross BlueShield of Texas (exclusively obtained by Slate) to examine the ludicrous extent to which insurers in the non-group market count even the most trivial preexisting conditions against people applying for health insurance, a practice now being phased out under the new health reform law.

2) "Unreconciled" explains how the reconciliation process, which health reform opponents claimed was never used for substantive legislation, had actually been used to pass the most substantive domestic bill of the Clinton administration (and one dear to those same opponents' hearts) welfare reform. This column was much-cited after it appeared.

3) "Why Stupak Is Wrong" which was cited even more widely, explained why Rep. Bart Stupak's claim that the Senate-passed health reform law would let taxpayer funds pay for abortions was not a matter of ideological disagreement, but simply incorrect, and tried to explain Stupak's flawed logic more fully than Stupak had been able to do for himself.

4) "Author, Author" eviscerated the Heritage Foundation's self-serving denial that Obamacare was substantially influenced by policies earlier developed at ... Heritage.

The title of the first story - Amid Nanotech's Dazzling Promise, Health Risks Grow - pretty much sums up the issues. The series focused on the fact that the government spends hundreds of millions to create new uses of this often amazing technology, but research did show that only a small fraction of the money went to researching the potential health hazards of the from human contact with the material. The reporter also documented that many of the nanoparticles being sold commercially use nanoparticles that scientists - including from the government - have shown to be lethal.

See the series on the web:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Sidebar 1

Sidebar 2

The story recounted the strange rise and fall of a promising young surgeon, John Christian Gunn, whose eventual arrest and sentencing for bank robbery led to questions of how his poor performance during residency and his bizarre behavior in practice didn't raise more warning flags.

See the series on the web:

Part 1

Part 2

Connecticut's statewide respite care program was established in 1989 for patients with Alzheimer's, dementia-related disorders and their caregivers. The thinking was that caregivers could care for their loved ones at home instead of a nursing facility and save money in the process, while their loved ones could remain at home and retain their independence. In an assessment by the Center on Aging at the University of Connecticut in 2007, the estimated cost for an individual in a nursing facility, on average, was $119,000 per year; by contrast, a live-in home companion will cost around $70,000. Since Connecticut has a budget shortfall like most states, the cost of living for our elderly population is going to be a big issue in coming fiscal years. In April 2009, Connecticut's General Assembly unanimously passed an extension of this program and Gov. Rell signed it in May 2009. Caregivers received a yearly allowance of $3,500 for their loved ones under the old law for basic necessities such as food. The extension would have boosted that figure to $7,500 if the caregiver could demonstrate "additional need for services." What caregivers didn't know was that the program had been closed to new people with these illnesses two weeks before Rell signed the bill and would be closed for the remainder of 2010 because of the budget shortfall. More importantly, DSS quietly required that people who had been screened and in the system receive a maximum of $3,500. This series documents the struggle to balance the budget while maintaining an important social program for Connecticut residents. James Zipadelli was the primary reporter on this series for the national Web site OurParents.com. No attempt was made to influence these stories in any way by OurParents.com.

See the story on the web.

The story examines unethical practices of using the gastric band on obese teens (for whom the device is not approved) and how some doctors have glossed over complications with the device amid a lack of long-term data. The story also shines light on the relationships between the device manufacturers, doctors/researchers and those charged with overseeing medical standards. It highlights the fact that the FDA was unaware of ethical issues surrounding the NYU surgeon who submitted to FDA clinical results using Allergan's Lap-Band.

See the story on the web.

Stories are part of an on-going series on conflicts of interest in medicine.

The March 14 story was about the pharmaceutical industry using more private doctors to do promotional speaking for its drugs as universities banned such activities.

The May 30 story was about academic physicians being used by drug companies to conduct clinical trials while those companies controlled the clinical trial data.

The July 14 story was the result of a Wisconsin Open Records lawsuit filed by the Journal Sentinel against the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine to obtain emails of doctors' comments about UW's conflict of interest policy.

The August 29 story was about the FDA's approval of a revolutionary back surgery device based on clinical research by several orthorpedic surgeons who stood to benefit financially.

The November 28 story was about the FDA's approval of jaw joint replacement devices despite flimsy clinical trial data from doctors who had financial ties to the companies that made the devices.

See the series on the web.

Central Florida schools are continually battling mold -- some of it the most potentially dangerous, toxin-producing types. Over the past three years, local school districts have received thousands of complaints from teachers, students and others about moldy smells, mold-infested walls and furniture and health problems thought to be related to poor indoor air quality. The state has acknowledged and university research shows that such problems are widespread in Florida. Yet there are no state laws to govern how schools should prevent, monitor and fix these problems. A grand jury in South Florida urged legislators almost a decade ago to force schools to make improvements, but nothing has changed. The last time the Florida Legislature considered tougher regulations - in 2004 - it learned that identifying problems would be expensive and would make the state vulnerable to lawsuits. Since then, some schools have made matters worse by shutting off the air-conditioning to save money during weekends and summers in one of the hottest, most humid states in the country. And because maintenance funding has dwindled over the past few years, schools are putting off repairing and replacing roofs and air-conditioning systems -- the primary means for controlling the moisture that mold needs to grow and thrive indoors.

See this series on the web.

Christina Sanchez

At 38, Dawn Gusty could barely walk. The mother of two had been fighting multiple sclerosis for 12 years. Her condition was degenerating, and doctors could only offer her injections to reduce her symptoms. They didn't work. She knew if she just followed their advice she would soon be immobile. She couldn't accept that and decided against the advice of her neurologist to go to Mexico to get what the United States wouldn't allow her to have a stem cell transplant. In "Her last chance to walk," The Tennessean reporter Christina Sanchez tells the story of Gusty's journey, from the first twinges of her disease through her decision to risk everything on unorthodox therapy abroad.

See this story on the web. The Story | Video | Infographic I | Infrographic II | Slideshow

Chuck  Kurtz

The articles looked at several aspects of the then just-passed health care reform legislation: public health agencies and who they serve; the insured and the uninsured; the impact to family physicians; reaction from local and federal elected officials; and the impact to pharmacies and prescription drugs and their customers, especially senior citizens. The most significant finding was in interviewing pharmacists and their claims of pharmacy benefit managers being the main reason for the high cost of prescription drugs.

Pedro Fernando Frisneda

This three-part series was about diabetes and how this disease is affecting the Mexican-immigrant community in New York City. Type 2 diabetes represents a major health challenge and threat for this group, in which both new cases of the disease an the risk of associated complications are greater than in other communities. Health authorities and many doctors in the United States already classified diabetes as an "epidemic" and Latinos have two times higher risk of developing this disease than people of any other race. Diabetes ranks first among health problems affecting Hispanics in this country (10.2% of all U.S. Latinos). The Mexican community is at highest risk, representing 24% of all cases and the worst part is that half of them do not know they are ill.

See this story on the web: Part I | Part II | Part III

Lisa Chedekel

Lisa uncovered that several doctors were practicing freely in Connecticut after being disciplined or sanctioned in the neighboring states of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and New York. She also found that Connecticut often takes no action against doctors who are disciplined neighboring states in contrast to medical boards in those other states, which do impose their own reciprocal sanctions after Connecticut takes disciplinary action. Also some doctors sanctioned in other states have relocated to Connecticut, with no license restrictions.

See this story on the web.

Tracey Ann O'Shaughnessy

The advent of gene testing makes it possible for people to peer into their medical future. But what does one do when confronted with the knowledge that a lethal disease is very likely in one's future? One Connecticut family, battered by cancer, believed it was taking preemptive measures when it began to test members and those members began having healthy tissues removed.

See this story on the web.

Heather  May

This explores why Latinos have up to double the rate of neural tube defects despite an inexpensive vitamin that can drastically reduce the risk. While many women know to take prenatal vitamins during pregnancy, most don't know to take it before pregnancy. The reasons for the health disparity are lack of education and the government's failure to fortify corn masa flour, a staple of the Latin diet.

Hiran Jayantha Ratnayake

"Insurance Claims Approved, Payments Denied" focused on how health insurance companies can approve claims but then drag their feet in paying the claim, especially in situations where the onus was on the policyholder to make sure their treatment provider was paid in a timely fashion.

"Treatment Brings New Hope for Hand Disease" investigated how hand surgeons who were considered the authorities on a specific hand-related disease were withholding information on another treatment option.

"Law Curbs Teen Tanning" focused on how lawmakers and cancer doctors were using misleading statistics to drive home the message that indoor tanning is highly dangerous to consumers.

"Generics Cheaper, But Not Often Cheap" looked at wide differences in the cost of the same generic medicines. Generics can cost $200 more at one pharmacy than another but the only way customers will find out is by actively shopping for generics the same way they do for other products.

Sonya Colberg

Patients are waking up during surgery and others are dying because health care workers are forced to stretch or substitute drugs that are in critically short supply. This story looks at the causes and outcomes to this issue which affects not only Oklahoma but health care facilities nationwide. This story looks to numerous health professionals who said they were concerned.

See this story on the web.

Sonya Colberg

Brendon Mathis began the fight of his life when doctors discovered the teen had an extremely rare form of Hodgkin's lymphoma. Fortunately, Brendon went into remission after his chemotherapy. But the next battle began when his doctor determined that only Procure Proton Therapy offered Brendon his best chance of staying healthy. The family and doctors began a passionate struggle to try to get the family's insurance company to cover the life-saving treatment. With the clock ticking, Brendon got the treatment though the insurance company continued to delay. To this day, the family isn't sure how much, if any, of the more than $100,000 treatment will be paid by the insurance company. Though the insurance commission figures show that more complaints are lodged against Blue Cross Blue Shield than any other company, the issue is common in the insurance industry.

Edmond teen's family seek answers

Heather May

This story is about the parallel paths of one family waiting for a liver transplant for their toddler and another family saying goodbye to their 12-year-old who would become the donor. Donor families and recipients don't usually connect so quickly. These families did at the donor's funeral.

See this story online.

Greg Barne, Jennifer Cahoun, John Ramsey

For years, studies have shown that soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from mental health problems caused by multiple deployments and the horrors of war, but they fail to put a human fact to the soldiers, families and their communities. 

The Fayetteville Observer pored over the studies and reams of information from the Army and Fort Bragg through the Freedom of Information Act. Reporters interviewed countless soldiers and their spouses, health providers, Army officials and community activists. The result was a five-part series in which soldiers and their spouses reflect on how the hidden wounds of war have taken a toll on their lives, and how the Army and society are ill-prepared for the mental health issues that are only now begining to present themselves.

See this story on the web.

Kay Ellen Schwebke

Every year, an estimated 250,000 central-line associated bloodstream infections, or CLABSI, occur in U.S. hospitals and 30,000 to 62,000 people die as a result. Although a successful prevention model exists, there has been no national improvement in reducing these infections. "On the CUSP: STOP Blood Stream Infections (BSI)," a model developed by researchers from the Johns Hopkins University Quality and Safety Research Group, eliminated CLABSI in more than 70 Michigan hospitals and more than 103 intensive care units that participated in a study published in 2006. This success has been sustained for more than four years, saving thousands of lives and millions of dollars.

This story explored the low level of participation in Minnesota. Although several Minnesota organizations seemed to believe there was no need to participate since the problem was under control, staff from non-participating hospitals were unwilling to release their infection rates. Meanwhile, staff from participating hospitals reported value, shared their infection rates, and encouraged other Minnesota hospitals to join them.

See this story on the web.

The health care system in Grand Junction, Co., is one of the highest-quality and lowest-cost in the nation. In short, it is health care reform that works. Colorado Public News explored what Grand Junction is doing to achieve such amazing results, in a five-part series with text, video, photos, and charts. The package includes interactive charts showing the quality and cost of health care in 300 cities around the nation.

View the 13-part package:
Part 1 Main | Find your city's rank in health care spending | Find your city's rank in health care quality | Medicare spending by state | Hospital care varies widely in Grand Junction and McAllen | Part 2 Main | Ready access highlights health care in grand junction | Grand Junction's multifaceted health care approach | Opting for exercise over surgery in grand junction | Grand Junction or McAllen: Who is healthier? | Can other communities replicate the grand junction model? | Just how much less expensive?

Indiana nursing homes may be the worst in country. They have fewer aides per patient than nursing homes in any other state. Fifty-two of what the Government Accountability Office considers to be the country's worst 510 nursing homes are in Indiana. Our projects team at The Indianapolis Star looked into why that is. This series found that Indiana had handed out more than $100 million of Medicaid money to nursing homes in a quality incentive program that officials later admitted was flawed. The program was pitched as a way to incentivize quality but all homes got the same amount of money no matter how poor their care. Local county health department had bought up 39 nursing homes and then diverted more than $200 million in Medicaid funding from them in order to build a hospital -- even as the quality of care at those homes dropped. Indiana was failing to take such basic safety measures as doing background checks on the people to whom it issued nurses licenses. The attorney general had largely ignored his obligation to discipline administrators of dangerously bad nursing homes -- even after the homes were flagged by the health department many years in a row.

See this story on the web. 

Yet, until our series of stories about dialysis, few outside of it were aware that despite massive outlays by U.S. taxpayers Americans endure some of the worst results for dialysis care in the industrialized world. Two years of investigating found a system infected by lax and ineffective oversight, provider profits that trumped patient needs and a cloak of secrecy hiding the real human costs. In the most egregious cases, dialysis patients had been killed by the very therapy meant to sustain them.

See this story on the web.

A Tribune investigation into a Chicago care center for disabled children revealed 13 deaths due to neglect or unexplained circumstances. Illnesses were ignored, life-support alarms went unanswered and kids with complex medical issues were left unattended. Instead of cracking down, lawmakers and regulators allowed problems to worsen. Rules were weakened, deaths not fully investigated and fines dropped or reduced. One child became a focus of the Tribune's reporting: Jeremiah Clark, a 9-year-old boy whose death followed two days of neglect.

See this story on the web.

Project Director: Jim Morris

Reporting Team: Steve Bradshaw Ana Avila Murali Krishnan Roman Shleynov Scilla Alecci Te-Ping Chen Dan Ettinger Carlos Eduardo Huertas Shantanu Guha Ray Marcelo Soares Abhishek Upadhyay

Editors: David E. Kaplan and Marina Walker Guevara (ICIJ)

This nine-month, cross-border investigation, conducted by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists in partnership with the BBC, revealed that a global network of industry groups has spent nearly $100 million in public and private money since the mid-1980s to keep asbestos -- a known killer banned or restricted in 52 countries -- on the market.

Based in Montreal, Mexico City, New Delhi and other cities and backed by industry-funded scientists, these groups share information and coordinate public-relations initiatives touting "controlled use" of asbestos. Public health authorities say that controlled use of the toxic fiber is nearly impossible in developing nations, where workplace and environmental standards are weak. The industry campaign, they say, is helping create new epidemics of asbestos-related disease in countries such as China and India. Independent scientists believe that between five to ten million people will die from asbestos-related disease by 2030, a toll increasingly centered in the developing world. A follow-up story published Dec. 20 revealed that Japan is using a questionable scientific method to test buildings for asbestos.

See this story on the web.

Over the past year, McClatchy's coverage of historic water contamination at Marines Base Camp Lejeune, N.C., has drawn new attention to a decades-old case that could prove to be among the military's most widespread environmental disasters to date. Former residents link the poisoned water to kidney cancer, childhood leukemia, lymphoma, reproductive cancer, miscarriages and a spate of more than 65 known cases of male breast cancer. Following McClatchy's stories, the Navy agreed to fund a million-dollar scientific study. Congress opened new investigations. And the Department of Veterans Affairs acknowledged in September that the increased attention has led more ill Marines to seek disability compensation.

See this story on the web.