Florida Health News

Families of disabled face grim choices; 'people are panicking'

 5/9/2008 © Florida Times-Union
Elsie Casanova of Jacksonville can work because her two adult sons who have cerebral palsy are in a state-funded day-care program. Budget cuts may take that away, forcing her either to quit work to care for them -- which would bring financial ruin -- or place them in an institution. "Right now, I'm just trusting in God," she said. But advocates for the disabled are taking a different approach: a lawsuit.

Plastic surgeons need a lift amid economic downturn

 5/9/2008 © Palm Beach Post
How's this for an economic indicator?  Dr. Donato Viggiano used to perform at least two or three breast augmentations every month. Now, the Port St. Lucie plastic surgeon averages one every three months.  Cosmetic procedures are rarely covered by insurance. Given the home loan crisis, the real estate bust and soaring gas prices, no one is terribly surprised that consumers are putting off spending $5,000 or more for breast lifts.

Crist has a $2.4-billion change of heart

5/9/2008 © St. Petersburg Times 
Gov. Charlie Crist said "God bless Gov. Chiles" as the 2008 Legislature drew to a close last week, thankful for $2.4-billion in reserves made possible by the late Lawton Chiles. Lawmakers used $300-million of the money to avoid painful cuts for the state's sickest and poorest this year. But the money, the settlement from Florida's lawsuit against Big Tobacco, would never have been there if Crist had gotten his way in the mid 1990s.

Facebook, Florida agree on new safeguards

 5/9/2008 © South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Facebook, the world's second-largest social networking Web site, will add more than 40 new safeguards to protect young users from sexual predators and cyberbullies, attorneys general from Florida and other states said Thursday.

WellCare's stock spikes on rumors of sale

 5/92008 © St. Petersburg Times
Is WellCare Health Plans courting potential suitors? The Tampa company is mum about it, but rumors gave a nice bump to its shares late Wednesday and throughout the day Thursday.

Ride to Mayo ready if he gets that call

 5/9/2008 © Florida Times-Union
VanTanner, 52, - who suffers from hepatitis C, which he said he contracted from a tattoo he received as a 17-year-old - is such a golf fan that he wanted to volunteer at The Players Championship despite his situation. He was hesitant, though, because his liver is damaged to the point where he is high enough on the transplant list that he has to remain within an hour or two of the Mayo Clinic in case one becomes available.

Survey shows 5 in 6 don't know signs of stroke or correct response

 5/9/2008 © South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Only one in six people surveyed in Florida and nationally could identify all the correct signs of stroke and also name the most critical thing to do in response (call 911), says a new report Thursday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Cervical-cancer vaccine: a pain in the pocketbook

By Whitney Sessa
5/8/2008 © Florida Health News
GAINESVILLE -- When Erica Lipner-Bernstein paid $500 for her Gardasil vaccine, she couldn’t help but think of its “one less” commercials, which urge women to take the shots so they’ll be “one less” possible victim of cervical cancer. She also couldn’t help but wish it were “one less” bill she had to pay. Her family’s health insurer would cover treatment if she caught the cancer-causing human papillomavirus, but it doesn't pay to prevent transmission. Thousands of other Florida college students are in the same boat, and school health centers are beginning to act. 

Quicker approval for hospitals coming

 5/8/2008 © Orlando Sentinel
One of Gov. Charlie Crist's legislative priorities this year was to kill a key regulatory hurdle for the development of new hospitals: certificates of need.  But the CON, as it is often called, is still very much alive following the legislative session that ended Friday.  And the streamlined process to build health-care facilities should take effect once Gov. Crist signs the new law.

U-Miami president advises Congress on health reform

Shalala

5/8/2008 © Washington Post
With the presidential candidates fighting over how best to rein in soaring health care costs and cover the uninsured, a veteran of the last major U.S. health care reform battle urged lawmakers on Tuesday to build broad public support before embarking on any reform. 
Donna Shalala, who served as Secretary of Health and Human Services under President Bill Clinton, told the Senate Finance Committee that public support for Clinton's health reform effort in the early 1990s diminished as people with health insurance began to worry about what it would mean for their coverage.
The 1990s proposal also faced staunch opposition from the health care industry, which launched a series of television ads that helped doom the plan.

Competitive eating: Are winners born or made?

Conti

5/8/2008 © Los Angeles Times
At 6-foot-3 and 213 pounds, Crazy Legs Conti stays in shape with jogging and six to eight small, healthful meals most days.  
And then there are days when he binges big-time, like the Sunday a few weeks ago when he scarfed a bushel of Florida sweet corn in no time flat.  This was not self-indulgence. It was self-disciplined preparation for the April 27 National Sweet Corn Eating Championship in Palm Beach, Fla., where Conti hoped to defend the title he won a year ago after downing 34.75 ears of corn in 12 minutes.

Doctor from Africa leads Tampa charity-care effort

 5/8/2008 © St. Petersburg Times
More than five years have passed since a Nigerian doctor founded African Ambassadors in Tampa.  The organization that began serving the community in 2003 with only two doctors, a nurse and slim funding has since helped nearly 2,000 patients who can't afford adequate health care, organizers say.  For founder Dr. Chuma Osuji, it has had some ups and downs, but through it all, the organization has survived.

Hospital profits sag under weight of uninsured

 5/7/2008 -- Florida hospitals, which have to treat patients who can't pay, find themselves in a predicament. Privately insured patients pay more than $3,000 extra per stay to cover costs of the uninsured, a report issued by the Florida Hospital Association says. The Palm Beach Post reports on lower first-quarter earnings for the state’s major for-profit chains. And Naples Daily News reports that Health Management Associates faces a fight over board membership because of “abysmal shareholder returns.”

Marsh fires bring health alert in South Florida

5/7/2008 © Miami Herald 
A wind shift should clear the sky of soot and smells Wednesday, but smoke from Lake Okeechobee fires or similar ones in the Everglades will remain a concern until rainy season.  Also read about an air pollution advisory issued for Hillsborough County in the Tampa Tribune.

She's in trouble for letting ex-husband use her policy

 5/7/2008 © Lakeland Ledger
WINTER HAVEN--A former clerk in the State Attorney's Office has been charged with two counts of insurance fraud after allowing her health insurance to pay her ex-husband's hospital bill, according to investigators. 

Students think everyone else is drinking, smoking

 5/7/2008 © Naples Daily News
High school students in Lee County think 88 percent of their peers drink alcohol at least once a month. They also think 82 percent of their peers smoke cigarettes and marijuana.  But they’re wrong. So wrong.

Soaring food costs force changes in school menu

5/7/2008 © South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Here's what the soaring cost of food has meant to Broward County's school lunch menu: white bread instead of whole wheat, cheap fruits and vegetables, and cutbacks in popular-but-pricey Jamaican meat patties and egg rolls.  Recently, food prices are going up and cutting into budgets. But for the Broward County School District, which serves 44,000 breakfasts and 138,000 lunches a day, clipping coupons to save money isn't an option.