U.S. cancer deaths rose by more than 5,000 in 2005, a somewhat disappointing reversal of a two-year downward trend, the American Cancer Society said in a report. The cancer death rate has been dropping since the early 1990s, and early in this decade was declining by about 1 percent a year.
Former legislators, a retired Minnesota Viking and representatives of business, labor and medicine are urging Minnesotans to press politicians to adopt new methods for preventing and treating chronic disease. The push comes as Minnesota legislators prepare to present a proposal designed to strengthen care for people with chronic illness, and to save money.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has shelved a cost-cutting plan to shut all but one of the county's healthcare clinics and reduce services at its six comprehensive outpatient health centers. Although healthcare advocates for the poor applauded, some supervisors questioned whether the proposal would hurt the indigent and uninsured people who depend on the county for their healthcare and warned that private clinics might not have the ability to treat displaced patients.
Kimberly Ryan, former chief operating officer for Tulane Medical Center in New Orleans, has taken over CEO duties at the 200-bed Emory Eastside Medical Center in Snellville, GA. Ryan's experience at Tulane Medical Center included the evacuation of the facility after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. She is credited with helping manage the rebuilding of the hospital after the hurricane, according to a release.
Middle Tennessee Medical Center in Murfreesboro has started notifying employees that less than 3 percent of its 1,200-member work force will face layoffs. Administrators are shrinking their work force to improve efficiency, but MTMC will adhere to national standards for operating a hospital efficiently, said a hospital spokesman.
About 350 doctors, patients and healthcare workers rallied in Chicago to press for increased funding for the Cook County (IL)Bureau of Health Services. Physicians told rallygoers that patients face increasingly long waits for appointments and that working conditions for health professionals have worsened. The rallygoers urged county commissioners to restore funding from cuts imposed during the 2007 budget crunch.