Hundreds of service workers at the University of California's 10 campuses and five hospitals began a five-day strike in a dispute over wages. University officials reported "minimal impact" from the walkout, however. Campus shuttles were idled at UC Berkeley and cafeteria hours were curtailed at UC Irvine, but patient care was not affected at any of the university's five medical centers, said UC officials.
In the last decade, there's been a tenfold increase in the number of charity clinics in the Dallas area identified by an association formed by the Dallas County Medical Society. The clinics, now numbering more than 40, are among the only option for growing numbers of people without health insurance, especially illegal immigrants who are fearful to use government-affiliated clinics or hospitals. The growth in charity clinics "really shows the alarming situation in our community of the uninsured growing," said Connie Webster, community health director for the Dallas County Medical Society.
Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell's office says the state has fielded more than 7,000 phone calls from the public inquiring about the new Charter Oak Health Plan, which is for uninsured adults who are too old for the state's HUSKY healthcare plan for children and too young for Medicare. Charter Oak was launched on June 30, and its Web site is averaging 1,800 hits a day. The state has received 1,950 applications since July 1, and Rell's office estimates that 15,000 to 17,000 people will be enrolled in Charter Oak by the end of this fiscal year.
The Food and Drug Administration is warning doctors and patients that electronic devices such as pacemakers, cardiac defibrillators and insulin pumps can malfunction when people get CT scans. The scans can cause medical devices to shock patients or start sending inaccurate signals, the FDA said in a public health alert. The agency has received six confirmed reports of devices that malfunctioned after a CT scan and another nine reports of suspected problems, according to the FDA. No deaths occurred.
More than two-thirds of Massachusetts residents support the state's two-year-old, near-universal health insurance law, according to a new poll. The survey by the Harvard School of Public Health and the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation found that 69% of those polled backed the law, an increase from the 61% who said they favored it when it was first adopted. Yet when pollsters asked the same question of residents who have bought health insurance or changed policies because of the law, support dropped to 52%.
Three experimental drugs have doctors hopeful that millions of people at risk of lethal blood clots may soon get easier treatment. The drug research comes as Medicare is considering withholding payment from hospitals when at-risk patients develop clots in their veins, a common preventable cause of hospital deaths. The National Quality Forum has estimated that only about a third of patients who need protective blood thinners while hospitalized get them.