State Highlights: One Of NYC’s Top Public Health Officials Looks For ‘A Different Way Of Doing Business’; Texas Bogged Down With Massive Backlog Of Patients Requesting Balance Billing Mediation

Media outlets report on news from New York, Texas, Florida, Massachusetts, Wyoming, California, Arizona, Minnesota, Iowa, Maryland and Georgia.

The Wall Street Journal: As A Doctor She Treated Children, Now Health Commissioner Cares For An Entire City
Oxiris Barbot is waiting patiently to hold the baby. A pediatrician, Dr. Barbot is visiting an East New York apartment on a recent morning to observe a staff member as she counsels a postpartum mother on breast-feeding, safe sleeping practices and general pediatric care. This home-visit program is one of hundreds offered by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, which Dr. Barbot now leads as its commissioner. Hers is one of the highest-profile jobs in the public health field. (West, 2/11)

Texas Tribune: Texas Mediation For Balance Billing Faces Massive Backlog
Thousands of Texans seeking government help with surprise medical bills were hit with another shock last year: a clogged-up consumer protection bureaucracy. A massive backlog that began last summer left state regulators unable to provide timely help to the thousands of Texans who requested mediation from the Texas Department of Insurance. (Root and Najmabadi, 2/12)

The Wall Street Journal: A Year After Parkland: Making Sure To Say, ‘I Love You’ At Morning Drop-Off
The horror of the shooting here nearly a year ago that left 17 people dead crosses Ina Berlingeri-Vincenty’s mind every morning when she drops her son Nico off at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Before he gets out of the car, she says, “I make sure I say, ‘I love you.’” (Campo-Flores, 2/12)

Boston Globe: Partners Health Care Hospitals Up And Running After Suffering Network Issue
The 12 hospitals in the Partners Health care system have regained access to the medical records network after the state’s largest health care provider resolved a technical problem, a Partners Health Care system spokesman said Monday around 9:15 a.m. The medical records network was down for hours Monday, forcing the cancellation of a “small number” of non-urgent surgical procedures and delays in some other appointments, said Partners spokesman Rich Copp. (Ellement, 2/11)

Wyoming Public Radio: Conversion Therapy Remains Legal Across Most Of Region
Conversion therapy for LGBTQ youth remains legal across most of the country, and much of our region. But right now, Colorado is considering a statewide ban on the practice. It includes various kinds of treatments intended to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. (Mullen, 2/11)

Tampa Bay Times: All Children’s Says 13 Heart Surgery Patients Were Hurt By Care
An internal review by Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital has found more than a dozen incidents in which children in the hospital’s heart unit were harmed by the care they received. The cases should have been immediately reported to state officials, the hospital’s interim president told employees during private town halls this week. None were reported until recently. The hospital’s former leaders also didn’t properly notify the board of trustees about safety concerns in the heart surgery department. That led to the federal government’s recent declaration that All Children’s had left patients in danger, the interim president said. (McGrory and Bedi, 2/9)

KQED: California's First Surgeon General Takes Aim At 'Toxic Stress'
California has never had a surgeon general, but that will change today. Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, a San Francisco-based pediatrician, has pioneered research into the effect that childhood traumas have on health. As the state’s top doctor, Burke Harris will act in an advisory capacity to Gov. Gavin Newsom. (Orr, 2/11)

Boston Globe: It’s Official: Athenahealth Is Now Owned By Two Private Equity Firms
A pair of private equity firms have officially acquired Watertown health information technology firm athenahealth.The company said Monday that the $5.7 billion transaction announced late last year is complete. Athenahealth is now a private company owned by Veritas Capital and Evergreen Coast Capital, an arm of the activist hedge fund Elliott Management. (Rosen, 2/11)

Arizona Republic: Arizona Investigates Case Of Man Found At Bus Stop With Amputated Foot
The Arizona Department of Health Services, along with the state medical and nursing boards, have opened investigations into what may have gone wrong in a hospital "patient dumping" case revealed by The Arizona Republic. Martin, a mentally impaired man who had been missing for months, was found at a bus stop with an amputated foot, The Republic reported in January. (Sanders, 2/11)

The Star Tribune: Blue Cross Blue Shield Parent Diversifies With Asset Management
Workers who manage assets at Eagan-based Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota look after a portfolio of investments and holdings with a value of roughly $1.6 billion. Over the past 12 months, Blue Cross officials have decided to try leveraging this expertise by creating a business called Aware Asset Management, a federally registered investment adviser that large companies including other insurers can hire for help with managing investments. (Snowbeck, 2/11)

San Francisco Chronicle: Sen. Wiener To Introduce California Bill Protecting Victimized Sex Workers
California Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, will introduce legislation Monday that would prevent law enforcement from arresting and charging sex workers who come forward as victims or witnesses to serious crimes. The proposed law, SB233, would also prevent officers from using condoms as probable cause to arrest a sex worker in any situation. (Sernoffsky, 2/11)

Iowa Public Radio: Iowa Food Pantries Increasing Mobile Stops, Services
Beginning this week, agencies that help get food to hungry Iowans are expanding their services. The Des Moines area’s DMARC Mobile Food Pantry will add four more stops to its schedule, which will provide a healthy, three-day supply of food to some people who haven’t been able to get it from other food pantry locations. (Mayer, 2/11)

The Baltimore Sun: Former Military Hospital In Baltimore Near Hopkins Campus To Get New Life As Academic Center 
Johns Hopkins University now plans to make over a 1930s-era hospital building on the edge of its Homewood campus that was originally established by Congress to care for sick and disabled seamen for academic purposes. The building, originally the 290-bed Baltimore Marine Hospital, has served many public, private, university purposes over the decades. It was marked for demolition at one point to make way for several Hopkins health system buildings, but university officials now say they plan to keep the structure. (Cohn, 2/12)

Boston Globe: In Maine Deaths Outnumber Births, And The State Is Grappling With What To Do
As baby boomers head into retirement, and many young people move away in search of opportunity, Maine is one of only two states, along with West Virginia, where deaths now outnumber births. That gulf is reshaping life here in myriad ways, from shrinking the workforce to intensifying the demand for services for the elderly, and it will only widen in the coming years, demographers predict. (MacQuarrie, 2/11)

Georgia Health News: In New Offensive Against HIV, Metro Atlanta Is A Battleground
The map of the United States shows four blue dots clustered in northern Georgia. They represent the metro Atlanta counties of Fulton, DeKalb, Gwinnett and Cobb.It’s not exactly surprising that the four — the most populous in our state — are among 48 counties in the nation that the Trump administration is targeting for its plan to stop the spread of HIV. (Miller, 2/11)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Kemp Backs School Mental Health Program In Georgia Budget
Gov. Brian Kemp visited a pair of schools Monday to shine a spotlight on a new initiative tucked into his state budget proposal aimed at addressing mental health problems at Georgia schools. The spending plan steers an extra $8.4 million to the Apex program, an organization that the Kemp administration views as crucial to identifying and counseling troubled students while also targeting issues that health experts say could threaten school safety. (Bluestein, 2/11)

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