Health

The chairman of the Kansas Senate’s budget writing committee Wednesday defended the panel’s recent decision to withhold state funding for a new classroom building at the University of Kansas Medical School.

Sen. Ty Masterson, an Andover Republican, said he’s not convinced the university needs additional state funding to construct the building on its medical school campus in Kansas City, Kan.

Masterson said KU has the resources to complete the project if it’s the priority that university officials say that it is.

As an uninsured agriculture worker, Salvador Lopez said he’d welcome health coverage so he could afford diabetes medication.

Health insurance would also help his wife, said the Excelsior Springs, Mo., resident. Not feeling well on Saturday, she actually had her blood pressure checked at the health fair the couple attended with their two daughters in Kansas City, Kan.

But organizers said the main point of the two-day fair was to enroll people for health insurance through the new marketplace established through the Affordable Care Act.

Every day, police in the Kansas City metro area are inundated with calls to handle mental illness emergencies.

"Usually more than one time a day,” says Don Nash, sheriff of Wyandotte County, Kan.  “Calls could come in from a family member. Calls could come in from the general public. From a business owner.”

Federal health exchange in enrollment is slowing, according to data released Tuesday.

The Department of Health and Human Services reports that 29,309 in Kansas and 74,469 in Missouri selected insurance plans by the end of February. That is up 31 percent in Kansas and 38 percent in Missouri from the previous report, a slow-down compared with an increase of about 60 percent in both states during January.

In a conference call, Julie Bataille of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services brushed aside concerns about slowing momentum.

We eat every day and most of us enjoy it. It satiates our hunger, and provides us with nutrition and complex and pleasurable flavors and textures. But for some people eating can become the center of an obsession, an inescapable part of the date filled with anxiety. Eating disorders impact 2.7 percent of population, according the National Institute of Mental Health, but the problem extends far beyond the struggling individual.

Many Americans are turning away from pharmaceuticals and experimenting with integrative medicine. This type of treatment aims to heal the entire body and not just the disease. Acupuncture, yoga, essential oils, vitamins and herbal supplements are just some of the ways patients are seeking relief from everything from headaches to cancer.

On today's Central Standard, two integrative medicine doctors weigh in on this alternative to Westernized treatments.

Guests:

Kansas insurers will be allowed to renew for an additional year health insurance policies that do not comply with Affordable Care Act requirements.

The Kansas Insurance Department announced Thursday that it would accept the Obama administration’s offer for states to extend policies that do not comply with new federal health insurance requirements.

The offer came as part of new Affordable Care Act regulations issued by the Department of Health and Human Services on Wednesday.

The University of Kansas Medical Center will create a new center to help those with multiple sclerosis improve their physical and emotional health as well as lifestyle.

KU announced Wednesday morning that an $800,000 grant from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation would help fund the project.

A former day care facility at 3503 Rainbow Blvd. will be renovated to house the new Comprehensive Center for Multiple Sclerosis Care.

The new center will serve between 100 and 125 participants weekly.

As the parents of baby boomers move into their twilight years, an elephant enters the room: when should we start to talk about long-term care? 

With 12 million Americans already in need of attention and a further 15 million just around the corner, that question of how to best look after ourselves and loved ones is becoming more important by the day.

Jim Heeter is President and CEO of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce. His four years in the role have given him a front-row seat to watch the growth of Kansas City's heath care industry, as well as how health reform is affecting Kansas City business overall.

He answered five questions as part of our monthly series, KC Checkup.

Autism advocates argue that legislation being considered in Kansas falls short of best practices for treating the disorder.  

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in every 88 children in the United States has autism. 

It’s a disorder that impairs a variety of verbal and non-verbal communication skills. For some, the effects can be mild, but for others, the symptoms can be so severe that they leave individuals unable to care for themselves.

Truman Medical Centers announced Friday that CEO John Bluford will retire this summer after 15 years in the position.

His retirement is effective July 18, according to a news release. Bluford turns 65 on May 1.

Bluford is working with a committee that includes TMC board members and appointees from the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine on details of his departure and transition efforts, according to the release.

Every year about this time, teenagers everywhere hear the call of spring break. To get pale, winter skin ready for the beach, lots of spring breakers make a few visits to a local tanning salon. Recent studies show around 30 percent of white high school girls tan at salons.

Many new proposed state laws aim to reduce that number, but health advocates have found Missouri especially resistant to any legislation that gets between skin and UV bulbs.

An expert on the epidemic of gun violence that has gripped Kansas City and cities across the country for decades, says the issue has been "completely misunderstood."

In the second part of Wednesday's Up to Date, we talk with him about his method of viewing violence as an epidemic, a condition that can be reversed using "science-based methods."

Guest:

• Dr. Gary Slutkin, epidemiologist and founder/executive director of Cure Violence

It’s one thing for a doctor to counsel a seriously-ill patient about how to deal with his illness and how to face the idea of death. But imagine going from being the doctor to being the patient.

The University of Kansas Hospital kicked off a campaign Monday to raise private money for a new $250 million building on its main Kansas City, Kan., campus.

The Hospital aims for $100 million in donations for the "Cambridge North" project.

At a hospital leadership meeting Monday afternoon, Burns and McDonnell chairman and CEO Greg Graves and his wife, Deanna, announced their pledge of $1 million for the building, as well as a Burns and McDonnell Foundation pledge of $2.5 million.

It’s something that every parent should do, but many don’t know how, or feel really awkward trying, to get it together to have ... "The Talk."  These days it’s about more complicated issues than just the birds and the bees — gender identity, casual hookups and more play into the discussion. 

Steve Kraske talks with psychologist Wes Crenshaw about how parents can approach the topic of sex with their kids. A teenager and her mother join the conversation to discuss their method for handling the subject.

Guests:

The legislative committee charged with overseeing state building projects today added money to next year’s budget to help the University of Kansas fund construction of a $75 million classroom building on its Kansas City, Kan. campus.

The Joint Committee on State Building Construction voted to add $1.4 million to the fiscal 2015 budget to help pay for bonds that will be issued to fund the project.  The plan is for the state to contribute $15 million over time to help finance up to $35 million in construction bonds.

University of Kansas Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little is scheduled to appear before a legislative committee Thursday to renew a request for state help in financing a state-of-the-art classroom building at its medical school.

In testimony to the Joint Committee on State Building Construction, Gray-Little is expected to say that the $75 million building is urgently needed to meet accreditation standards and to accommodate new ways of teaching that emphasize active learning in small-group settings over note taking in large lecture halls.

The non-profit Kansas Advocates for Better Care is out with its annual list of nursing homes cited by state inspectors for the fewest deficiencies.  The facility at the top of the list is in Atchison, Kan.

The Dooley Center, in Atchison, has not been cited for a single violation the past three years. Mitzi McFatrich, who heads Kansas Advocates for Better Care (KABC), says 20 nursing homes in the state have had five or fewer deficiencies in the last three years.

Enrollment on the federal health exchange is up about 60 percent from a month ago in both Kansas and Missouri.

New numbers from the Kansas Department of Health and Human Services show that 22,388 people purchased insurance in Kansas as of Feb. 1, 2014. January's report showed 14,242 Kansans had enrolled.

In Missouri, the number of enrollees has jumped from 33,138 in January to 54,157 in February.

A new health care proposal in Missouri would revamp the state’s Medicaid system, create more pricing transparency and offer incentives for physicians to work in underserved areas, among other changes. Identical state health reform bills (HB 1793 and SB 847) were introduced Monday by State Rep. Keith Frederick, R – Eureka, and State Sen. Rob Schaaf, R – St. Joseph.

Be grateful if your employer allows you to stay home on snow days. For hospital workers, they can mean days away from home.

University of Kansas doctors, nurses and other emergency health providers slept in cots at the hospital before and after the snow storm that pummeled Kansas City on Tuesday.

"We're operating like a hotel," says Jill Chadwick of KU Hospital.

KU Hospital's clinics were closed Tuesday, but the emergency room, as well as services like chemotherapy and organ transplants, continued operations as scheduled.

It’s been three years since the suicide of Sasha Menu Courey, a student at the University of Missouri. But revelations and questions have come to light in the last few weeks — allegations that Sasha had been raped by at least one fellow student, perhaps three members of the football team.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius visited Kansas City Monday morning, drumming up interest in Obamacare.

In the first segment of Monday's Up to Date, Steve Kraske talks with the head of Healthcare Foundation of Greater Kansas City about insurance available through the Affordable Care Act and ongoing efforts to connect people to it.

Guest:

• Dr. Bridget McCandless, president and CEO, Healthcare Foundation of Greater Kansas City

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius urged the uninsured to enroll on the federal health exchange at a press conference in Kansas City, Mo., on Monday.

At the Full Employment Council near 18th and Vine streets, Sebelius touted the benefits of the health exchange for both the uninsured and for the Kansas City metropolitan area.

A new study show that kids who are physically fit tend to also outperform their more sedentary peers in the classroom. The findings are from the first year of a new program called K-FIT.

The study involved more than 13,000 fourth through ninth graders, at more than 150 schools across Kansas during the 2011-2012 school year.

Kansas officials said they have received formal approval from federal authorities to include long-term services for the developmentally disabled in KanCare.

The approval document included "special terms and conditions," spelling out federal expectations of the program's expansion, which has been resisted by most of the state's providers of developmental disability services.

Dr. Rex Archer is the director of the Kansas City, Mo., Health Department, which administers everything from flu shots to restaurant inspections. Archer says he is responsible for 480,000 patients and that social equity is the key to the city's future.

He answered five questions as part of our monthly series, KC Checkup.

What do you see as the biggest priority for health right now?