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When patients with sickle cell disease have a health crisis — crescent-shaped red blood cells blocking blood flow — their condition can quickly lead to a fatal stroke or infection. But, despite efforts to educate doctors, research shows that patients are waiting hours in ERs and are often denied pain medication.
New HIV infections occur disproportionately among Black women, but exclusionary marketing, fewer treatment options, and provider wariness have limited uptake of preexposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, drugs, which reduce the risk of contracting the virus.
Many women, especially Black women, have reported discrimination in maternity care, but expectant mothers lack tools to see where this happens. Funding and regulations to measure disparities have been slow in arriving, but some innovators are trying to fill the void.
Mississippi has the highest rate of maternal mortality in the U.S. Now, it also has a federal grant to help in rural areas. The award could signal more flexibility from federal officials.
As more seniors opt for Medicare Advantage, a few small insurers have begun offering plans that provide culturally targeted benefits for cohorts including Asian Americans, Latinos, and LGBTQ+ people. The approach, policy researchers say, has potential and perils.
In this special episode of ϳԹ News’ “What the Health?” host Julie Rovner interviews three health policy experts.
As high school graduates prepare to leave states like California that protect abortion rights for historically Black colleges in states where abortion is banned, they're getting ready to safeguard their reproductive health during college.
Studies show that high rates of Black fetal and infant deaths are largely preventable — and part of systemic failures that contribute to disproportionately high Black maternal mortality rates.
Mandy Cohen, the new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, earned praise for her leadership and communication as the face of North Carolina’s response to covid-19. People in the state’s most vulnerable communities tell a more complicated story.
Chagas disease, caused by a parasite, affects people primarily in rural Latin America. But an estimated 300,000 residents of the U.S. have the disease, which can cause serious heart problems. Patient advocates call for much more aggressive efforts to fight it.
Community health workers, who often help patients get to their appointments and pick up prescriptions for them, have increasingly been recognized as an integral part of treating chronic illnesses. But state-run Medicaid programs don’t always reimburse them equally, usually excluding those who work on tribal lands.
April Valentine’s family wants to know whether racism could have played a role in her death. A ϳԹ News analysis shows state regulators are ill-equipped to find discrimination in its many forms.
Novo Nordisk, the dominant company in the multibillion-dollar market for weight loss drugs, focuses on Black lawmakers and opinion leaders to spread the message that obesity is a chronic disease that needs treatment.
Social and economic pressures have long compelled Black girls and women to straighten their hair. But mounting evidence shows chemical straighteners — products with little regulatory oversight — may pose cancer and other health risks.
As settlement dollars land at the state level, state councils wield significant power in determining how the windfall gets spent. And, though they will likely include the most knowledgeable voices on addiction, these panels also face concerns about conflicts of interest and other issues.
Amid a years-long rise in maternal mortality rates in the United States, Idaho lawmakers decided to disband a committee created to investigate pregnancy-related deaths.
Some medical professionals warn that the Supreme Court’s recent ruling against using race as a factor in admissions could have far-reaching implications for the diversity of medical students, the practice of medicine, and patient care. Here’s what you need to know.
The $120 million International African American Museum that opened this week in Charleston, South Carolina, allows visitors to step back in history at Gadsden’s Wharf, where tens of thousands of enslaved Africans arrived in America, the genesis of generations of health disparities.
Kristie Fields, a cancer patient in Virginia, was urged to go public to seek financial help. She worried about feeding hurtful stereotypes.
Though most California counties are experimenting with dispatching health professionals rather than law enforcement to respond to people experiencing mental health crises, powerful police unions fear defunding.
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