Ventura County Star Stories: Public Health

Poll finds wide use of placebo treatment

Fri, 24 Oct 2008 07:00:00 -0000

LONDON — About half of American doctors in a survey say they regularly give patients placebo treatments — usually drugs or vitamins that won't really help their condition.

6 animals test positive for West Nile

Sat, 11 Oct 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Three more wild birds, two sentinel chickens and one horse in Ventura County have tested positive for West Nile virus, county health officials reported this week. The birds were collected in or near Thousand Oaks and Simi Valley. State test results confirmed this week that they had West Nile.

State, insurers, doctors in battle over billing

tkisken@venturacountystar.com (Tom Kisken ) — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 07:00:00 -0000

A person injured in a car crash is treated in the emergency room. The insurance company pays the out-of-network doctors involved in the care less than they think they're owed.

Growing number of parents refuse vaccines

jcmoore@venturacountystar.com (Jean Cowden Moore) — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Coreen Costello, a mother of five, decided to not vaccinate her younger children.

Like a growing number of parents, Costello does not want to expose her kids to risks she says she believes are associated with the vaccinations children routinely receive before they start kindergarten.

"I know for certain if we vaccinate, we're taking a risk of side effects that could be damaging. I don't know for certain they'll be exposed to disease," said Costello, who home schools her children in Agoura Hills. "I think coming into contact with those diseases is a smaller risk."

Lack of independent studies leave parents questioning the risks

Sun, 07 Sep 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Barbara Loe Fisher has been fighting about the safety of childhood vaccines for three decades. But the president of the National Vaccine Information Center says she's not opposed to vaccination so much as she's opposed to a "one-size-fits-all vaccine policy imposed by government health agencies."

Parents and doctors may be unable to afford costs of shots

Sun, 07 Sep 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Some parents are unable to vaccinate their children because the shots are too expensive and too complicated, experts say. The federal government each year buys enough vaccine to inoculate more than 10 million children and subsidizes vaccination through state Medicaid programs.

135,000 school kids lack protection from disease, surveys say

Sun, 07 Sep 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Hundreds of thousands of children are going to school this fall without protection from deadly diseases. More parents are deciding not to vaccinate their children against mumps, measles, rubella, polio and other dangerous diseases. The parents are refusing to vaccinate because of concerns that the vaccinations themselves are harmful, or because of the growing cost and complexity of getting the shots.

2 birds test positive for West Nile virus

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Two more birds in Ventura County have tested positive for West Nile virus, county health officials said Thursday.

Two birds test positive for West Nile virus

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Two more birds in Ventura County have tested positive for West Nile virus, county health officials said Friday.

E. coli patient hospitalized 3 weeks

tkisken@venturacountystar.com (Tom Kisken ) — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Laura Comer spent three weeks in the hospital. Suspect plasma was flushed out of her body and replaced with fresh quantities. Seven doctors treated her, some of them quoting mortality rates.

Pilot program in county focuses on advance directives

tkisken@venturacountystar.com (Tom Kisken ) — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 07:00:00 -0000

No heroic measures. The words may mean no ventilators and no resuscitation to terminally ill people who plug the phrase into advance directives dictating how they want to die.

Abuse of prescription painkillers spurs move for online database

tkisken@venturacountystar.com (Tom Kisken ) — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Pain patients understand why California's attorney general says he needs to raise $3.5 million to stop addicts and drug dealers who use doctors to stockpile Vicodin and OxyContin.

Abuse of prescription medicine is rampant in part because chronic pain can put your head in a vise and reduce you to a lump of flesh unable to do anything but lie on a sofa, said Bob Ramos of Santa Paula, whose spine has been surgically fused. It can feel as if "someone was grabbing your ligaments and pulling them out of your back," said Terry Kierzek of Agoura Hills, who had a cyst on his spine.

10% Medicare payment cut held off

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Amid intense political pressure from the nation's doctors, the Bush administration said Monday it would hold off on a 10 percent fee cut in Medicare payments to doctors that was slated to kick in today

Stem cells show promise in bone repair

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Medical researchers have made strides in the technology to rebuild damaged bone tissue using stem cells, doctors at the University of North Carolina announced this week.

Tomato industry in a pickle

shoops@venturacountystar.com (Stephanie Hoops) — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 07:00:00 -0000

The tomato industry is expected to suffer bigger losses in the ongoing salmonella outbreak than the spinach industry did in the 2006 E. coli panic, Tom Nassif, president and chief executive of the Western Growers Association, said Tuesday. Spinach growers lost $75 million to $100 million because of the E. coli scare, but tomatoes are much more widely consumed, Nassif said. "The spinach market has never recovered to where it was," he added.

County distributes $8.3 million in tobacco funds to health services

clerici@venturacountystar.com (Kevin Clerici) — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 07:00:00 -0000

More than $8.3 million in annual tobacco lawsuit settlement funds were distributed Tuesday by the county Board of Supervisors, providing money for mental health and children's services and extended hours at primary care clinics.

County warns of mosquito threat

Sun, 25 May 2008 07:00:00 -0000

With the start of the summer season and increased outdoor activities, the Ventura County Environmental Health Division is encouraging people to protect themselves from mosquito bites.

Marrow donor drive scheduled Saturday

Fri, 16 May 2008 07:00:00 -0000

A drive for people to join the National Marrow Donor Program registry will be held Saturday at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles

Fair hosting marrow donation registration

Fri, 09 May 2008 07:00:00 -0000

The National Marrow Donor Program will hold a bone marrow registry drive Saturday at the Simi Valley Street Fair.

Health officials fear a measles outbreak in U.S.

Fri, 02 May 2008 07:00:00 -0000

Federal health officials warned Thursday that the U.S. could be on the verge of a major outbreak of measles, a viral disease that had been declared wiped out in this country in 2000.