California Law Protecting Health Care Workers Is Model For National Efforts On Workplace Violence
Advocates for health care workers hope to change the view that attacks can be part of the job. In other news, nurses tend to the homeless in a program in Sacramento, and state officials are trying to recruit more dentists to accept Medi-Cal patients.
Valley Public Radio:
For Health Care Employees, Workplace Violence Is More Common Than You Might Think
Over the course of three months in 2017, over two thousand incidents of workplace violence in health care were reported in California, which comes out to about an incident happening every other week. Some experts would say that number is probably low, because they suspect the issue is underreported, for a variety of reasons. One of the leading ones is a perception that tolerating violence is just part of the job, but this is a perspective many in California hope to change. (Tsutsui, 8/21)
The California Health Report:
In Effort To Help Homeless Residents, Sacramento Hires Street Nurses
It’s a warm summer day in Sacramento and Amanda Buccina, a registered nurse, has just arrived at Johnston Park to see her second patient of the day. Brian is a 68-year-old man diagnosed with leukemia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Although he worked his entire life, Brian’s health conditions caused him to lose both his job and ability to pay rent. As part of the Street Nurse program launched by WellSpace Health in March 2016 and funded by Sutter Health, Buccina and another nurse, Rennie Jemmings, provide care to the medically fragile homeless population in Sacramento. (Childers, 8/21)
The California Health Report:
Still Grappling With Provider Access Issues, State Pours More Money Into Denti-Cal
In an ideal world, Jennifer Kent would like to have added 1,000 new dentists across California willing to accept enrollees in Denti-Cal, the state’s low-income dental program, over the past year. Kent, director of the California Department of Health Care Services, the agency that manages the program, has had to settle for a much more modest number. According to Kent, 73 new dentists were enticed to join Denti-Cal in 2017. “It’s not moving as fast as we would like,” she said. (Shinkman, 8/20)