When Wait Times Become A Death Sentence: A Look Inside Backlog For Disability Benefits
The Washington Post investigates the ever-growing backlog for people seeking disability benefits.
The Washington Post:
597 Days. And Still Waiting.
Webster County, Miss. — On the 597th day, the day he hoped everything would change, Joe Stewart woke early. He took 15 pills in a single swallow. He shaved his head. And then he got down to the business of the day, which was the business of every day, and that was waiting. He looked outside, and saw his mother there in a green sedan, engine running. So many months he had waited for this moment, and now it was here. Time for his Social Security disability hearing. Time to go. (McCoy, 11/20)
In other national health care news —
The Hill:
Facing 'Hard Decisions,' Health Centers Plead For Restored Funding
Community health centers are scrambling to make contingency plans as they anxiously wait to see if Congress will renew billions of dollars in federal funding that expired on Sept. 30. Often situated in medically underserved areas, the health centers provide care to some 26 million of the nation’s most vulnerable people. They’re required to take any patient who seeks care, regardless of whether they can pay. (Roubein, 11/21)
CQ:
Funding Cuts To Hospitals Imminent Unless Congress Acts
Billions of dollars in cuts to a federal program that helps hospitals cover the cost of caring for the uninsured will begin to take effect in a matter of weeks if Congress does not delay them. The House recently included a postponement in cuts to what's known as disproportionate share hospital, or DSH, payments in its bill to reauthorize funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (HR 3922). But the Senate hasn't followed suit thus far, leaving hospitals in the dark about whether they will start to see funding slashed in the first quarter of 2018. (Williams, 11/20)
The New York Times:
New Gene Treatment Effective For Some Leukemia Patients
A new way of genetically altering a patient’s cells to fight cancer has helped desperately ill people with leukemia when every other treatment had failed, researchers reported on Monday in the journal Nature Medicine. The new approach, still experimental, could eventually be given by itself or, more likely, be used in combination treatments — analogous to antiviral “cocktails” for H.I.V. or multidrug regimens of chemotherapy for cancer — to increase the odds of shutting down the disease. (Grady, 11/20)
The New York Times:
Skin Cancers Rise, Along With Questionable Treatments
John Dalman had been in the waiting room at a Loxahatchee, Fla., dermatology clinic for less than 15 minutes when he turned to his wife and told her they needed to leave. Now. “It was like a fight or flight impulse,” he said. His face numbed for skin-cancer surgery, Mr. Dalman, 69, sat surrounded by a half-dozen other patients with bandages on their faces, scalps, necks, arms and legs. (Hafner and Palmer, 11/20)
Stat:
Our Bodies Are Full Of Bugs. This MIT Engineer Wants To Manipulate Them To Treat Disease
Our bodies are full of bugs. They’re everywhere, hanging out on our skin, reproducing in our gut, growing on the glistening surface of our eyes. These bacteria, it turns out, don’t just beget other bacteria. They also beget scientific paper after scientific paper, which, in turn, beget headline after headline. But for all our talk of microbiomes, we aren’t all that great at shaping them, says Dr. Timothy Lu, an associate professor of biological engineering and electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (Boodman, 11/21)