Sacramento Bee: UC Nurses Approve Five-Year Contract With 15 Percent Wage Increases
The California Nurses Association reported Monday that registered nurses at the University of California have voted overwhelmingly to ratify a five-year contract that includes pay increases totaling 15 percent over the life of the deal. The new contract becomes effective immediately, union officials said, and besides wages, includes clauses that ensured nurses would not be assigned to areas requiring specialty expertise without proper training, granted greater protections for nurses working on a daily contractual basis and required UC facilities to have a comprehensive plan to manage workplace violence. (Anderson, 10/1)

In other news on health care personnel —

Los Angeles Times: Prominent Gynecologist At Huntington Hospital Again Accused Of Sexual Misconduct By Medical Board
A prominent Pasadena obstetrician is facing the possible loss or suspension of his medical license following an accusation by state regulators that he made inappropriate comments about a patient’s appearance and sex life. The allegation lodged last week by the Medical Board of California marks the fifth time Dr. Patrick Sutton has been accused of sexual misconduct, according to a review by The Times of court records and medical board files. (Ryan and Hamilton, 10/1)

Santa Rosa Press Democrat: Sonoma West Medical Center Files For Liquidation Bankruptcy
Sonoma West Medical Center, the management services firm that until early September operated Sebastopol’s struggling district hospital, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last week, according to court filings. The move, known as a liquidation bankruptcy, affects some 180 creditors ranging from insurance companies to vendors that provided medical products, food and office supplies, according to a voluntary bankruptcy petition filed Sept. 26. Dan Smith, president of the board of directors of Sonoma West Medical Center, who is listed as the authorized representative in the bankruptcy filing, could not be reached by phone or email Monday. The listed attorney, Douglas Provencher of the Santa Rosa law firm Provencher & Flatt, also could not be reached by phone or email. (Espinoza, 10/1)

In other news from across the state —

San Francisco Chronicle: Hospital Probes Whether Staff Followed Guidelines In Case Of Man Who Allegedly Decapitated Grandmother
Believing he was possessed by a demon, Luke had repeatedly slammed his head against a wall on Sept. 24, causing a gash that had to be stapled closed, prosecutors said. Despite his mental breakdown, Luke was sent home, where hours later, he allegedly killed 82-year-old Chii-Chyu Horng. On Monday, officials at San Francisco General Hospital said they are investigating whether staff followed proper protocol for people experiencing crises when they released Luke, 30, shortly after treating the wound. (Sernoffsky, 10/1)

Capital Public Radio: Can Sacramento City Unified School District Expel Junk Food From Classrooms? 
End-of-year pizza parties, birthday cupcakes and post-quiz candy are often the norm for rewarding high grades or good behavior in school. But a new campaign in the Sacramento City Unified School District is encouraging teachers to find healthier and more creative ways to celebrate success. (Caiola, 10/1)

In other public health news —

KPBS: Teen Pregnancy Rates Fall Dramatically In San Diego And Imperial Valley
A new report from the State Department of Public Health shows falling teen pregnancy rates over the past two decades. Between 2000 and 2016, San Diego County saw teenage births fall nearly 70 percent. In Imperial County, they fell close to 60 percent. (Fudge, 10/1)

The Washington Post: ‘It Seemed To Last Forever.’ One Year Later, Mystery Of Las Vegas Massacre Remains
When the first bullets cracked through the air over a country music festival on the Las Vegas Strip last year, many concertgoers thought they were hearing fireworks. It took a moment to realize it was gunfire, a barrage of bullets that seemed endless, they recalled afterward. “I remember my husband saying, ‘Get down — get down,’” a 33-year-old woman from California who came to Las Vegas to attend the festival would later tell police. She was then hit in the upper left thigh: “It was within a few seconds of being on the floor I got shot instantly.” (Berman, 10/1)

Los Angeles Times: One Year Later: Las Vegas Dims The Neon And Pauses To Reflect On Its Darkest Hour
Mynda Smith’s sleep was restless. Normally, she would have had a protein shake for breakfast, but on Monday all she could do was sip water. A year ago her sister was killed. Neysa Tonks, 46, was one of 58 people gunned down at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival on the Las Vegas Strip — the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. The tragedy was big and public, but within Tonks’ family, the loss was also private and constant. (Montero, 10/1)

NPR: Cheap, Short-Term Health Policies May Leave Gaps In Coverage
If you're looking for cheaper health insurance, a whole host of new options will hit the market starting Tuesday. But buyer beware! If you get sick, the new plans – known as short-term, limited duration insurance — may not pay for the medical care you need. (Kodjak, 10/1)

In other national health care news —

NPR/ProPublica: Health Insurance Industry Insider To Employers: Learn To Negotiate
Marilyn Bartlett took a deep breath, drew herself up to her full 5 feet and a smidge, and told the assembled handful of Montana officials that she had a radical strategy to bail out the state's foundering benefit plan for its 30,000 employees and their families. The officials were listening. Their health plan was going broke, with losses that could top $50 million in just a few years. It needed a savior, but none of the applicants to be its new administrator had wowed them.Now here was a self-described pushy 64-year-old grandmother interviewing for the job. (Allen, 10/2)

USA Today: VA Hospitals' Cancellations Of Diagnostic Exam Orders Draw Scrutiny
Radiology technologist Jeff Dettbarn said he knew something was wrong at the Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in Iowa City, Iowa, when a patient arrived in February 2017 for a CT scan, but the doctor’s order for it had been cancelled. “To have a patient show up for a scan and not have an order – you’re like, ‘What the heck is going on?’” he told USA TODAY in an interview. (Slack, 10/1)

The Associated Press: Drugmaker Pfizer's CEO Read To Be Replaced By COO Bourla
The biggest U.S.-based drugmaker will change leaders in January when Pfizer Chief Operating Officer Albert Bourla replaces CEO Ian Read, who has led the company for nearly eight years. Pfizer Inc. said Monday that Read will become executive chairman of Pfizer's board of directors. The move comes after Pfizer's board in March gave Read an $8 million bonus contingent on boosting Pfizer's stock price and staying on for up to a year. (10/1)

The New York Times: Breakthrough Leukemia Treatment Backfires In A Rare Case
A highly unusual death has exposed a weak spot in a groundbreaking cancer treatment: One rogue cell, genetically altered by the therapy, can spiral out of control in a patient and cause a fatal relapse. The treatment, a form of immunotherapy, genetically engineers a patient’s own white blood cells to fight cancer. Sometimes described as a “living drug,” it has brought lasting remissions to leukemia patients who were on the brink of death. Among them is Emily Whitehead, the first child to receive the treatment, in 2012 when she was 6. (Grady, 10/1)

ProPublica: A Surgeon So Bad It Was Criminal
The pain from the pinched nerve in the back of Jeff Glidewell’s neck had become unbearable. Every time he’d turn his head a certain way, or drive over bumps in the road, he felt as if jolts of electricity were running through his body. Glidewell, now 54, had been living on disability because of an accident a decade earlier. As the pain grew worse, it became clear his only choice was neurosurgery. He searched Google to find a doctor near his home in suburban Dallas who would accept his Medicare Advantage insurance. (Beil, 10/2)

The Washington Post: Trump’s Family Separation Policy Was Flawed From The Start, Watchdog Review Says
The Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” crackdown at the border this spring was troubled from the outset by planning shortfalls, widespread communication failures and administrative indifference to the separation of small children from their parents, according to an unpublished report by the Department of Homeland Security’s internal watchdog. The report, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Post, is the government’s first attempt to autopsy the chaos produced between May 5 and June 20, when President Trump abruptly halted the separations under mounting pressure from his party and members of his family. (Miroff, Sacchetti and Kim, 10/1)

The New York Times: The Government Is Moving Migrant Children To A Texas Tent City. Here’s What’s Behind It.
More than 1,600 migrant children have been sent with little notice on late-night voyages to their new home: a barren tent city in West Texas, where they do not receive schooling and have limited access to legal representation. The Trump administration opened the facility because shelters that house migrant children have been overflowing. Here’s a look at what’s happening. (Dickerson, 10/1)

The New York Times: For Private Prisons, Detaining Immigrants Is Big Business
Thomas W. Beasley had something for sale, and figured he could market it the same as any other merchandise. “You just sell it like you were selling cars or real estate or hamburgers,” he told an interviewer. That was three decades ago. Only Mr. Beasley wasn’t hawking new wheels, beachfront property or beef patties. His stock in trade was prison bars. As a co-founder of Corrections Corporation of America in 1983, and with a get-tough-on-crime spirit ascendant in the country, he sold lockup space to federal and state governments that were jailing people faster than they could find room in their own institutions. (Haberman, 10/1)

The Hill: Top Trump Immigration Official Downplays Impact Of 'Public Charge' Proposal
The Trump administration’s top immigration official downplayed the attempted impact of a new proposal that would restrict green cards and visas for immigrants who use public benefits. Francis Cissna, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said the proposed “public charge” rule is very specific in the scope of benefits it targets, and the number of immigrants who are eligible for those benefits, or who could become eligible for those benefits, is limited. (Weixel, 10/1)