Many who know me might be shocked by this: I shot my first pistol when I was 8 or 9, taught by my father, a physician, aiming at targets in our basement. At summer camp, I loved riflery the way some kids loved art. Staring… Read More »Analysis: I Was a Teenage Rifle Owner, Then an ER Doctor. Assault Weapons Shouldn’t Count as ‘Guns.’
Can’t see the audio player? Click here to listen on SoundCloud. This story also ran on Reveal. It can be republished for free. This week marks a grim milestone: Half a million Americans have died of covid-19. KHN reporter Jenny Gold, in collaboration with Reveal from… Read More »‘Into the Covid ICU’: A New Doctor Bears Witness to the Isolation, Inequities of Pandemic
This story also ran on The Guardian. It can be republished for free. In his 17 years as an emergency medical provider, Anthony Almojera thought he had seen it all. “Shootings, stabbings, people on fire, you name it,” he said. Then came covid-19. Before the… Read More »‘It Doesn’t Feel Worth It’: Covid Is Pushing New York’s EMTs to the Brink
As the rollout of covid-19 vaccines picks up across the U.S., moving from hospital distribution to pharmacies, pop-up sites and drive-thru clinics, health experts say it’s vital that these expanded venues be prepared to handle rare but potentially life-threatening allergic reactions. “You want to be… Read More »Is Your Covid Vaccine Venue Prepared to Handle Rare, Life-Threatening Reactions?
As Los Angeles hospitals give record numbers of covid patients oxygen, the systems and equipment needed to deliver the life-sustaining gas are faltering. It’s gotten so bad that Los Angeles County officials are warning paramedics to conserve it. Some hospitals are having to delay releasing… Read More »In Los Angeles and Beyond, Oxygen Is the Latest Covid Bottleneck
This story also ran on The Guardian. It can be republished for free. Workers at Garfield Medical Center in suburban Los Angeles were on edge as the pandemic ramped up in March and April. Staffers in a 30-patient unit were rationing a single tub of… Read More »As the Terror of COVID Struck, Health Care Workers Struggled to Survive. Thousands Lost the Fight.
USE OUR CONTENT It can be republished for free. In March, during the first week of the San Francisco Bay Area’s first-in-the-nation stay-at-home order, KHN spoke with emergency department physicians working on the front lines of the burgeoning COVID-19 pandemic. At the time, these doctors… Read More »‘Nine Months Into It, the Adrenaline Is Gone and It’s Just Exhausting’
This story also ran on The Guardian. It can be republished for free. As a boy, Robert Weber chased the blazing lights and roaring sirens of fire engines down the streets of Brooklyn, New York. He hung out at the Engine 247 firehouse, eating ham… Read More »In COVID Hot Zones, Firefighters Now ‘Pump More Oxygen Than Water’
Kurt Papenfus, a doctor in Cheyenne Wells, Colorado, started to feel sick around Halloween. He developed a scary cough, intestinal symptoms and a headache. In the midst of a pandemic, the news that he had COVID-19 wasn’t surprising, but Papenfus’ illness would have repercussions far… Read More »What Happened When the Only ER Doctor in a Rural Town Got COVID
Adam Woodrum was out for a bike ride with his wife and kids on July 19 when his then 9-year-old son, Robert, crashed. “He cut himself pretty bad, and I could tell right away he needed stitches,” said Woodrum. This story also ran on NPR.… Read More »After Kid’s Minor Bike Accident, Major Bill Sets Legal Wheels in Motion
DENVER — In March, Claire Tripeny was watching her dream job fall apart. She’d been working as an intensive care nurse at St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood, Colorado, and loved it, despite the mediocre pay typical for the region. But when COVID-19 hit, that calculation… Read More »Need a COVID-19 Nurse? That’ll Be $8,000 a Week
A mom of eight boys, Kim Gudgeon was at her wits’ end when she called her family doctor in suburban Chicago to schedule a sick visit for increasingly fussy, 1-year-old Bryce. He had been up at night and was disrupting his brothers’ e-learning during the… Read More »Parents Complain That Pediatricians, Wary of COVID, Shift Sick Kids to Urgent Care
In mid-March, Karla Monterroso flew home to Alameda, California, after a hiking trip in Utah’s Zion National Park. Four days later, she began to develop a bad, dry cough. Her lungs felt sticky. The fevers that persisted for the next nine weeks grew so high… Read More »‘All You Want Is to Be Believed’: The Impacts of Unconscious Bias in Health Care
In late August 2019, Shannon Harness awoke to serious pain in the lower right side of his abdomen — a telltale sign of appendicitis. He booked it to the emergency room of the only hospital in the county: Heart of the Rockies Regional Medical Center… Read More »Veteran’s Appendectomy Launches Excruciating Months-Long Battle Over Bill
Health workers across the country looked on in horror when New York became the global epicenter of the coronavirus. Now, as physicians in cities such as Houston, Phoenix and Miami face their own COVID-19 crises, they are looking to New York, where the caseload has… Read More »‘Is This When I Drop Dead?’ Two Doctors Report From the COVID Front Lines