An icy parking lot near Brighton, Oregon. Many people have fallen, or had pipes burst in the cold and icy weather. (Credit: Tracci Dial / NWPB) Listen (Runtime :57) Read […]Read More
Idaho reached record levels of COVID-19 testing positivity at 38.8% last week, said Christine Hahn, state epidemiologist at a press briefing Tuesday. Read More
The year 2021 isn’t even over, yet Oregon and Washington have already smashed their previous records for total annual deaths. Those records were just set last year. The coronavirus pandemic is only one piece of the explanation.Read More
It's a growing problem in Washington: kids with developmental disabilities and complex behaviors who are stuck in the hospital with no reason for being there. Usually, they end up in the hospital after a crisis or an incident. But once the child is medically cleared to leave, their parents or their group home won't come get them citing inadequate supports to manage the Read More
The days are quickly ticking down to next Monday's deadline when most Oregon and Washington teachers, health care workers and public employees need to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19.Read More
Respiratory therapist Gina McCarthy cares for COVID-19 patients in overflowing MultiCare Tacoma General Hospital. Never in her 28 years in the profession has she worked hours like she does now.Read More
The overcrowded hospitals we've been telling you about for weeks are having ripple effects out into the community -- some you could predict and some which are a little more startling. Take for example a fire that gutted a house in Ocean Shores, expensive airlifts from Leavenworth, Washington, and slow response times for ambulance transports in Portland.Read More
President Biden on Tuesday is set to announce new steps to reach rural Americans in the push to get as many people as possible vaccinated for the coronavirus, a White House official tells NPR. This emphasis comes as rural hospitals are raising alarms about the pace of vaccination — even among their own employees.Read More
While millions of Americans wait for the COVID-19 vaccine, hospital board members, their trustees and donors around the country have gotten early access to the scarce drug or offers for vaccinations, raising complaints about favoritism tainting decisions about who gets inoculated and when.Read More
The Trump administration's rule, which goes into effect this month, was made possible in part through the efforts of Cynthia Fisher, the founder and chairman of PatientRightsAdvocate.org. Patients from across the United States have told "stories of being blindsided by outrageous medical bills," Fisher told NPR's Weekend Edition. "This is the win to put affordable into the Read More
Emily McCarty is a Yakima-based reporter for Crosscut/KCTS. Her mom, Mary, died in a Spokane hospital in November, four days after being diagnosed with COVID-19. McCarty wrote about her mom and her family’s personal experience in an essay titled “I lost my mom to COVID-19. Don’t let the holidays steal yours.” Read More
The number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus in California has surpassed 2 million, according to Johns Hopkins University, as the virus has spread with startling speed in the state. It's the first state to pass that number. In the last day, according to Johns Hopkins, California saw 43,986 new cases and 319 deaths.Read More
“Unfortunately, I think within the next week it’s going to be a significant rise in COVID-19,” said Dr. Kevin Caserta, the chief medical officer for Providence SW Washington. Already, the two hospitals Caserta oversees, St. Peter and Providence Centralia, have seen a near doubling of COVID patients over the past six to eight weeks – from roughly 25 to nearly 50 today.Read More
A majority of hospital nurses said they had never been tested for the coronavirus, according to a recent survey. Hospitals say they are simply following the CDC's guidance.Read More
Deaths from COVID-19 have jumped nearly 40% this week, and hospitals around the country are straining under their patient load. Here's what happened in the first week after Thanksgiving. Read More
Hospitals are getting so crowded with COVID-19 patients that they're having to resort to workarounds to treat them all. Experts warn this may hamper doctors' ability to save lives.Read More
"We are today in a more dangerous position than we were in March when our first stay-home order was issued," Gov. Jay Inslee said during a Sunday press conference. "In March, we were heading into the summer months. And we were largely successful relative to other states because of the combination that we acted early we did not wait," he added.Read More
Lydia Mobley is a traveling ICU nurse. She describes how hard it's been treating patients during the current surge in coronavirus cases.Read More
Where are hospitals reaching capacity? Which metro areas are running out of beds? NPR has learned federal agencies collect and analyze this information in detail but don't share it with the public. Read More
Two new peer-reviewed studies are showing a sharp drop in mortality among hospitalized COVID-19 patients. The drop is seen in all groups, including older patients and those with underlying conditions, suggesting that physicians are getting better at helping patients survive their illness.Read More
One thing that has improved a lot over the course of the pandemic is treatment of seriously ill COVID-19 patients in intensive care units. Here's one man's success story.Read More
After the Trump administration moved hospital COVID-19 data reporting to HHS, bypassing the CDC, the new data system has been rife with erratic updates and anomalies.Read More
Idaho's case count has quadrupled since mid-June, and about half of the more than 15,000 confirmed cases in the state have come in the past two weeks. Read More
Everyone involved even tangentially in health care today is consumed by the coronavirus pandemic, as they should be. But the pandemic is accelerating a problem that used to be front and center in health circles: the impending insolvency of Medicare.Read More
As of Friday afternoon, 61 people were hospitalized for COVID-19 in Yakima County. Even though at least another 17 patients were transported out of the county, the region’s major hospital, Virginia Mason Memorial, had completely run out of hospital beds as of Thursday night. Read More
Across the U.S., convention centers and empty fields were transformed into emergency field hospitals at a cost to federal taxpayers of more than $660 million. Most haven't treated a single patient. Read More
It was physically and emotionally demanding work made all the more challenging because families weren’t allowed to visit their loved ones. Dr. Luke Hansen said seeing people die in a chaotic emergency room without their families at their side was one of the hardest parts of his time in New York. Read More
Hospitals in Washington are starting to act on the permission given them by Gov. Jay Inslee to resume non-essential medical procedures. Some may begin work by or before next week.Read More
Nine rural hospitals in Washington from Forks to Omak to Republic have new shipments of hospital masks, thanks to the organization that advocates for them in Olympia. And that organization’s CEO is getting a big kick out of the whole thing.Read More
Guidance regarding the CARES Act says health care providers who take emergency funds aren't allowed to "balance bill" coronavirus patients ― and every patient is a possible COVID-19 patient.Read More
Protective surgical gowns are one of the most scarce and eagerly sought items in the current coronavirus pandemic. Responders-turned-MacGyvers in at least three separate places, including two in Washington state, have independently hit upon a do-it-yourself alternative using common construction house wrap.Read More
It is starting to take more time for cases, hospitalizations and deaths to double in several states, indicating social distancing is working. Here's how to make sense of those numbers. Read More
When the coronavirus outlook got scary and hairy in mid-March, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee recruited an outsider to join his crisis management team. He convinced a retired vice admiral to temporarily move cross-country to serve as Washington state's COVID-19 hospital "czar."Read More
Over the previous weekend, Dr. Jessica Van Fleet-Green rounded-up 200 masks for her team – a mix of the more protective N95s and standard surgical masks. The donations came from a dental office that’s now closed because of the coronavirus pandemic, two construction contractors and even her father who found two at home. Read More
Max Brooks wrote the zombie apocalyptic horror novel World War Z, and is a lecturer at West Point’s Modern War Institute. He offers insight into pandemics and advice on what is fact hygiene. Read More
While the greater Seattle area has so far borne the brunt of the outbreak in Washington, health care workers outside the epicenter are bracing for what’s to come. Read More
Medicare is cutting payments to 786 hospitals with the highest infection and complication rates. The list includes a third of the hospitals proclaimed as the nation's "best" in one prominent ranking.Read More
The state of Oregon is pushing the community hospitals along the Oregon Coast to improve their earthquake resilience. This comes after a state report predicted none of them would be able to sustain operations after the feared Big One -- a magnitude 9 offshore Cascadia earthquake and tsunami.Read More
