| Court makes it easier for patients to enter rehab
Pennsylvanians battling drug and alcohol addiction will not need a second opinion from their HMO before entering treatment programs, a state appeals court ruled. In a unanimous decision released Thursday, Commonwealth Court ruled that group insurance companies and HMOs must cover drug and alcohol treatment costs for policy holders referred to detoxification, rehabilitation and outpatient programs by a doctor or psychologist. The ruling will help about 15,000 state residents with private insurance who seek substance abuse treatment each year, said Deborah Beck, president of the Drug and Alcohol Service Providers Organization of Pennsylvania. It's a really important decision that I think gives power back to doctors and psychologists, said Beck, whose Harrisburg-based organization represents licensed treatment centers and school-run counseling programs.
Hospital announces new cancer care center
A local hospital will be able to offer cancer patients state-of-the-art care thanks to an unlikely partnership.When Anderson Hospital in Maryville opens its Comprehensive Cancer Care Center in September, cancer patients will have access to traditional treatments like chemotherapy and radiation therapy. But the center will also offer cutting-edge research and investigative therapies thanks to a partnership with Mary Crowley Cancer Research Centers.Based in Dallas, Mary Crowley is a national leader in cancer research. Mary Crowley focuses on non-toxic treatments, including gene-targeted therapies, cell-based therapies and vaccines, all of which do not harm patients' existing healthy tissue and system.The nearest Mary Crowley center is in Dayton, Ohio, and although nearby hospitals may provide cancer research or trials, Mary Crowley trials are highly innovated and unique.But with hundreds of hospitals from throughout the Midwest to choose from, why would Mary Crowley research come to Maryville? Edwardsville residents Allen and Linda Cassens are to thank.
Open House for After School Program
JACKSONVILLE, FL -- Children in Duval County Public Schools will be back in the classroom Monday (August 20th). It's time for them to get back into a routine. For many, that routine includes after school activities. Jaxparks has a free after school program for kids ages 6 - 12. It's called Club Rec.
The program is offered at 20 centers in the city of Jacksonville. A teen program will be set up at 3 of the sites.
Pam Wilson, Marketing and Community Relations Managers with Jaxparks, describes it as "the coolest club in town." Kids will be able to play games, like basketball and pool, and do arts and crafts. Wilson says the program also offers educational components and a grade monitoring system. Kids get incentives, or small prizes, when they make good grades.
Wilson says one of the main goals is to mix education with recreation and physical fitness.
Online Casino Bill Finds Stiff Objection
The long awaited legislation introduced to the South African Parliament by Fungai Sibanda, the acting Director General of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to regulate and legalize online gambling, has run in to opposition from some other MPs. The bill proposed, the National Gambling Amendment was proposed as a way to prevent crime and to protect players, compulsive gamblers and underage gamblers. However, good as the idea may sound, some MPs, led by ANC member Ben Turok protested the bill saying that the only reason that South Africa should regulate online gambling, or interactive gambling, as the bill calls it, should be to abolish or restrict it. They tend to see it as a moral issue, gambling being a "social evil." In fact, the opposing MPs have said that legalizing online gambling will be like making money out or prostitution.
County losing drug program
Local officials must find a new treatment home for low-income pregnant women hooked on drugs or alcohol because the El Paso County Health and Environment Department is abandoning its remaining substance abuse treatment program to refocus its mission. The departments program, dubbed the McMasters Clinic, was left over from the 1970s era of health departments straying from their original task of maintaining the health of communities, not individuals, director Rosemary Bakes-Martin said. El Paso and Boulder counties are the only two that receive state funding for substance abuse treatment programs. But now with tuberculosis and other potential publichealth crises to get a handle on, Bakes-Martin and her crew will wash their hands of Mc-Masters by July 1. Really what public health should be doing is providing the information and helping the local health providers, Bakes-Martin said.
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