Gov. Nathan Deal said Tuesday that his proposed budget would fund 400 new residency training slots in hospitals across the state for graduates of Georgia medical schools. Georgia taxpayers currently fund these young physicians’ education through medical school, ‘‘only to see them perform their residency outside of our state and not return,’’ Deal said in…
After seven years of being addicted to meth, Jennifer Ploof had ‘‘lost absolutely everything.’’ She had been jailed 10 times, convicted of possession of methamphetamine and possession with intent to sell the powerful drug. Meth ‘‘made me lie, do harm to others, made me abandon my child,’’ Ploof says. Ploof, 27, is now in recovery…
Dr. Martha Cottrell was so eager to practice in Athens’ first community clinic for the poor that she volunteered for the job before the clinic even existed. A product of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Model Cities initiative, one of the Great Society programs introduced in the 1960s to reduce poverty and violence in urban areas,…
A loss of $3.7 million in federal funds is forcing Georgia to reduce its workforce for HIV prevention. After an inquiry by Georgia Health News, the Department of Public Health this week acknowledged that 20 people in state health districts have been notified they will probably lose their jobs in January, and that an unspecified…
Lori Thornton knows the nurses at the Oglethorpe County health department want her to quit smoking. She has already lost weight and improved her diet through a state public health program that helps low-income and uninsured Georgians manage their high blood pressure. “If it wasn’t for the health department, I would not seek any help,”…
When most people visit the doctor, they are probably not thinking of anything but getting individual care. But it’s becoming more common for providers to look past individual blood glucose levels and cholesterol counts to the social factors that affect the health of whole communities. That’s why the GHSU/UGA Medical Partnership and the UGA College…
Jennifer Fuller was among 31 women who recently went to a Rome clinic for a free Pap screening. Fourteen of the women had not had a Pap test in the past three years. Two had gone more than 10 years without the screening. (Two years is the generally recommended interval.) It had been four years…
When Lauren Baker enters a restaurant, she’s looking not for a meal, but for potential code violations. As cooks shuffle around stoves and trays of food, she washes her hands, puts on gloves and a hairnet, and takes out her checklist. Then she begins going through the kitchen, poking food with a digital thermometer, looking…
Several Georgia counties could lose at least 40 percent of their state grant-in-aid money for public health under a new formula being rolled out this year. Chatham County, home of Savannah, could lose under one estimate more than $1 million, or 50 percent of its previous allotment. Other counties potentially losing a big chunk of…
A cardiologist has returned to his home turf to study a disease that exacts a major toll in Georgia, especially for blacks. Cardiovascular disease causes 20 percent of all deaths in Georgia, but it’s responsible for 30 percent of deaths of black Georgians, according to the Georgia Department of Public Health. More than twice as…