The president of a police union in New York City said the 650 officers who guard NYC Health + Hospital's 11 locations should carry a firearm, according to the New York Post.  By Harrison Cook - 8/17/18

The National Institutes of Health has started the first in-human trial of an experimental live, weakened Zika virus vaccine.  By Anuja Vaidya - 8/17/18

The most recent Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is proving extremely difficult for the World Health Organization to contain, according to STAT.  By Harrison Cook - 8/17/18

While Madison, Wis.-based UnityPoint Health-Meriter suspended a nurse under investigation for infant abuse allegations in February, no arrests or charges have been made, according to the Madison State Journal.  By Mackenzie Bean - 8/17/18

Craig Sweet, MD, an endocrinologist at Fort Myers, Fla.-based Specialists in Reproductive Medicine & Surgery, discussed how healthcare has evolved for transgender patients in an interview with the Fort Myers News-Press.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

The Colorado Department of Human Services suspended all medical and dental practices at Wheat Ridge (Colo.) Regional Center Aug 15., after learning the state-owned facility had been improperly cleaning surgical tools since 2015, according to Denver7.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

Health organizations are obligated to contribute accurate and timely information to the general public, but the bulk of this information comes from social media and does not help people make informed health decisions, wrote Yotam Ophir, PhD, the Joan Bossert Postdoctoral Fellow in Science Communication at the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School of Communication in Philadelphia, in an op-ed for Science Alert.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

A study, published in the American Journal of Infection Control, examined the effects of healthcare-associated infections beyond physical health.  By Anuja Vaidya - 8/16/18

With about 115,000 Americans on the transplant list for a life-saving organ and 20 people dying everyday waiting for an organ donor, companies like Auburn Hills, Mich.-based Arigos Biomedical are developing methods to preserve organs for future transplants using technology once thought impossible, according to Futurism.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

President Donald Trump signed the Right to Try Act into federal law May 30, giving patients with life-threatening conditions the opportunity to access investigational drugs without FDA authorization. To ensure this law provides the maximum benefits for patients, the FDA should provide clarity over several ambiguous requirements outlined in the law, three health experts argued in an op-ed published in The Journal of the American Medical Association.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

Katie Stubblefield became the youngest person to receive a face transplant in the U.S. when she underwent the procedure at Cleveland Clinic in 2017, according to CBS News.  By Harrison Cook - 8/16/18

CMS' plan to change Medicare payments to a flat rate per visit regardless of a patient's sickness could have harmful consequences for severely ill patients, a professor of medicine argues in a STAT op-ed.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18

Google searches for preeclampsia surged after Beyoncé discussed her experience with the condition during a Vogue interview published Aug. 5. After the term's popularity spiked online, ProPublica reviewed preeclampsia materials from some of the nation's leading consumer health websites and found many pages contained incomplete, imprecise or misleading information.  By Harrison Cook - 8/15/18

After Hawaii became the eighth U.S. jurisdiction to authorize medical aid in dying April 5, the legislation's set of safeguards could restrict access for patients looking to end their life, two authors argue in Health Affairs blog post.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18

Although the CDC receives 30,000 Lyme disease reports annually and that number has tripled over the past two decades, there isn't a vaccine for the vector-borne illness — and just one new vaccine candidate is in the pipeline, The New York Times reports.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18

As of July 14, the measles has sickened 107 people across 21 states this year, according to the CDC.  By Harrison Cook - 8/15/18

An intensive care unit diary can help patients gain clarity of their time in the cardiac ICU, serving as a reality-sorting tool that is effective in connecting their flashbacks and potentially inaccurate memories to actual events, according to a study published in Critical Care Nurse.  By Anuja Vaidya - 8/15/18

When physicians track seven factors of heart attack patients after they are first admitted to the hospital, they can help identify those with the highest risk for 30-day readmission, researchers from Dallas-based UT Southwestern Medical Center found.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18

As hospitals work to reduce readmissions, healthcare experts are looking at why patients return to the hospital and strategizing ways to keep discharged patients from becoming inpatients again, according to U.S. News & World Report.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18

Springfield, Mo.-based CoxHealth is putting vein pattern readers in its six hospitals to reduce the risk of giving patients the wrong treatment, Ozarks First reports.  By Megan Knowles - 8/15/18