Subject: Medicine

• The Wayward Blog Still Allows Smoking

  April 9, 2008

• Cooking with Testicles!

  October 10, 2008

• Cellar Rat wants you to taste for a cure

  October 23, 2008

• Dog Days

  July 8, 2004

• Strip Tease

  August 12, 2004

• Barack will not bogart that joint

  Flickr: Toronto JimIf you happen to live in one of the 13 states that allow medical marijuana, President Obama is cool with that. For all intents and purposes, pot is de facto legal there now. In case you're wondering, Kansas and Missouri are not two of those states. But neighbor Colorado is.Last Wednesday, Attorney General Eric Holder, discussing some bigger news about a Mexican pot bust, smoothly slid in the news that the DEA would no longer conduct raids on medical marijuana dispensaries. For

  March 2, 2009

• A city ponders: Who gets to drive the ambulance?

  People with heart conditions could feel safe at Kansas City, Missouri, City Hall today. First responders packed a conference room on the building's 13th floor in order to participate in a discussion about a possible merger between the fire department and the MAST ambulance service. Earlier this year, the city council formed an advisory committee to look at the issue. Fire fighters and their union, Local 42, have wanted to manage the ambulance function for a long time. MAST officials wish to

  March 10, 2009

• Kansas snubs out another smoking bill

  Flickr: Star5112I don't mean for this to be "let's harp on Kansas" day but sometimes it's too easy. Yesterday, a committee in the Kansas House killed a statewide smoking ban. The Associated Press is reporting that the "House Health and Human Services Committee took less than five minutes Wednesday to vote to table the issue until it receives more information." There's zero chance the bill will get reconsidered this session. This is the third fourth statewide smoking ban bill to not pass in Kansa

  March 19, 2009

• Legalize it! (And then invest in it)

  More and more I hear arguments for legalizing marijuana. Joe Klein and Andrew Sullivan are two people pushing especially hard for it right now, although President Barack Obama has blown off the issue -- and for good reason. If Obama made a huge deal about legalizing pot he might make gains among a percentage of people who probably already support him, but he'd lose plenty more voters. But what if pot were to be legalized without becoming legal?That appears to what's happening. Two weeks ago, Att

  April 6, 2009

• Air Supply

  February 1, 2007

• Hey, Smokers!

  February 8, 2007

• As Kathleen Sebelius leaves to help Barack Obama reform health care in Washington, here’s a checkup on what happened in Kansas

  April 9, 2009

• Wrap It, Grandpa

  The Greatest Generation is Kansas City’s newest high-risk group for HIV.

  October 23, 2008

• The Ararat Shrine Blood Drive

  September 4, 2008

• Get Tested

  April 16, 2009

• As Kansas City’s HIV infection rate rivals Africa’s, some black ministers admit that silence equals death

  May 29, 2008

• Smoke Scream

  March 27, 2008

• UnSimplifying Kansas City's Smoking Ban

  January 31, 2008

• Walk the Walk

  January 17, 2008

• Bands of Sisters

  December 13, 2007

• Free Prostate Screening

  December 13, 2007

• Memorial Flickers

  November 29, 2007

• FundRazr

  August 16, 2007

• Into Africa

  March 15, 2007

• Free-Market Brewer

  The guy who's leading the fight against smoking bans may be the brewer of your favorite beer.

  January 25, 2007

• In Search of the Smokiest Bar

  Shots and a cigarette may soon become history. So we hunt for places that make your hair stink.

  January 11, 2007

• Cheeseburger Now!

  September 21, 2006

• Kids or Cigs?

  The Shakespeare Festival's food vendors rough it in the park.

  July 6, 2006

• In God She Trusts

  Public school kids recently got the Word on teen sex.

  March 2, 2006

• Kill Phil

  January 19, 2006

• On the Line

  April 23, 2009

• An Arm and a Leg

  Amputations may rise, but an HCA-owned hospital is in it for the money.

  May 27, 2004

• Women's Rites

  Four talented actresses take us on a bumpy ride through the change.

  April 1, 2004

• The Deepest Cut

  Obese patients trusted Dr. Timothy Sifers for the best weight-loss surgery available. It was too good to be true.

  February 26, 2004

• A Nasty Rumor

  The African-American AIDS Project gets stripped of its funds.

  April 24, 2003

• The High Cost of Perfection

  Plastic surgeon Eric Swanson's bankruptcy stalls his malpractice lawsuits.

  June 20, 2002

• Impractical Nursing

  Death and mayhem visit Kansas City's biggest hospital chain.

  July 26, 2001

• Poor Diagnosis

  It just doesn’t pay to find a tumor in a poor woman.

  May 31, 2001

• The Factory Life

  Thousands of Missourians with lifelong disabilities work for just a few cents an hour. Somebody has to do it.

  February 15, 2001

• Dying for Dollars

  Kansas City still can't get its AIDS funding straight.

  November 16, 2000

• When do anti-smokers go too far?

  Flickr: Denni SchnappAn electronic cigarette charging.I am not a smoker, except for the occasional cigar. I'm anti-smoking in that I hate the smell of smoke and think it's a disgusting habit.But I'm inclined to believe anti-smoking crusaders have gone too far when they start suppressing opposing arguments -- exactly what tobacco companies did for much of the last century. Especially when the people being suppressed aren't fringe scientists but highly respected anti-smoking activists like public-

  April 16, 2009

• HEAD AND ART

  May 7, 2009

• How to celebrate Food Allergy Awareness Week (hint: not with peanuts)

  According to a study done by Newsweek, food allergies affect more than 11 million Americans. The number of children who suffer from one of the most severe food allergies -- peanuts -- has more than doubled in the past 10 years. When I was in grade school, people made fun of the kid who couldn't have peanuts and that was that. Now school officials are so afraid of something bad happening that kids with severe allergies sit at their own special lunch tables.The Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network

  May 11, 2009

• The extreme debate about alcohol in moderation

  For years it's been accepted wisdom that drinking in moderation, especially red wine, helps lower the chances of heart disease. But now that presumption has been flipped on its head, as doctors are wondering whether moderate drinking is not a cause of lower heart disease but merely a byproduct. Studies show that moderate drinking is most often done by people who live moderately in other aspects of their life. It may simply be that leading a moderate life of not eating too much, exercising some a

  June 16, 2009

• Wrap it up, KC, part II

  No wonder Men's Health gave Kansas City a D- for STDs. Jackson County has a higher rate of AIDS and HIV than most of the country. Jackson County's rate of AIDS is bigger than 81.6 percent of the counties in the nation. JaCo also has a higher rate of HIV than 92.5 percent of the country. That's what Danny O'Farrell of the National HIV/AIDS Atlas told KSHB Channel 41.  The National HIV/AIDS Atlas charts AIDS and HIV rates by age, gender and race/ethnicity in every county in the country. JaCo

  June 23, 2009

• Still time to get a free HIV/STD test

  If you're woeful behind on getting an HIV/STD test, Kansas City's Health Department is offering free, confidential testing from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday to honor National HIV Testing Day, which is actually Saturday. So if you're wondering what that sore is, go get it checked out at the Health Department Atrium, 2400 Troost Ave. They'll fix you up -- and also test you for gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphilis, too. If today's no good, the Health Department also offers free test Monday through Wednesd

  June 26, 2009

• Don't skimp on the self-exam, ladies; this runner had a double mastectomy at 23

  The lump in Karla Keller's left breast was so big, it didn't take a physician to find it. She wasn't doing one of those arm-in-the-air, finger-probing self exams, either. "It was so big, I felt it while I was rubbing soap over it in the shower," she says. Karla Keller​She still wasn't prepared for the doctor's diagnosis: Three tumors in her left breast. All aggressive. Each fast-growing. She was just 23 years old. On Sunday, she'll be one of the hundreds of pink-clad survivors, running in

  August 7, 2009

• Rightbloggers scour Kennedy funeral for Anti-Obamacare ammo

  ​ Starting today, Roy Edroso's Rightbloggers: Exploring the right Wing Blogosphere will run here every Monday until Armageddon.After a plane crash killed liberal Sen. Paul Wellstone, his wife and daughter, and several staff members in 2002, his friends and family held a memorial at the University of Minnesota attended by 15,000 people. The theme was "Stand up, keep fighting" for Wellstone's beliefs, and the expected Democratic replacement for Wellstone on the November ticket, Walter Mondale, w

  August 31, 2009

• Expressions of Courage

  September 3, 2009

• Get well soon, Kathleen Sebelius

  ​Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is on the mend after having a procedure to remove the most common form of skin cancer from her forehead. The silver fox was looking rough, like Quasimodo rough -- check out the screen capture taken from the Associated Press -- yesterday while she testifying before Congress. Reports say Sebelius had a spot of basal cell carcinoma -- a slow-growing form of skin cancer -- removed.Get well soon, Kathy.

  October 22, 2009