Gather a group of new parents and the conversation will likely turn to their childbirth stories – ranging from the joyful to the gnarly to the positively traumatic. Birth story podcasts and websites feature a curated range of birth experiences, and you can buy embossed leather “birth story” journals as a baby shower gift. People are ...Read more

TAMPA, Fla. — When a hemp dispensary in this Florida city started to stock edibles with certain mushroom extracts last year, state regulators quickly ordered it to stop selling the items.

The shop had been advertising fruit-flavored gummies and other products containing tiny doses of mood-altering chemicals from the mushroom Amanita muscaria....Read more

Cardiovascular disease — the No. 1 cause of death among people 65 and older — is poised to become more prevalent in the years ahead, disproportionately affecting Black and Hispanic communities and exacting an enormous toll on the health and quality of life of older Americans.

The estimates are sobering: By 2060, the prevalence of ischemic ...Read more

More than 600,000 Americans have lost Medicaid coverage since pandemic protections ended on April 1. And a KFF Health News analysis of state data shows the vast majority were removed from state rolls for not completing paperwork.

Under normal circumstances, states review their Medicaid enrollment lists regularly to ensure every recipient ...Read more

DENVER -- For as long as emergency medicine has existed, being physically assaulted has been part of the job.

Talking about feelings that come after an assault, though? Not so much.

That’s something that paramedics and others working in emergency medicine are trying to change, said Crystal Eastman, a paramedic instructor and “peer ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Influential health care interests are jockeying over a potential infusion of $19.4 billion into Medi-Cal, California’s Medicaid program, while also angling for a 2024 ballot initiative to permanently lock in that funding, California Healthline has learned.

The Coalition to Protect Access to Care, which includes groups ...Read more

An overdose crisis is affecting children, adolescents and adults across the United States. Most drug overdoses in young people are caused by opioids, and specifically, fentanyl.

Opioids have long been used medically to treat pain. But highly potent opioids like fentanyl, which is rampant throughout the illicit drug market, are now the leading ...Read more

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- After leaving prison, where he’d been incarcerated for nearly three decades, a man in his 60s took up residence in the woods of Kansas City, where he stayed for five years.

He eventually found his way to City Union Mission’s emergency homeless shelter, where staff learned he’d been panhandling to pay for his eyesight ...Read more

State abortion bans in Tennessee and beyond, which constrain women’s health care, have put family planning clinics at risk of losing their federal funding.

The conflict involves the Title X family planning program, which provides services to low-income people, including minors. As of 2021, more than 3,200 clinics used federal grants to supply...Read more

WASHINGTON — Policy analysts, Democrats, and Republicans dissatisfied with the deal agree: Federal health programs have dodged a budgetary bullet in the Washington showdown over raising the nation’s debt ceiling.

A compromise bill, approved late Thursday by the Senate, includes some trims and caps on health spending for the next two years. ...Read more

Health care advocates are sounding the alarm over how Florida is handling last month’s end of emergency Medicaid, which they warn could force thousands of eligible children to lose medical coverage because their parents don’t know they must reapply to the federal program.

One reason they don’t know, according to advocates, is that Florida...Read more

ATLANTA — A new report from the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has shed some new light on the health habits of Americans. According to the report, 8.2% of adults between the ages of 18 and 64 taking prescription medications reported not taking their drugs as prescribed in order to cut costs – adding up to 9.2 ...Read more

Those with type 2 diabetes who are planning out their exercise schedule should consider getting in a workout after lunch, according to a new study from Boston researchers.

Type 2 diabetes patients who were physically active in the afternoon saw greater improvements in blood sugar levels than those who were most active at other times of day, the...Read more

When Rose Al Abosy began weighing which obstetrics and gynecology residencies to apply to, she spoke to advisers, considered programs’ academics and evaluated how state laws would affect her ability to train in providing abortions.

The Boston University Medical School graduate narrowed down the options to 80 programs in states that had not ...Read more

A little-known respiratory virus is grabbing the limelight from COVID-19 and RSV after cases surged earlier this year, spurring companies to prepare their vaccines for a waiting market.

About one in five U.S. lung patients who were tested in March for the illness, called human metapneumovirus, or hMPV, showed signs of the disease, according to ...Read more

BOISE, Idaho — Two Idaho families are suing to block a law that makes it a crime to provide gender-affirming care for transgender youth.

House Bill 71, passed by the Legislature this year and signed into law by Idaho Gov. Brad Little, makes it a felony for physicians to provide transition-related surgeries and medication, such as puberty ...Read more

In the past five years, several new drugs have been brought to market that could lead to a profound, if not revolutionary, change in how health care providers – and the public – view weight loss.

Three drugs in particular – sold under the brand names Wegovy, Ozempic and Mounjaro – have shown remarkable effects on weight loss ...Read more