The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "health risks" ...
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Hospital at Risk
My investigation of the Minnesota Security Hospital, a state-run facility that provides psychiatric treatment to nearly 400 adults deemed "mentally ill and dangerous," uncovered high rates of violence and injuries of employees and patients at the facility, a critical shortage of psychiatrists, and widespread confusion among employees about what to do when a patient becomes violent. I found that much of confusion was the result of the abrasive, threatening management style of head administrator David Proffitt, who was hired in 2011 to reform the facility. I began investigating Proffitt and found he was hired without a basic background check. I uncovered many troubling details from Proffitt's past, including domestic violence, a PhD from a now-defunct online degree mill, a forced resignation from his previous job as the administrator of a private psychiatric hospital in Maine, and other failings. The state ordered Proffitt to resign and the Minnesota legislative auditor began an audit of the department's hiring practices. The assistant commissioner of the Department of Human Services who led the hiring search also resigned. The governor proposed $40 million in renovations to address safety concerns. Regulators from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration visited the facility for the first time in 21 years. The facility also implemented new training for employees to reduce violence. My investigation of the facility continues.
Tags: Psychiatrists; domestic violence; injuries
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Poisoned Places: Tonawanda
It's difficult to definitively link any one person's illness to air pollution from a particular plant. But the concerns about the health effects of Tonawanda Coke's toxic pollution rallied a small group of people in Tonawanda -- most of them sick -- to force complacent regulators to clean up the air. The case highlights the risks posed to communities around the country by an environmental regulatory system that largely entrusts companies to voluntarily disclose how much toxic pollution they emit and that can take years to act once violations are discovered.
Tags: air pollution; toxic emission; Tonawanda; Coke; health effects;
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The State of our Maternal Health
In California, the health of pregnant women has been getting worse over the years and the maternal death rate is even worse that Bosnia's. The story investigated the causes behind what is making women sicker. One finding included showing that women in California are at a greater risk of having a cesarean surgery at for-profit hospitals where there is a financial incentive to perform this procedure.
Tags: pregnant; pregnancy; cesarean; hospital; maternal; maternal death
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Medicating the Military
The stories looked at the nature and scope of the use of prescription drugs in the military community, with a focus on psychiatric medications and painkillers. The reporting found that use of psychiatric medications has risen dramatically in the past several years and some doctors suggest it may be a factor in the military's suicide epidemic of recent years. Reporters found that many psychiatric drugs - including powerful anti-convulsants and anti-psychotic medications - were being used "off label", or in ways not formally approved by the FDA. Reporters found that many troops were taking up to 10 medications at a time in so-called drug cocktails that experts say are untested and unproven in these combinations. Reporters also found that deaths caused by accidental drug overdoses had tripled during the past several years and that the Army's specialty care units were quietly conducting internal investigations and making significant changes to hospital protocols to reduce risk of accidental deaths. Finally, they found that psychiatric drug usage was also up significantly among military children.
Tags: Military; Army; Veteran; Health; Wellness; Medicine; Drugs; Pain killers; Psychiatric Medication; Mental Health; Suicide; Depression; Military Children; Hospital; Prescription
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"The Air We Breathe"
The people living in and around Pittsburgh are breathing in some of the poorest quality air in the U.S. High levels of Benzene and other harmful chemicals have been found in the air causing potentially serious health risks to residents who inhale the "toxic brew" over a long time period. The Allegheny County Board of Health has "indefinitely postponed" voting on issuing new air quality permits.
Tags: Neville Island; Coke Works; Clairton; Allegheny County Board of Health; air quality; Dan Onorato; Pittsburgh; Carnegie Mellon University; EPA; American Lung Association
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Dead by Mistake
This series documents the massive number of deaths and injuries caused from preventable medical errors. These errors cause "more deaths than traffic accidents', more specifically they cause nearly "200,000 deaths per year" Behind the numbers are the people who trusted the medical system, including the 30 individual cases spotlighted in this series. Furthermore, once the problems were revealed the medical community and the government failed to take the effective steps necessary to solve the problems.
Tags: Medical; medicine; health care; hospitals; errors; patients; risk; victims; death; mistakes; safety; system
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"Childhood Lead Poisoning Rates in Chicago"
In this three-part series, Matthew Hendrickson examines the factors that contribute to lead poisoning in Chicago children. He finds that most children who are affected come from low-income families and that many are at risk for health problems down the road. In Chicago, children are not required to have a blood test until they start school, so early detection of lead poisoning is rare.
Tags: Public Health Department; Chicago; childhood lead-poisoning protection program; Tony Amato;
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Positive
"The state of Illinois has increased its HIV spending by tens of millions of dollars-creating two new grant programs designed to combat the epidemic among African Americans. One of the grant programs was mismanaged and much of the funding does not target the highest risk population." Furthermore, the health department and non-profits were either understaffed or waiting for the funds to be received before they could treat anyone.
Tags: Illinois; AIDS; African Americans; Human Immunodeficiency Virus(HIV); Grant programs
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CDC Buries Toxic Warnings
"The Centers for Disease Control suppressed repeated warnings from one of its top scientists, raising questions about whether the CDC bowed to pressure from FEMA to conceal the long-term health risks of formaldehyde in the trailers it distributed to hurricane victims."
Tags: Dr. Christopher De Rosa; Ellmore Ohio; beryllium; health threat; poisoning; toxicology; environmental medicine;
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The CDC, FEMA and formaldehyde
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, people who moved into trailers provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency almost immediately complained about the air quality in them. As complaints mounter, FEMA had an agent of the center for Disease Control conduct a test of the formaldehyde found inside the trailers. Joaquin Sapien explains why it took more than two years for the government to admit that formaldehyde levels in many of the trailers were high enough to increase the risk of caner and repiratory illnesses.
Tags: formaldehyde; Federal Emergency Management Agency; FEMA; Hurricane Katrina; Center for Disease Control; CDC; housing; FEMA trailers; air quality; environment; health