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 "treatment programs" ...
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Hurdles high for offender commitment
The Star Tribune analyzed data and found that the majority of sex offenders with a high chance of committing another crime were released instead of being admitted to a psychiatric institution. One of the offenders, Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., was charged with the disappearance of Dru Sjodin, a college student in North Dakota. However, some offenders with a smaller chance of committing a crime again were placed in the psychiatric facility. The article also describes the high cost of the sex-offender treatment program compared to the cost of prison, and exlains that politics might have something to do with the inconsistency in committing repeat offenders.
Tags: Dru Sjodin; Alfonso Rodriguez Jr.; Department of Corrections; sex offenders; Ryan Swenson; social institutions
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Examining Table. Operation that rated hospitals was success, but the patient died. Cleveland clinic found fault with program of CEOs, whose ardor faded, too. Low grades spurred reforms.
The article explains what happened to Cleveland's Health Quality Choice program. The program "attempted a systematic monitoring of the quality of medical care at hospitals in the area. It made the results public, hoping to improve treatment and to help the companies save money." However, now this program has collapsed. This article explains why.
Tags: Cleveland; Health Quality Choice; medical care; quality; companies; hospitals; doctors; health care; money; costs
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Special Delivery. How Medicare altered its rules after hearing a very desperate plea. Hepatitis B patient is refused coverage for transplant, until Capitol Hill calls. 'Informally' changing policy.
According to the article, "Medicare, the federal health program for 39 million elderly and disabled people, has long taken a conservative approach to covering liver transplants. Pioneered in the early 1980s, the operations weren't covered by Medicare until 1991, and then just for a few diagnoses. Five years ago, Medicare expanded coverage to all beneficiaries with "end-stage liver disease," with two exceptions: patients with liver cancer or with hepatitis B." This article explains why.
Tags: Medicare; federal health program; health care; hepatitis b; liver cancer; cancer; doctors; hospitals; treatment; sickness; medicine
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Making Mental Illness a Crime: For more Georgians, disorders mean time in jail, not treatment centers. I Hear Voices Sometimes, Crazy Stuff. Bibb County Jail Uses Outside Help to Treat Mentally Ill. Prisons: A costly answer to mental health care. Funding Problems Hamper Treatment of Mental Illness. Mental Illness History Comes Full Circle. Advocates Say System is Broken; Funding woes, short- staffing, deluge of paperwork strain state mental health workers. Breaking the Cycle: New programs may prevent jail time for mentally ill Georgians. Mandatory Treatment: Not an easy decision.
Georgia's jails are being filled not only with criminals but also with people suffering from mental illness. These articles explore this recent development and examine how it affects the prisoners, the institution, the state and the taxpayers. The article also discusses various kinds of mental illness and offers suggestions as to how a better system for dealing with it could be developed.
Tags: National Alliance for the Mentally Ill; NAMI; schizophrenia; manic depression
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Throwaway Kids: Broken Promises; Curse or Cure? Desperate Children, Haphazard Care; Where New York Lags, Milwaukee Succeeds
A Journal News investigation into New York's care system for mentally ill children exposes abuse and neglect. Some of the most needy children are sent to residential treatment centers, which "are costly to taxpayers, yet function without adequate standards of oversight and without a means to evaluate the effectiveness of the care." A major finding is that the facilities increasingly use psychotropic drugs to keep the kids under control. Instead of helping children improve their conditions and returning them to their communities -- as a model Wisconsin program has achieved -- the New York system is overhauled.
Tags: emotionally disturbed teenagers; crime; police; arrests; school; orphanages; Department of Social Services; juvenile justice
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In A Child's Best Interest
MSNBC reports on child welfare hearings in three Indiana juvenile courts. "Specifically, these hearings involve children who are the victims of abuse, neglect, or at-risk situations. The program focuses on one of the more desperate corners of modern life and penetrates the world of the juvenile justice system, which, by law, is closed to the public and media. Our cameras expose stories of sexual abuse and capture how the courts handle these young victims. We also reveal excruciating, personal experiences as children are placed in residential treatment facilities. Lastly, we document the incompetence of a state child welfare system that allowed a teenage girl to go through two-dozen foster homes during her 14 years in the system."
Tags: TAPE; TRANSCRIPT; Video; juvenile justice; FOIA; teenagers; foster children; abuse; neglect; sexual abuse; child welfare hearings; Indiana juvenile court; residential treatment facilities; state child welfare system
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Juvenile Justice
Tulsa World reports on how Oklahoma juvenile criminals are evaluated, treated and returned to society. The findings are based on public records, court databases and "unprecedented access to the juvenile court and treatment process," the authors report. One story describes a highly successful program, called STARS, for troubled youth. Another part of the series looks at the process of establishing a juvenile sex offender registry. Branstetter and Morgan conclude that " a brush with the law usually is enough to redirect a teenager in trouble."
Tags: CAR; crime; sex offenders; children; teenagers; probation; law enforcement; police; judges; prosecutors; drugs; alcohol abuse
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East Baton Rouge Parish Juvenile Drug Court Program
The Advocate reports on how federal grants have been recklessly spent by the East Baton Rouge Parish Juvenile Justice Court on high executive salaries. The stories reveal that the Straight and Narrow Drug Treatment Center, one of about 30 drug courts in the state, has failed to effectively supervise the drug-addicted children who graduated from the program. The investigation finds that the key players behind the faulty drug treatment programs - including two judges, an attorney and his roommate - are entangled in bizarre legal accusations of sexual harassment and racially motivated attacks.
Tags: courts; minorities; racial problems; drugs; federal funds; drug addicts; sexual harassment; public records; conflicts of interests
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Patients don't get full story on doctors
San Francisco Chronicle reports on the lack of information about malpractice verdicts on the website of the Medical Board of California. The story reveals that the public database omits records on doctors' misdemeanors, remedial actions (like drug and alcohol treatment programs), malpractice settlements, various lawsuits, complaints, detailed information on formal discipline, etc. Consumers are required to write the Medical Board for detailed information, and often wait for weeks to get a response. Wallack points to three high-dollar verdicts against negligent doctors, which were not included in the state board's database.
Tags: San Diego's Center for Public Interest Law; physicians; licensing; incompetence; negligence
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The Thirty Years' War
The New Yorker reports on the progress of our war on cancer, which has lasted more than thirty years. The question is whether we've been fighting cancer the right way. "If you had demanded that the N.I.H. solve the problem of polio not through independent research, but by means of a centrally directed program... you would get the very best iron lungs in the world... but you wouldn't get the vaccine that eradicated polio," the New Yorker quotes a former National Cancer Institute director. New discoveries are often touted as miracles without ever causing significant drops in mortality rates. Though knowledge about cancer has been increasing, the American mythology of cancer is running into the realities of federally run programs.
Tags: cancer; Richard Nixon; Citizens Committee For The Conquest of Cancer; National Cancer Institute; National Institutes For Health; STI-571; cancer treatments