Andy Marso
Stories by Andy Marso
Doctors Caught In Middle As Travel Ban Intersects With Rural Recruitment
Dr. Saeedeh Salmanzadeh became a U.S. citizen at a naturalization ceremony in October 2015. When the presiding official asked if any of the new citizens wanted to speak, she was one of the first to raise her hand. By then Salmanzadeh had spent 15 years in America, after leaving her home in Iran where she…
Medicine By Monthly Fee Expanding In Kansas: Is KanCare Next?
Dr. Damon Heybrock’s office doesn’t look like a traditional medical clinic. Heybrock finished converting a two-story row house into a medical practice in September, putting exam tables in the bedrooms and a centrifuge for lab tests next to the kitchen sink. Original pieces by Kansas City artists cover the walls of the clinic in Westwood,…
Hospital Leader Challenges Brownback On Innovation, Medicaid Comments
The head of the Kansas Hospital Association is taking issue with comments made by Gov. Sam Brownback at a recent news conference. Asked about his continuing opposition to Medicaid expansion, Brownback downplayed the importance of the issue, telling reporters that innovation is more important to hospital finances than the billions of additional federal dollars that expansion would…
Deaf Kansans Request Medicaid Changes
It’s common knowledge that a child’s first years are critical for language development. But what if that child is deaf and has parents who don’t know sign language? Chriz Dally, a board member of the Kansas Association of the Deaf, posed that scenario last month at a meeting of state officials and members of the…
Federal Investigation of Kansas Medicaid Waiting Lists
A spokesman for the U.S. Department of Justice said Tuesday that the department is still investigating complaints about Medicaid waiting lists for disability services in Kansas. The services are daily living supports in home and community-based settings that people with disabilities would normally receive Medicaid coverage for if they were in assisted living facilities. In…
Rankings show Kansas up in child health, but down in child poverty
Kansas improved its ranking in child health but dropped in child poverty in the latest data released by a national nonprofit that advocates for children. The state retained its No. 15 overall ranking from the Annie E. Casey Foundation in its 2015 Kids Count survey published Tuesday. The latest information comes from 2013 and shows…
Kansas AG fights EPA water ruling
Fresh off a win in one multi-state lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt announced he will join another. Schmidt’s office said Tuesday morning he was joining attorneys general from eight other states in fighting the “Waters of the U.S.” rule intended to expand the scope of the Clean Water Act…
The $50 Million Budget Cuts in Kansas
Gov. Sam Brownback’s office will work to identify $50 million in budget cuts mandated by the Legislature for the upcoming fiscal year, although future restoration of those reductions could be constrained by automatic income tax cuts. Brownback addressed reporters Tuesday in a news conference recapping the historically long session that ended Friday. The governor acknowledged…
Health Advocates See Tobacco Tax Benefits Slipping
While health advocates cling to the possibility of Kansas lawmakers using a large tobacco tax increase to help solve the state budget crisis, Statehouse momentum is heading toward a much smaller increase — or none at all. Groups like the American Cancer Society, American Heart Association and the University of Kansas Cancer Center praised Gov….
Kansas Water Talk Slows to a Trickle
Securing Kansas’ water supply — once a hot topic of the legislative session — has faded into the background in Topeka amid pounding rains and a grinding budget crisis. Rep. Tom Sloan, a Republican from Lawrence, led weeks of hearings on water issuesearlier in the session as chairman of the House Vision 2020 Committee. But,...