General – Page 18 – AZ Dept. of Health Services Director's Blog

Here you will find topics ranging from current events that affect public health in Arizona to overall information about the Arizona Department of Health Services

Vital Records & Same Gender Marriage

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:27-07:00 October 27th, 2014|General|

By now I’m sure you’ve heard that Arizona began recognizing same gender marriages (as an outcome of a recent federal court case). The court decision will influence some of the things that we do in our Vital Records shop - mostly as we process of death certificates. Arizona law specifies the people that can get [...]

2014 AIDS Walk

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:27-07:00 October 24th, 2014|General|

HIV/AIDS affects or infects over 15,000 people in the state of Arizona. HIV has become a chronic disease, one that can be managed, which means most people are not dying of AIDS. However, there are still a lot of difficulties associated with being HIV positive. The prescriptions alone can be expensive and the side effects [...]

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Vaccines- Calling the Shots

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 23rd, 2014|General|

Every time a different disease surfaces in the news like MERS, Ebola or Enterovirus D 68, one of the first questions people ask is, “Is there a vaccine for it?” A new documentary created for NOVA on PBS – Vaccines – Calling the Shots recently outlined the history of vaccines and the possibility of vaccine-preventable diseases [...]

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Ebola Toolkits

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 20th, 2014|General|

One of the roles we play in any outbreak is making sure that our partners in the state have all the information they need to respond to a situation and be safe in that response. I’ve posted about our continuing education of those partners, but now we’ve created a one-page stop for partner. Our Ebola [...]

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Plague over the Centuries

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 15th, 2014|General|

Ring around the roseies, A pocket full of posies, Ashes, ashes! We all fall down! In 1348, London was 4 million strong, but within 2.5 years a third of those had “fallen down.” The streets were narrow and cramped, often piled ankle deep with human and animal waste. The putrid smell contaminated everything in the [...]

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New Draft Medical Marijuana Regulations Out for Public Comment

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 15th, 2014|General|

For the last few months we’ve been reviewing our medical marijuana rules to make changes to them in response to an Arizona Superior Court judge’s decision. In addition to the changes needed to comply with the Court’s ruling, also proposing other changes to the medical marijuana rules that affect qualifying patients, caregivers, and dispensaries that [...]

Help Your Health & Wallet

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 9th, 2014|General|

If you’re a “benefits eligible” state employee, you now have a new opportunity to improve your health and your wallet. This week Benefit Options Wellness launched a new health initiative called the Health Impact Program (HIP). It’s a point-based incentive program that encourages participation in a variety of wellness activities, while logging progress toward a [...]

Continuing Medical Education for PTSD Treatment

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:28-07:00 October 8th, 2014|General|

A few weeks ago I issued a Director’s Decision that will authorize the use of marijuana (under the AZ Medical Marijuana Act) for patients undergoing treatment for PTSD. Medical marijuana certifications will be valid only for palliative care (not treatment). I delayed the implementation date until January 1 to allow time for certifying physicians, dispensary [...]

Streamlined “Delayed Birth Certificates” for Native Americans

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:29-07:00 October 6th, 2014|General|

The vast majority of Arizonans are born in hospitals. Shortly after delivery the electronic paperwork to establish an Arizona birth certificate gets input and processed. Even babies delivered at home attended by a midwife (about 1% of Arizona births) have their birth certificate information captured and processed. Many years ago, especially in Arizona’s Indian Country, [...]

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Arizona Community Profiles Dashboard (Part II of IV)

By Will Humble| 2017-02-10T09:49:29-07:00 October 1st, 2014|General|

A couple weeks ago I wrote about our new Community Profiles Dashboards. They’re a huge leap forward for public health professionals, city planners, non-profit organizations, medical providers and anyone interested in health data. The data are arranged on the Dashboards - in state, county, and Primary Care Areas - to provide several options to compare and explore [...]

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ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES

Health and Wellness for All Arizonans

ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES

Health and Wellness for All Arizonans

ARIZONA DEPARTMENT
OF HEALTH SERVICES