Health Journalism 2014

$5.00 April 2014 Conference Call in Denver AHCJ’s 2014 Event United Past, Present and Future Page 10 Journos’ ACA Report Card Mixed Reviews for News Coverage about the Launch of Obamacare Page 16 No Stopping Nonprofi ts Non-Commercial Outlets Broaden While Struggling for Funds Page 22 Land of Dr. Oz America’s TV Doctor Has Healthful Words for His Colleagues End of Life Page 34 Covering a Daunting but Vital Subject a Challenge for Journalists Page 4 Pharmacist. Mom. Advocate. Never Uses Acronyms. Do you need a healthcare source who doesn’t require a decoder ring? Pharmacist Kathleen Jaeger knows patient care, and talks in terms that your audiences will find inviting. She is the National Association of Chain Drug Stores’ senior vice president of pharmacy care and patient advocacy. She is available for interviews about community pharmacy’s role in improving patient health and healthcare affordability – and she likely can help with any stories on your plate. For more clarity and less confusion on issues ranging from healthcare reform to accountable care organizations, please arrange an interview by contacting Chrissy Kopple at (703) 837-4266 or [email protected]. www.nacds.org 14np0005.pdf RunDate: 04/07/14 Full Page Color: 4/C FROM THE EDITOR e Beginning of the End e end of life is a tough reality on every level — for those experiencing it, those caring for someone who is, for those paying the medical bills or even those just contemplating ultimately facing it, as we all must. CONTENTS Reporting on the emotionally loaded controversies surrounding end-of-life issues is no less MORTALITY MATTERS ....................... 4 daunting. Our cover story takes a look at an infrequently covered but crucial topic that will End-of-Life is Becoming an Ever- grow exponentially in importance on the health-care beat as aging baby-boomers increasingly More-Important Beat face the deaths of their parents — and themselves — and the issue becomes more and more DOCUMENTING DEATH ...................... 8 politicized. HBO Films Continue Their Exploration On the other end of the coverage spectrum, the rollout of the Obama Administration’s of End-of-Life Issues A ordable Care Act dominated the headlines over the past year, challenging health-care DENVER DOINGS ............................... 10 reporters to ferret out the truly meaningful issues in the over-the-top battle between Time-Tripping at AHCJ’s “Healthcare Obamacare’s supporters and its detractors. Journalism 2014” Our report on ACA coverage found mixed reviews for the press, with some e orts praised REEFER MADNESS AT AHCJ ............ 14 for their astuteness and others blasted for disseminating utter misinformation and hype. Denver’s Legal Pot Drew Some Curious And, as our sidebar found, the preponderance of ACA coverage came at the expense of other Attendees Out to Shops important health-care developments, which were too often relegated to reduced space in less ACA REPORTS: MORE ‘C’ THAN ‘A’ ... 16 visible positions. Coverage of the Obamacare Rollout is e annual Association of Health Care Journalists conference held in Denver last month Rated a Mixed Bag proved a hit with most of the attendees we talked to, as our on-scene coverage reports, and PBS PULLS OUT THE STOPS ............ 19 its foray into the topic of legalization of marijuana in the host state made an for some Ken Burns’ Six-Hour “Cancer: The Emperor insightful — and often amusing — experiences and discussions. of All Maladies” is Being Readied for 2015 We’ve also got an examination of the state of the nonpro t news sector — one obvious IN SHINING ARMOR .......................... 21 example of success being Kaiser Health News, which we pro le separately — a look at the The Knight Foundation Gives $2.2 Million John S. and James L. Knight Foundation’s recent backing of a spate of data-driven projects, to Seven Data-Driven Projects and some pointers on the ever-more-necessary art of self-promotion for journalists. FINDING A WAY TO FLOURISH ......... 22 Finally, Dr. Mehmet Oz has some news for you in our Sign-O column: Journalists though Despite the Continual Struggle for Funding, you may be, you nonetheless are healers, too. Nonprofi t News Keeps Broadening SHARING THE NEWS ......................... 23 — Tom Gilbert, Editor Kaiser Health News and Its Partners Say They’ve Got a Good Thing Going ADVERTISING SALES BLOWING YOUR OWN HORN ............ 25 Ph: (212) 210-0748 Fax: (212) 210-0772 Self-promotion is Becoming as Important Executive Producer: to Journalists as Good Writing Skills Jeff Reisman, [email protected] (212) 210-0748 Producer: EDITORIAL OFFICES Danny Schreiber, [email protected] (503) 723-9688 AHCJ AWARD WINNERS ................... 27 Phone: (212) 210-0748 Fax: (212) 210-0772 Production Manager: Nicole Dionne A Look at 2013’s Best in Health-Care Publisher-Editorial Director: David S. Klein Journalism Circulation Manager: Nicole Chantharaj Editor: Tom Gilbert OVERSHADOWED BY OBAMACARE ... 32 Art Director: Elise Cozzi Other Important Health Topics Were Shunted Aside by ACA coverage NewsPro (ISSN 2151-1764), Volume 5, Issue 1, is published regularly at Crain Communications Inc., 685 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017. Periodical postage pending at New York, NY, and SIGN-OFF: DOCTOR’S ORDERS ......... 34 additional mailing of\ ces. POSTMASTER: send address changes to NewsPro, Circulation Dept., Dr. Mehmet Oz on the Importance of 1155 Gratiot Ave., Detroit, MI 48207-2912. Health-Care Communication NewsPro® is a registered trademark of Crain Communications Inc. Get to Know ACI TheJournalist’sSourceonCleaning, Hygiene&Health Get informed perspectivefromthe American Cleaning Institute® representingcleaning product makers and suppliers. Contactusyear-round: [email protected]•202-662-2517 • www.cleaninginstitute.org 1331LSt. NW, Suite 650 •Washington, DC 20005 April 2014 | NewsPro | 3 COVER STORY COURTESY OF HBO TO PHO GEORGE WILLIAM HALL (JACK HALL) FROM HBO’S “PRISON TERMINAL: THE LAST The Ultimate Beat DAYS OF PRIVATE JACK HALL” As Baby Boomers Age, Journalists Will Increasingly Have to Deal With End-of-Life Coverage By Elizabeth Jensen eviewing the 2013 Showtime documentary “Time of Death,” those two cases, ventilators were mischaracterized as “life support,” Time magazine critic James Poniewozik succinctly summed which they couldn’t be if the patient was already dead, and questions Rup the challenges surrounding end-of-life journalism: “How were raised as to whether “brain-dead” actually meant “dead.” do you recommend a TV series that’s well-made, thought-provoking, (Legally, it does, in all 50 states.) deeply moving — and that most of your readers, with good reason, Coverage around end-of-life issues is only going to become more will not want to watch?” urgent and the need for clarity more crucial. An aging baby-boomer End-of-life issues as an area of journalistic scrutiny come with population is grappling both with care for their parents, who are a seemingly guaranteed large audience: Everyone will die, someday. living longer, and confronting their own mortality more directly than But the subject gets surprisingly little attention, whether due to any other previous generation. worries that readers and viewers won’t tune in or read, or hesitance on Politicians, meanwhile, have forced end-of-life issues out of the the part of the journalist to plunge into emotionally draining terrain. realm of the personal and into the political arena on the front pages, e topic is a journalistic challenge: Subjects need to be coaxed and “that’s beginning to have an e ect on how people are thinking to share stories, often at a personally wrenching time. And when about decisions related to end-of-life,” said Mildred Z. Solomon, it hits the news — as it did this winter, in the high-pro le cases of president of e Hastings Center, a nonpartisan, nonpro t bioethics Jahi McMath and Marlise Munoz, two women who were being kept research institute, which sponsored several sessions exploring end- biologically functioning by technology despite being declared brain- of-life issues at the recent Association of Health Care Journalists dead — journalists run into confusing issues and terminology not annual conference. “It’s not a topic that needs to be polarized,” she easily understood or explained on deadline. In some press reports on added. “It’s a human issue.” 4 | April 2014 | NewsPro Nashville Public Television dealt with these challenges when last don’t get the death they say they want.” year it began a multi-year initiative, “Aging Matters.” e baby-boom e reporting found that conversations could help. e medical generation “has always done things di erently,” said Beth Curley, issues surrounding death are particularly complicated, Curley said; Nashville Public Television’s president and chief executive. For many “when a doctor says, ‘do boomers, as their parents started aging, questions of how to care for you want this or that,’” them “are becoming very visceral,” she said, and as the station looked oftentimes the patients ahead, questions arose about how prepared Nashville is for caring for and families “have no the boomers themselves when they get to that point. idea.” “What’s it going to mean personally, and as a community?” Curley “ ere’s a lot of said, to keep loved ones in their homes, meet housing, transportation research now that gives and medical needs and nd caregivers? clinical evidence that Because there was a local hospice with its own project in the some of the routine works, the rst focus for the multi-pronged undertaking turned out things we do near end to be the end-of-life issue; “NPT Reports: Aging Matters: End of of life don’t make sense, Life,” a national documentary tackling the roles of advance directives, but we continue to do palliative care and hospice, among other topics, begins airing on them,” said e Hastings public television stations nationwide this month.

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