Reporting Ethically on Children’s Physical and Mental Health

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:28:05 -0800

When I began interviewing 17-year-old “Cindy,” she was reading a mystery while answering my questions. Then she put the book down, took her baby pet python from around her boyfriend's neck, and placed it inside her bra to warm it up.

Snakes were not a focal point when I was considering the challenges of interviewing teenagers. I saw pretty quickly, though, that the pet python comforted Cindy. It may even have been a deal breaker for the interview if I had freaked out and ran out of the house.

Campaign Contributions and Health Reform

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 17:12:17 -0800

Follow the money. That simple phrase – though never uttered by Bob Woodward’s most famous source – has propelled countless reporters to dig deeply into all manner of news stories.

And nearly four decades after Woodward and Carl Bernstein tracked donations to President Nixon’s reelection committee, the ability to follow the money trail in politics remains a powerful tool for reporters regardless of their beats.

Health Reform: Where Do Journalists Go From Here?

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:05:47 -0800

Here's a recap of the latest developments on the health reform front, along with some helpful resources and story ideas for your community.

Tuberculosis in Silicon Valley

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 16:38:06 -0700

My odyssey into the world of tuberculosis began with a simple remark by a well-connected friend in the summer of 2007: "Have you heard that the county TB clinic is overwhelmed with cases?"

Health Effects of Climate Change

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 21:10:12 -0700

Late in the summer of 2007, residents of Castiglione di Cervia, Italy, began coming down with symptoms unusual for inhabitants of a small village in the plains of northern Italy. In the town of 2,000, more than 100 people were struck with a high fever, rashes, and crushing pain in their bones and joints - caused, doctors eventually discovered, by a tropical mosquito-borne infection called chikungunya.

Covering Alternative Medicine

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 14:20:29 -0700

As a veteran reporter whose first thought when approaching scientific, medical and health claims is to ask those behind the claims to "show me the evidence," I've long been cautious about many practices that fall under the rubric of "alternative medicine." It's especially easy to do that when you're based in a place like Southern California, legendary for self-styled healers and doctors working outside the medical mainstream.

Live Organ Donations

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 13:46:17 -0700

Probably every health reporter in the country has been asked at one time or another to write a story about live organ donors. Such stories have become a staple of newspaper front pages and TV newscasts. Even so, few reporters have questioned whether the obvious benefit for the recipient was worth the risk to the donor.

Writing about Eating Disorders

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:50:19 -0700

As a longtime newspaper editor and reporter, I loved conflict and irony. And when the story pitted a parent against a child — especially an apple falling far from the tree — it was even better. Everybody can either relate or feel superior.

Dental Disease

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:27:40 -0700

Debbie Crites had a secret.

When Crites visited the dental clinic in Fort Gay, West Virginia in the winter of 2007, her X-rays showed that two teeth were missing since the last time she visited. Her dentist, Dr. Dan Brody, was puzzled. What happened to the two teeth? he asked her. Did they fall out?

H1N1/Swine Flu: Useful Resources

Barbara Feder Ostrov — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 13:17:05 -0700

Although scientists and public health officials have long worried that an avian flu virus would spark the world's next influenza pandemic — and developed emergency plans for it — it is a mutated swine flu virus that has emerged as the bigger threat. The current swine flu outbreak, which appears to have originated in Mexico, is a worldwide pandemic as defined by the World Health Organization on June 11, 2009.