Health

Neonatologist Erick Ridout, MD, has helped care for hundreds of preemies needing critical care. His work with other clinicians to reduce needle draws in preemies has significantly improved care and outcomes, while saving millions of dollars. He shares his published research with clinicians across the country. 

Jerry Harrop and Lowell Harrop are brothers who serve as volunteers at a Utah hospital. For many years, they—along with other pianists—have shared their musical talents playing beautiful music on the grand piano in the hospital lobby, bringing peace and joy to hospital patients and guests.

People and families who receive Medicaid-funded home and community-based service waivers can learn more about how a rule change will affect their services during a training event in Salt Lake City on Thursday. 

Auni, Caitlin and Dallin Naulu's first baby, was diagnosed with a terminal illness—spinal muscular atrophy (SMA). Over the next 14 months before Auni passed away, clinicians, family and friends helped Auni live the best life she could. She brought joy and sunshine to all. 

Surgeon Shane Lewis, MD, finds that listening to patients and learning more about who they are makes his work more effective and more satisfying. He and his wife, Dixie, share memories of one surgery patient, an 80-year-old Vietnam vet, who was worried about his wife at home alone. 

Some vaccines have been extremely successful. 

“If you want to see one of the greatest public health achievements ever, follow smallpox, and how we were able to eradicate it.”

Doctors in Cache Valley have a new tool to help them detect and diagnose breast cancer earlier in their patients - 3D mammography.

Monica Muncy is still emotional remembering when the car she was riding in hit Utah Highway Patrol Sergeant Cade Brenchley's vehicle on a slick road. Cade spent several days in the hospital with broken bones and a torn ACL, and recovered fully. 

Hiking in the Utah mountains, Casey Hunter slipped and fell down a steep snowy incline and boulder patch. With his leg hanging and patched together with a make-shift tourniquet, he crawled up the mountain, found the cell phone he had dropped in the fall, and called his wife, Amy. A Life Flight hoist team rescued him from the slope. 

Using newly released 2016 Center for Disease Control data, the insurance comparison company QuoteWizard surveyed which states had the highest skin cancer rates and Utah was number one for the most new cases. Adam Johnson was the survey’s research analyst.

Oncologist Lincoln Nadauld, MD, has a passion for Precision Genomics. He and colleague Tazia Taylor work in a Utah cancer center. Dr. Nadauld's vision: "In 10 years, I see us preventing cancers and identifying them much earlier. So instead of waiting until someone has a cancer, and then finding it on a CT scan, I could see us drawing blood on patients when they're in their 20s and 30s and 40s and detecting cancer before it's a problem."

Michelle Evans and Shannon Tripp, mother and daughter, found very different paths to the nursing careers they love. "Through everything, through the very rock bottom, you can still find gratitude and hope."

Utah County-based group Charity Vision is expanding operations in Haiti, supplying local doctors with resources to grow their practices. But working with Haitian local practices has an unusual struggle, as Doug Jackson, CharityVision's CEO and the son of its founder, explained.

When Peter Hammond was in end-stage liver failure and in dire need of a transplant, he was among the first patients in the nation to accept a healthy liver infected with hepatitis C and undergo a high-risk liver transplant. He was later cured of the disease.

Vaccine hesitancy is a growing phenomenon across the United States and in Utah in particular.  According to the Utah Department of Health, Utah ranks 41st among for the percentage of children who have received the complete set of recommended childhood vaccinations.

The original songs of Marty Nygaard, MD, a Utah pediatrician, have been making patients, doctors, and caregivers smile for more than two decades. Here, he and his wife, Louise, share memories and laughter.

In today’s booming economy, more and more employers are facing a shortage of workers; one that they might fill by reaching out to people with disabilities. But what about the cost of accommodations for workers with disabilities?

Caring for aging parents with Alzheimer's was both tender and trying for LuAnn Lundquist and Jenny Jones. LuAnn remembers her father-in-law saying, "My grandkids are out here in the forest, and it's snowing..." LuAnn replied, "I'll make campout beds, and I'll go find the kids." Her father-in-law was asleep in 30 seconds.

Four years and seven brain surgeries after a traumatic ATV accident, Britton Shipp is walking, driving, working and inspiring others. Sommer remembers the key milestone for her, “I just couldn't wait to hear the words, ‘I love you mom,’ again.”

We’ve heard a lot about the booming economy, and it’s true the employment rate has risen, for both people with and without disabilities. 

Still, the employment gap—that’s the difference in employment rates between typical employees and those with disabilities—is still wider than it was in 2008, when the Great Recession began, according to a study from the University of New Hampshire.

Where does Utah fit in all of this? We rank third in the nation for employment rates among people with disabilities, according to the same study.  Today, as part of the UPR original series Diagnosed, JoLynne Lyon speaks to an employer and a service provider. They have different jobs, but they both want employees with disabilities to thrive—and the companies that hire them to succeed, too.

Cindy Henry reminisces with her 91-year-old father, Jim Greer, about how his singing to her as a child added joy and peace to her life. As an imaging tech at a Utah hospital, Cindy now sings to young patients to help calm their fears.

Darrin Hawes and Keith Hambly are best friends and search and rescue volunteers in northern Utah. One Memorial Day, during a search and rescue mission, Darrin also helped save Keith’s life using CPR. When Keith’s heart started beating again, he underwent heart surgery and the placement of two stents that same day.

Dominic Moore, MD, is a pediatrician and the medical director of palliative care at a children’s hospital. Seeing his mother, Brenda Moore, juggle six kids while caring for her parents—both with cancer—motivated Dr. Moore to choose a career helping people with serious illness. 

Sean Talley’s role as a Shock-Trauma ICU nurse manager at a Utah hospital is both intense and rewarding. Sean says because he grew up in a rough part of Las Vegas, he can spot dangerous situations, and he finds joy in helping others.

Stein Rosqvist and his wife Michele Rosqvist talk about the life-altering night Stein was the sole survivor of a Life Flight helicopter crash. They discuss the events of that night, Stein’s recovery, and what their lives have been like since that night.