NEW YORK (AP) — Lowe’s is testing whether robots can improve customer service in its stores.
The machines look like white columns with two large screens on either side of them. They have wheels that allow them move and are equipped with 3D cameras to scan and identify items.
Customers can research items they are looking for on the screens, and the robot can lead them to the aisle where an item is located.
The robots also have a database of the store’s inventory, so they can let customers know whether something is in stock.
The head of Lowes’ Innovation lab, Kyle Nel, says people can come in “with a random screw and say Mr. Robot, I need more of these,” and find it.
Lowe’s is testing four robots at its Orchard Supply Hardware store in San Jose, California.
Lowe’s has been working on infusing more technology into its customer service. It has also developed a “holoroom” that lets users see what different pieces of furniture look like in different rooms in a virtual-reality environment.
WEBB CITY, Mo. (AP) — Webb City officials plan to use a $3 million grant to buy land for a wetlands project designed to combat pollution runoff from former mines.
The southwest Missouri city recently received the grant from the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. The plan is to buy land along Center Creek to use as a 100-acre wetland. Another 1,200 acres would be used for wildlife habitat, walking trails and picnic areas.
The Joplin Globe reports Webb City leaders have been talking to federal and state regulators about ways to reduce heavy metal runoff from decades of lead and zinc mining.
Interim City Administrator Carl Francis says the wetlands would trap sediment, excess nutrients and pollutants that currently flow into Center Creek and then into Spring River.
LATHROP- Two Missouri women were injured in an accident just before 12-noon on Monday in Clinton County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 2000 Nissan Altima driven by Gregory N. Kemp, 43, Shawnee, KS., was northbound on U.S. 69 three miles east of Lathrop.
The vehicle failed to stop at a stop sign, traveled into the intersection and was hit by a 2005 Chevy Aveo driven by Elinka A. Carter, 60, Polo that was westbound on MO 116.
Carter was transported to North Kansas City Hospital.
A passenger in the Chevy Marie L. Justofin, 85, Polo, was transported to Liberty Hospital.
The MSHP reported all were properly restrained at the time of the accident.
WASHINGTON (AP) —For Americans wondering why President Barack Obama hasn’t forced all states to follow a single, national rule for isolating potential Ebola patients, the White House has a quick retort: Talk to the Founding Fathers.
A hodgepodge of state policies, some of which directly contradict Obama’s recommendations, has sowed confusion about what’s really needed to stop Ebola from spreading in the United States. While public health advocates denounce state quarantines as draconian and scientifically baseless, anxious citizens in non-quarantine states are asking whether they’re at greater risk because their governors and the president have adopted a lesser level of caution.
If public health departments across the country aren’t singing the same tune, that may be by design.
Although the Constitution empowers the federal government to isolate sick people entering the U.S. or traveling between states, it’s the states themselves that have the bulk of the authority to regulate public health in America — including the decision to enforce quarantines within their borders.
“I guess you can take that up with James Madison,” said White House spokesman Josh Earnest, referring to the fourth president and key drafter of the Constitution, when asked why there was no binding federal policy. That’s ironic, perhaps, coming from an administration Republicans are constantly accusing of exceeding its legal authority on everything from immigration and health care to foreign policy.
With states and localities having broad authority to impose quarantines themselves, Earnest said the federal government’s role was to “marshal scientific evidence” for best practices to stop Ebola’s spread. On Monday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did just that.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease at the National Institutes of Health, defended the Washington policy Tuesday, but said that states have a right “to go the extra mile” if they wish.
In an appearance on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Fauci declined to criticize the more stringent quarantine policies implemented in New York and New Jersey by Govs. Andrew Cuomo and Chris Christie. “I don’t want to use the word mistake,” he said. “They’re doing it in good faith.”
Christie said Tuesday he feels the CDC’s latest guidance is “incredibly confusing.”
“The CDC is behind on this,” he said on NBC’s “Today” show. “Governors ultimately have responsibility to protect the public health of people within their borders.”
Fauci, appearing on CNN, said the CDC guidelines are “based on the science, on what we know and how it’s transmitted. It’s a good matching, based on science, of the level of risk with the kind of monitoring the kind of restrictions. Based on scientific evidence as well as experience.”
“When you start getting the viral load that is enough to be able to be transmitted,” he said, “you’re feeling very, very poorly.”
For the first time, the CDC recommended 21 days of isolation and travel restrictions for people at highest risk for Ebola — a nurse stuck by a needle while treating an Ebola patient in Guinea, for example — even if they have no symptoms.
But the recommendations are just that: recommendations.
States are still free to go above and beyond the CDC guidelines. And if states were to opt to be more lenient, there’s next to nothing Obama could do to force their hand.
Case in point: An order issued Friday by New Jersey, like one in New York, requires three-week quarantines for anyone who treated Ebola patients in West Africa — not just those deemed high-risk because of a needle-stick or failure to use proper protective gear. But under the new federal guidelines, those lower-risk workers merely must have their temperatures monitored twice a day.
Legal experts say New York and New Jersey could be on shaky legal ground. To justify infringing on an individual’s civil liberties, like freedom of movement, states face a high bar to prove their orders are based on science and epidemiology. Courts also like to see that states are acting as narrowly as possible rather than in broad strokes, such as lumping together everyone who treated Ebola patients even if they’re healthy.
“We have not seen for decades and decades the state or federal government say a whole category is going to be subjected to quarantines,” said David Fidler, who teaches international and public health law at Indiana University.
In fact, such broad quarantines are almost unheard of in U.S. history. Almost always, they have been limited to diseases that are airborne and easy to catch. Public health experts say Ebola is neither.
When an influenza pandemic dubbed the “Spanish Flu” infected millions in 1918, major U.S. cities closed schools and imposed strict quarantines. New York considered quarantining tuberculosis patients in the 1990s, and isolated some who wouldn’t comply with treatment.
But as any school nurse can tell you, TB and the flu can be passed from person to person by sneezing or coughing, while Ebola requires direct contact with an infected person’s bodily fluids.
Obama and top federal officials have echoed aid groups like Doctors Without Borders in warning that mandatory quarantines will dissuade doctors and nurses from volunteering to fight Ebola in West Africa, therefore making it harder to stop the disease at its source.
But others warn of another risk to public confidence here at home: If Obama insists people without Ebola symptoms aren’t contagious while states are quarantining those same people, whom should people believe?
“What several of these governors are doing is giving very confusing and mixed messages to the public,” said Lawrence Gostin, who heads the national and global health law program at Georgetown University. “It’s an inherent problem in our federalist system. We are designed as 51-plus governments. They can speak with different voices.”
KANSAS CITY- A Missouri man was injured in an accident just after 8:30 p.m. on Monday in Wyandotte County.
The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2004 Ford F350 driven by Kenneth Dean Johnson, 66, Blue Springs, MO., was northbound on Interstate 635 at mile marker 8 in the right lane. For an unknown reason the truck left the roadway, went down an embankment and struck a KDOT fence.
Johnson was transported to St. Luke’s Hospital. The KHP reported he was properly restrained at the time of the accident.
Organizers of a health literacy summit in Kansas City, Mo., offered a range of published materials to attendees- photo by Mike Sherry
By Mike Sherry
Hale Center for Journalism
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As reformers work on making the U.S. health care system more efficient, they’re also looking to improve communication with consumers – whether it’s ensuring they understand the nuances of insurance or grasping instructions from a doctor.
The concept is known as “health literacy,” and the notion extends beyond the written or spoken word, Dan Reus, a St. Louis business consultant, argued Friday at a health literacy summit in downtown Kansas City, Mo.
People also need to understand the ever-increasing electronic data that make up their medical records, he said.
Reus used himself as an example by detailing his three-decade-plus struggle with ventricular tachycardia, a type of irregular heartbeat that in his case is tied to a protein that does not work properly in the heart muscle. Reus, who was diagnosed when he was 12, said it’s a condition that could lead to a fatal heart attack at any time.
As the years have gone by, though, his interactions with his providers have diminished even as health technology has improved. Today, he said, his understanding of his condition and the things he can do to control it are no better than they were when he was first diagnosed.
“Data does very little for me,” he said.
Bottom line, Reus said: Patients need actionable communication from their providers. For him, that means getting information on fitness and having all his specialists communicate with one another.
One of his projects is called Metronome, a software project “to assemble the least technology needed to synchronize the most health stakeholders,” as the website tellingly describes it.
Reus spoke at a two-day conference – the first time that health literacy organizations from Missouri and Kansas have combined to have such a gathering – that drew about 160 people.
Dr. Bridget McCandless, president and chief executive of the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City, one of the gathering’s sponsors, offered some lower-tech insights gleaned from running a free clinic in Independence, Mo.
McCandless said she had a telling moment when preparing her presentation and searching the Internet for examples of good post-surgical instructions. She found one that was straightforward with easy-to -understand graphics, only to realize that the instructions were for a dog.
In her experience, McCandless said, providers need to keep their instructions short and simple.
“Patients are going to forget 80 percent of what you said and 50 percent they are going to remember wrong,” she said.
If patients are bombarded with dozens of instructional items, she said, it’s likely they will be overwhelmed and do nothing.
McCandless said she always asked her patients to repeat her instructions.
She recounted how proud she was of an informational form that patients could fill out while waiting in the exam room. When patients didn’t fill it out, she asked one what the problem was.
She said, “Look lady, if I wanted to take a test, I would’ve stayed in school.”
Mike Sherry is a reporter for Heartland Health Monitor, a news collaboration focusing on health issues and their impact in Missouri and Kansas.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Jefferson City, Mo., man pleaded guilty in federal court today to the attempted sex trafficking of a child as the result of an undercover investigation in which he thought he was meeting a 12-year-old victim for illicit sex.
Jeremy Ryan Bappert, 30, of Jefferson City, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Matt J. Whitworth to the charge contained in a Nov. 7, 2013, federal indictment.
According to today’s plea agreement, a confidential informant received a text from Bappert and notified the Columbia, Mo., Police Department. Bappert asked the confidential informant to find a young girl, “around 9 to 11 years old,” and asked what $100 would get him. A police detective instructed the informant to send a response to Bappert that a person named “Julie” had a child available.
The police detective assumed the role of “Julie” and had a number of text conversations with Bappert. Bappert asked how old the child would be and said he was looking for “very young.” The undercover detective told Bappert that “Julie’s” daughter was 12 years old.
On July 19, 2013, Bappert sent a text to “Julie” seeking to arrange a meeting. He offered to pay $150 and provide a gram of hash in exchange for meeting at a hotel room in Jefferson City. Bappert, whose driver’s license was suspended, wasn’t able to find a ride on that day. He sent another text on July 24, 2013, saying that he had arranged a ride to Columbia but would have to pay $50 to the driver. He offered to pay “Julie” $100 but promised to pay $200 the next time. He also offered to bring “Julie” a gram of hash.
On July 25, 2013, Bappert agreed to meet at a restaurant in Columbia. When Bappert entered the restaurant, he was arrested. Investigators searched Bappert’s cell phone and recovered 246 images and six videos of child pornography.
Under federal statutes, Bappert is subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in federal prison without parole, up to life in federal prison without parole, plus a fine up to $250,000. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.
This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Lynn. It was investigated by the FBI, the Boone County, Mo., Sheriff’s Department and the Columbia, Mo., Police Department.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas man has been sentenced to nearly six years in federal prison for his role in a carjacking.
U.S. Attorney Barry Grissom says 29-year-old Shaun Kendall of Topeka pleaded guilty to one count of carjacking on Monday. He was sentenced to five years and 10 months in prison.
Authorities say Kendall and another man threatened the driver of a 1999 Dodge Dakota in January before stealing the truck.
The other man charged in the carjacking is scheduled to be in court in December.
POLO- Two men were injured in an accident just before 12-noon on Monday in Caldwell County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a Ford Taurus driven by Jonathan T. Shelton, 39, Polo, was westbound on southeast Soo Line Drive one mile east of Polo.
The vehicle went off the south side of roadway, struck an embankment and overturned several times, ejecting the driver.
Shelton and a passenger Tyler P. Feil, 18, Polo was transported to Liberty Hospital.
The MSHP reported they were not wearing seat belts.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A 2-foot-tall image of deer in multicolored neon with a bulls-eye on its tail is affixed to a wall in the Kansas City Royals locker room. It hangs between the stalls of Aaron Crow and Tim Collins, and has a “W” underneath a crown.
Pitcher James Shields ordered it custom made, and after wins veterans select a “King of the Game” to flip the switch that lights up the so-called “Texas Heart Shot” while a smoke machine perched atop a refrigerator fills the room with a fog more befitting a night club than a clubhouse.
Trailing 3-2 to the San Francisco Giants in the World Series, the Royals hope to light up that sign two more times this week. But if they do come back to win their first title in 29 years, it’s unlikely there will be time for their usual clubhouse ceremony given the champagne-fueled chaos.
“I doubt it. It’s going to be crazy around here if we win both games,” outfielder Lorenzo Cain said Monday.
Kansas City turns to a 23-year-old rookie to save its season, but not just any 23-year-old rookie: the hardest-throwing starting pitcher in the major leagues.
Yordano Ventura gets the ball Tuesday night with the Royals in the same position they were in in 1985 when they sent Charlie Leibrandt to the mound against St. Louis. Kansas City won 2-1 that night on pinch-hitter Dane Iorg’s two-run single in the ninth after a blown call by first base umpire Don Denkinger, and the Royals went on to blow out the Cardinals 11-0 a day later behind Bret Saberhagen for their only title.
In the 41 previous instances the World Series was 2-2 in the best-of-seven format, the Game 5 winner has taken the title 27 times. But eight of the last 10 teams to come home trailing 3-2 swept Games 6 and 7.
“We have a lot of confidence in Ventura. We have confidence that we will win every time he takes the mound,” Royals first baseman Eric Hosmer said. “We know we can do it. We’re a confident group. But we can’t do anything without winning Game 6. We’re excited to get back home, where we feed off the fans and that energy.”
Kansas City hopes to light up Jake Peavy along with the deer in a rematch of Game 2 starters.
Ventura, whose fastball averaged 98 mph this season, didn’t get a decision in the second game, allowing two runs and eight hits in 5 1-3 innings before Royals manager Ned Yost went to his hard-throwing HDH relief trio of Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Greg Holland in the 7-2 victory.
“His confidence is just staggering,” Yost said. “You walk in that clubhouse, and he looks you square in the eye with that glint that says: ‘I’m ready for this.'”
The 33-year-old Peavy took the loss, giving up four runs and six hits in five innings-plus. He is seeking his first World Series win — he didn’t get a decision for Boston in Game 3 last year — and is well aware he could get the victory in the clincher.
“I can’t imagine anything being any sweeter than that,” he said. “This is the start that you play your whole career wanting.”
This is the first World Series in which four of the first five games were decided by five runs or more. The second all-wild card World Series has followed the pattern of the first in 2002. The Giants won the opener on the road, lost the next two games and won two in a row to take a 3-2 lead. San Francisco opened a 5-0 lead in Game 6 at Anaheim but lost 6-5, and the Angels won Game 7 the following night.
Yost hopes history repeats and Ventura is energized by the Kauffman Stadium crowd.
“Trust me, if we’re in this position, I would much rather be here than there with our fans. I think home-field advantage is huge,” he said after the team arrived back home at about 4:30 a.m. “It’s going to be a lot funner going into Game 6 here than it would be in San Francisco, that’s for sure.”
The Giants spent the night at home, chartered with player families on the flight and reached Kansas City about 12½ hour later. With the shift to the AL ballpark, designated hitters return: Billy Butler for the Royals and Michael Morse for the Giants.
San Francisco’s Tim Hudson and Kansas City’s Jeremy Guthrie would be the likely Game 7 starters if the Series is extended to Wednesday. And lurking is Madison Bumgarner, who pitched a four-hit shutout to win Game 5 on Sunday. Bumgarner, 4-0 in Series play with a record-low 0.29 ERA, could come out of the bullpen on two days’ rest for what would be his first relief appearance since throwing two scoreless innings in Game 6 of the 2010 NL Championship Series.
He wouldn’t estimate how long he could go.
“I’m not a big pitch-count guy,” he said. “So as long as you keep getting outs and you feel good, you should stay out there.”
NEW YORK (AP) — Lowe’s is testing whether robots can improve customer service in its stores.
