BRANSON, Mo. (AP) — A volunteer cleanup of Lake Taneycomo shoreline turned up nearly 4 tons of trash, including broken docks, tires and several fishing poles.
The volunteers swept over 10 miles of the shoreline on the lake near Branson in an annual cleanup effort. They worked between a park near Forsyth to near the Branson Lakeside RV Park.
Gopala Borchelt, executive director of Table Rock Lake Water Quality, says 4 tons of trash is significantly less than the effort has collected in the past. She says she believes people are becoming more aware of taking care of the lake.
The Springfield News-Leader reports the next major area cleanup will focus on the Table Rock Lake shoreline next April. It will be the 14th annual Table Rock Lake cleanup.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A nonpartisan report to Congress is raising new questions about a key provision of federal health care law: a compromise on abortion that allowed the legislation to pass in 2010.
The Government Accountability Office said in a report released late Monday that only 1 of 18 insurers it reviewed was separately itemizing a charge for coverage of elective abortions on enrollees’ bills.
The 2010 compromise that President Barack Obama sealed with conservative Democrats stipulated that no federal funds would be used to pay for elective abortions.
The GAO review did not address the fundamental issue of whether federal subsidies are being used for elective abortions, but abortion opponents said the findings underscore their view that the compromise is an accounting gimmick.
The administration says the policy may require additional clarification.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in an election-law case that could have big implications for GOP hopes of capturing control of the U.S. Senate in November.
The court will hear arguments Tuesday over whether Democrat Chad Taylor must stay on the ballot despite his announced exit from the race. Taylor threw the race into chaos when he announced he wanted to be taken off the ballot, without giving an explanation.
Taylor’s exit seemed to set up a clear two-person race between the three-term incumbent, Republican Pat Roberts, and wealthy independent Greg Orman, who many believe has a chance to unseat Roberts head to head.
Republicans say Taylor didn’t follow state law limiting when nominees can withdraw. Taylor took the case to the high court.
Even as we’re kicking off football season, we can all recognize that one area in which we shouldn’t just be tossing the ball back and forth is policy-making. Unfortunately, instead of putting the necessary policies into place to keep boosting jobs and businesses, some members of Congress have once against turned a traditionally nonpartisan issue into the next controversial political football.
As I traveled around Missouri in recent weeks, I saw signs of our country’s economic recovery everywhere. Businesses are thriving, companies are hiring, and construction is booming.
But we have more work to do. To keep us on this path to recovery, we’ve got to make sure we’re using every available resource at our disposal to continue boosting jobs and growing our businesses.
One of the most import tools in that toolkit is the Export-Import Bank, which helps Missouri businesses boost jobs and gives them a competitive edge to succeed internationally. This should be something that everyone, regardless of party, can get behind.
But, the Export-Import Bank has become the latest victim in an unfortunate trend of usually bipartisan efforts being turned into a political football by Tea Party Republicans.
Congress is scheduled to vote this week on whether to renew the charter of the Export-Import Bank, which is set to expire on September 30. In years past, this vote has been nonpartisan, and noncontroversial. In fact, former President Ronald Reagan once said that exports “create and sustain jobs for millions of American workers and contribute to the growth and strength of the United States economy. The Export-Import Bank contributes in a significant way to our nation’s export sales.”
But this year, it’s deeply disappointing that some extreme lawmakers are putting this vote in jeopardy.
These leaders should travel around their states as I did, listening to employees and meeting with executives at some of the 96 Missouri businesses that benefit from the Export-Import Bank. Nearly everyone at these companies agreed that the job-creating benefits the Export-Import Bank provides are critical to keeping their businesses strong and competitive, allowing them to succeed in the increasingly competitive global market.
Everywhere I went, folks told me the Export-Import Bank is one of the most important tools they have—helping them sell their goods and services to customers across the globe, and supports jobs for thousands of Missourians.
Export-Import Bank’s work is simple and incredibly valuable to American business. The Bank supports American jobs by helping to finance foreign sales of U.S. products through loan guarantees, direct loans, and credit insurance, all at no cost to taxpayers. The bank actually earns revenue for the Treasury, including more than $1 billion in 2013 alone. Since 2009, the Export-Import Bank has supported $188 billion in U.S. exports and 1.2 million American jobs. More than 3,400 small businesses rely on the bank to finance export deals
In Missouri, the Export-Import Bank has supported $1 billion in exports from 96 Missouri companies since 2007. And nearly 85 percent of businesses supported by the Export-Import Bank are small and medium-sized businesses.
Missouri’s businesses need this competitive edge to grow and thrive.
That’s why it’s critical that Congress take bipartisan action to renew the Export-Import Bank—and keep this valuable tool in the hands of Missouri businesses.
Claire McCaskill is the senior U.S. Senator from Missouri.
CHARLESTON (AP) — A Missouri man has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for threatening to bomb Charleston schools to distract police while he robbed an area bank.
A federal judge sentenced 26-year-old Deidrick Reed on Monday. He received eight years for the false bomb threat and seven years for using a firearm during a crime.
Prosecutors say Reed admitted to calling Charleston authorities in December and claiming there were bombs at the elementary, junior and senior high schools. They say Reed and an accomplice robbed the Citizens Bank of Charleston of nearly $30,000 while law enforcement responded to the bomb threats.
KANSAS CITY- A Kansas man was injured in an accident just after 9 p.m. on Monday in Wyandotte County.
The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 1999 Ford Escort driven by inner, Mark A. Winner, 44, Kansas City, was exiting onto Parallel from Interstate 435 and left the roadway for an unknown reason. The vehicle then struck a KDOT sign and came to rest in the ditch.
Winner was transported to Providence Medical Center.
The KHP reported he was properly restrained at the time of the accident.
PATONSBURG- A Missouri woman was injured in an accident just after 7 p.m. on Monday in Daviess County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 1991 Chevy S-10 driven by Jeremy S. Arnote, 19, Bethany was southbound on 168th Street one mile north of Pattonsburg. The driver lost control on the dirt road. The vehicle traveled off the road and struck a tree.
A passenger in the vehicle Chelsie E. Henson, 25, Pattonsburg, was taken to Harrison County Community Hospital. Arnote was not injured.
The MSHP reported Henson was not wearing a seat belt.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Some Kansas farmers have begun planting next year’s winter wheat while others are busy harvesting corn and sorghum.
The National Agricultural Statistics Service reported Monday that 5 percent of the state’s wheat crop is seeded. That’s about average for mid-September.
Corn harvest has progressed to the 18 percent mark but remains behind the average of 23 percent. Corn condition is rated as 16 percent poor to very poor, 29 percent fair, 42 percent good and 13 percent excellent.
About 2 percent of the Kansas sorghum crop has now been cut, about average for this time of year.
A cold front last week dropped temperatures across the state, with light frost reported in isolated areas of north-central and northwest Kansas.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — More than 1,000 students have transferred from two St. Louis area school districts that have been struggling to gain traditional state accreditation.
Missouri law requires unaccredited districts to pay for students wishing to transfer to other nearby schools.
Figures presented to the State Board of Education show that 768 students have transferred in the current school year from the Riverview Gardens district.
The Normandy district has had 321 students transfer out, but that number could rise because a court ruling recently cleared the way for additional students to leave. The Normandy district is being run by a state-appointed board.
Deputy state education commissioner Ron Lankford says Normandy could face financial troubles if it has to pay for more than 500 transfer students. The district has a total of about 3,700 students.
Becky Vande Kieft, eEmergency nurse manager at Phillips County Hospital, talks via the new telemedicine link with a nurse at Avera eEmergency.-Photo by Bryan Thompson
By Jim McLean
KHI News Service
PHILLIPSBURG — A new nurse was on duty a few weeks ago in the emergency room at the Phillips County Hospital when paramedics arrived with a critically injured patient.
She immediately pushed the red button on some newly installed equipment. Seconds later, a seasoned ER nurse and board-certified doctor sitting at a bank of monitors 380 miles away in Sioux Falls, S.D., were using a high-definition camera and other diagnostic equipment to monitor the patient, give advice and document everything the on-site nurse was doing to save the patient’s life.
“The (Phillipsburg) nurse who was on was brand-new and she was being overwhelmed,” said Michelle Peak, a more experienced nurse who hustled to the ER to help.
Peak said even after she arrived, having an off-site nurse wired in and taking care of the charting was a “huge help.”
“It put us all a little more at ease,” she said. “But the big thing was, we didn’t have to take our hands off the patient.” First in Kansas
The Phillipsburg hospital is the first in the state to sign up for a 24/7 telemedicine program operated by Avera Health, a Catholic health care system based in Sioux Falls. For a flat fee of about $65,000 a year, it and the other hospitals in the network can make unlimited use of the eEmergency system.
“We want people to use it when they need it,” said Darcy Litzen, sales director for Avera’s eCare suite of telemedicine services, which also include eICU and ePharmacy. “We don’t want them thinking that it’s going to cost them an additional $50 or $75 every time they hit the button.”
With the addition of Phillipsburg, 89 rural hospitals in eight states across the upper Midwest are now using eEmergency, Litzen said. Another 10 are expected to come online soon, including Horton Community Hospital in northeast Kansas.
“I’ve been a firm believer in telemedicine since it first started evolving in the early 1990s,” said James Noble, CEO of the Horton hospital.
Having emergency room physicians, nurses and other specialists available day and night at the touch of a button can help less experienced staff in rural settings be more decisive in situations where every second counts, Noble said.
“It just increases their level of confidence,” he said. “It’s real time. You’ve got your second opinion right there. And you’ve got that specialist who’s an immediate backup for the family practitioner on call.”
Having specialists in the room, even if it’s via a video monitor, can also give patients increased confidence that they’re getting the care they need, Noble said.
‘Scary to be there by yourself’
Dr. Donald Kosiak can sympathize with the Phillipsburg nurse who found herself overwhelmed. He’s been there. With a medical degree from the University of North Dakota and graduate training at the Mayo Clinic, he confidently set up practice in the same small North Dakota town where his father and grandfather had practiced.
“There’s probably nothing I’m going to see in this small town that would ever scare me,” Kosiak said he remembers thinking at the time.
He was wrong. The first time he was called to the ER it was to treat a 16-year-old boy who had collapsed at school after suffering cardiac arrest. Wanting help, Kosiak said he asked the ER staff about using the telemedicine equipment sitting in the corner to connect with a specialist.
“They said, “Well, we’d have to dust it off and plug it in and remember how to use it, and then we’d have to call up to Bismarck, and they would have to dust their equipment off and call somebody. After about an hour, we might be able to make this work,’” he said recalling what he was told.
Kosiak wasn’t able to save the boy’s life.
“I think we did all the right things looking back on it, but it’s scary to be there by yourself and be the last and only line of defense for anything that comes through the front door,” he said.
That experience motivated Kosiak to help develop the Avera eCare system, with funding provided by the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust.
Holding on to patients
Michelle Peak, a registered nurse, and other staff at Phillips County Hospital watch their new video link with Avera eEmergency.-photo Bryan Thompson
Backstopping onsite caregivers helps to provide them confidence to treat patients they otherwise would be inclined to transfer to bigger hospitals and trauma centers, said Noble, the Horton hospital chief executive.
“I will tell you that right now, 99 percent of the time we err on the side of caution and decide to transfer patients,” he said.
But Noble said he believes that will change once the hospital is wired into the eEmergency system. If the hospital is able to reduce the number of patients it transfers, it would generate additional revenue and allow patients, many of whom are elderly, to recover closer to family and friends, Noble said.
Since 2009, rural hospitals using Avera’s eEmergency service have treated approximately 2,000 patients who otherwise would have transferred to larger hospitals, said Mandy Bell, the company’s development director. Avoiding those transfers generated about $15.8 million in savings and additional revenue for the hospitals, she said.
But many patients can’t get the care they need in a rural emergency room, Bell said. When a critically injured, heart attack or stroke patient needs to be transferred, the eEmergnecy staff can help get it done quickly. While the onsite ER staff is caring for the patient, the Avera nurse can be on the phone with the ambulance service and the destination hospital coordinating the transfer.
“We’ve seen a remarkable reduction in time to transfer,” Bell said.
Research indicates that advanced telehealth systems like those offered by Avera have the potential to produce huge savings, mainly by reducing unnecessary transfers and transportation costs.
A 2007 report by the Center for Information Technology Leadership found that equipping all the emergency rooms in the United States with telehealth technology could reduce patient transfers by almost 40 percent and cut transportation costs by nearly $540 million. The estimated savings, the report said at the time, would be more than enough to cover the costs of installing the equipment.
There also is evidence that hospitals with telehealth systems have an easier time recruiting doctors and other providers, in part because it reduces the stress of being on call.
For those and other reasons, Dave Engel, chief executive of the Phillipsburg County Hospital, is sold on the idea.
“This is really what the future of health care will be,” he said, “using technology to embrace the larger team of providers and specialists to care for individuals.”
