HR 3699, the Research Works Act, has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives to undo progress made in increasing taxpayer access to research funded by our tax dollars.

Introduced by California’s Darrell Issa and New York’s Carolyn Maloney, the bill would prevent the government from requiring that papers resulting from taxpayer-funded research be deposited online for free access to those taxpayers. In other words, it’s meant to protect the income streams of publishers, even when that income is derived from publishing the results of research studies funded by the government, works that should logically belong in part to the U.S. people who paid for them.

Practically, if passed, this bill would reverse the huge strides made in recent years for taxpayer access to federally funded medical research. A few years ago, it became a requirement that papers reporting results from research funded by the federal National Institutes of Health be deposited online in PubMed Central for free access. Because a huge amount of U.S. medical research is NIH-funded, this has meant that many articles about research affecting the public’s healthcare have become freely available online to that public that paid for it.

This NIH Public Access Policy generously gave publishers a one-year grace period for each article, meaning that any person, library, researcher, or even state and federally-funded institutions needing access to the most current research findings would still have to pay the publisher for access to those articles.

This is apparently not enough of the pie for publishers, who have fought for years against such taxpayer access. The Association of American Publishers is lobbying hard for this restrictive new bill, claiming public access policies are unwarranted interference with the private sector. Not surprisingly, one of Rep. Maloney’s top donors is Reed Elsevier, an AAP member and perhaps the biggest publisher of medical research (with $1.6 billion in profit in 2010) through its Elsevier division.

Find your Representative and her/his contact information and send a message at https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml. Several societies (such as the American Medical Association and American Nurses Association) and university presses are also members of the AAP – if you’re a member of these organizations or affiliated with a university whose press belongs to the AAP, you might also contact them to express your opposition.

It’s not just scientists who should oppose this legislation – it’s patients, educators, librarians, providers, and caregivers – anyone who believes that when the government funds medical research ultimately for better knowledge about people’s bodies and how to treat them, those people should be able to access that information. Write your Rep today.

Some other useful posts I liked on this topic:

• Elsevier-funded NY Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney Wants to Deny Americans Access to Taxpayer Funded Research – Michael Eisen at It Is Not Junk
• Why Is Open-Internet Champion Darrell Issa Supporting an Attack on Open Science? – Rebecca Rosen at The Atlantic
• Raising the barriers: restricting access to scientific literature will hurt STEM education – Sandra Porter at Discovering Biology in a Digital World at ScienceBlogs
• The Research Works Act: asking the public to pay twice for scientific knowledge – Janet Stemwedel at Scientific American’s Doing Good Science
• Scientists, Fight For Access! – Kevin Zelnio at Scientific American’s EvoEcoLab
• Why does the University of California Press support reactionary legislation opposing public access to scientific research? – Michael Eisen at The Berkeley Blog
• Calling on Publishers to Resign from The Association of American Publishers Re Anti-Open Access Stance, and YHGTBFKM: Ecological Society of America letter regarding #OpenAccess is disturbing – Jonathan Eisen at The Tree of Life
• And for even more, check this roundup from John Dupuis of ScienceBlogs, Around the Web: Some posts on The Research Works Act (Updated!), at Confessions of a Science Librarian

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Government, Libraryland

The local newspaper is covering genetic tests for breast cancer, privacy, gene tests patents, cost, and the fears some people have about getting tested.

Iris Carmen at Jezebel has a piece, “The Fight For Abortion Access For Military Women,” that is really about barriers in the military that prevent women from reporting sexual assault, the institutional difficulties faced by women servicemembers who become pregnant, and their lack of access to abortion coverage and providers.

Via the CDC’s National Prevention Intervention Network (@cdcnpin)

Follow @CDCNPIN@CDCNPIN
CDC NPIN

#30years ago today, @CDCMMWR reported on 1st cases of what became known as #AIDS. http://ow.ly/59vq3

June 5, 2011 8:31 am via webReplyRetweetFavorite

The link in the tweet goes to the actual June 5, 1981 MMWR reporting 5 cases of Pneumocystis Pneumonia in Los Angeles. It’s sort of a punch in the gut to read the opening passage of the editorial note – where the MMWR tries to explain what might be going on – knowing what was coming, what these 5 cases were the canary for. Warning for reference to a “homosexual lifestyle.”

Editorial Note: Pneumocystis pneumonia in the United States is almost exclusively limited to severely immunosuppressed patients. The occurrence of pneumocystosis in these 5 previously healthy individuals without a clinically apparent underlying immunodeficiency is unusual. The fact that these patients were all homosexuals suggests an association between some aspect of a homosexual lifestyle or disease acquired through sexual contact and Pneumocystis pneumonia in this population.

Via a librarian attending the Biomedical Informatics course at Woods Hole (#bmispring2011), I learned about the Office of Research Integrity’s page of summaries of closed research misconduct investigations. The cases seem to consist primarily of researchers making up or faking data or figures.

Thought Catalog (with which I’m unfamiliar) has “Tale of an Abortion,” one woman’s story of her choice to have an abortion.

Some Indiana politicians voted to defund Planned Parenthood, which received federal Medicaid/Title X funding for non-abortion health care, like cancer screenings and contraception. In response, HHS sent the state a letter explaining that they could not “exclude qualified health care providers from providing services that are funded under the program because of a provider’s scope of practice.” In other words, you can’t keep somebody from providing Medicaid-funded care just because they also provide non-Medicaid-funded abortions. Apparently it’s going to court.

The Feminist Majority Foundation reports in their feminist daily news that Yale Faces Possible Fines for Failure to Report Sex Crimes.

People.com associate editor Janet Mock writes for Marie Claire about her life as a transgender woman. She also was interviewed for NPR’s Tell Me More; a couple of the commenters note the inappropriate headline given the piece, which used “transgender” as a noun.

Notes from Libraryland:
The Wall Street Journal has a commentary that shouts “you kids get offa my lawn” at current YA fiction, which is apparently too dystopian, depressing, dark, and dangerous for young folks. There’s been a pretty awesome outpouring in defense of (YA) books on Twitter, using the #yasaves hashtag, with many reporting how alone, uninformed, afraid, sheltered, isolated, etc. they would have been if not for YA fiction, which can particularly be a lifeline for people who find that they are different in some way.

Also? It’s pretty hilarious that alongside an article decrying dystopia, darkness, and destruction in current YA fiction, and looks approvingly at efforts to keep those bad, bad YA books out of the hands of kids, a recommended, apparently-officially-okay title is Fahrenheit 451. Excuse me while I step away for a giggle break.

Here’s a 1971 letter from Isaac Asimov to future patrons of a new library. The Troy, MI library in question is in danger of closing if local folks don’t vote this August to fund it.

Apparently there will soon be swag for the National Library of Medicine’s 175th anniversary. This appeals to a special type of library geek.

Via searching on the #yasaves topic, I found this list of YA book recommendations, and have added several of these to my to-read list. Worth checking out.

The title: It has been 95 degrees here for the last week. I’m still walking 2.5 miles outside every day and have a broken a/c at home. If this is May, I might have to move to Antarctica in August.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Adolescent Health, Cancer, Funny, Government, HIV/AIDS, Libraryland, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups, Pregnancy

This post is late because I was busy taking the bus to get here.*

I wrote several times in 2008 about the case of Juana Villegas, an immigrant in Nashville who was arrested as the result of a traffic stop and ultimately ended up shackled to a hospital bed during labor, separated from her newborn for two days without seeing him, and denied a breast pump or cream for lactating women. This past week, a federal judge ruled in her favor that the shackling during labor and after delivery violated her civil rights. I have a full post up at Our Bodies Our Blog on this topic.

I also have a full post up at the OBOS blog on the Skin Deep database, which provides info on the safety and ingredients of skin care and cosmetic products.

I spent the last few days at the IHA Health Literacy conference. I intend to post on this separately later, including a list of a lot of good resources I learned about, but Siobhan has a few things up at her place. One thing I need to think about is the level at which this blog is written, and whether it is useful and helpful to make some adjustments so posts are more readable for a wider audience, and whether there would be interest in that.

The National Resource Center on LGBT Aging, which I think I also found out about from Siobhan, has information and guidance for providers, patients, and organizations on a number of topics, including ageism, HIV and aging, housing, legal support, Medicare, homelessness, and more.

Jodi Jacobson at RH Reality Check (which has a new look) asks, “What does it mean to be pro-choice?“

NPR, on Morning Edition and Talk of the Nation, aired several pieces on the local Magdalene/Thistle Farms, a residential program in Nashville, TN for women who have experienced violence, sex work, and addiction, and a bath and body products enterprise through which the women work and earn money. You can buy from them online at http://store.thistlefarms.org/.

A question at Good: Why isn’t birth control getting better?

Relatedly, I talked briefly with a representative of the California Family Health Council at the health literacy conference, and was told that they are trying to promote some longer term methods of birth control. This is among their other work, which includes the development of patient education materials on contraception, violence, cancer prevention, pregnancy, STIs, and other sexual and reproductive health topics. I always kind of get the willies when people talk about “promoting” long term contraception, because of the problematic history of how it has been used to assert control over the reproduction of women of color and poor women – regardless of what may be good methods, ethics and intent from whoever is talking about it. I’ll have to contact them and find out what the motivation for this is and how they are approaching it, because I didn’t have time to follow up at the event. In the meantime, anybody familiar with this group?

In the comments at Aunt B’s place, the topic of “gender parties” comes up. I have an appeal to saucy bakers to incorporate the message, “Now you know the sex, not the gender” into the design of these ill-conceived “gender party” cakes.

Here in Tennessee, Stacey Campfield has been pushing his “don’t say ‘gay’” bill, which – despite an intro that talks generally about home being the appropriate place for discussions of sexuality – provides specifically that “no public elementary or middle school shall provide any instruction or material that discusses sexual orientation *other than heterosexuality*” – which is not at all the same as “teachers shouldn’t be discussing sexuality in schools at all.

I picked up a weekly paper in Orange County this week and noticed that Dan Savage mentioned the bill in his 5/4 column, pointing readers to wesaygay.com, a site ostensibly set up by a couple of teenagers opposing the bill and gathering petition signatures in opposition – it’s nice to see students being active in this way.

The bill passed the House committee and is scheduled for a full Senate vote on May 9, although it has been reported that the state Senate will not take it up this year.

The wonderful Rev. Chris Buice of Knoxville argues in a commentary on the bill that prohibiting teachers from discussing homosexuality in school hinders them in acting against bullying and prevents them from having many educational discussions related to current events and legislation.

Apparently this coming week is National Women’s Health Week.

From the FDA:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) today announced a joint effort to remove products from the market that make unproven claims to treat, cure, and prevent sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Among the products targeted in today’s action are Medavir, Herpaflor, Viruxo, C-Cure, and Never An Outbreak.

The Harper Collins controversy has escaped the boundaries of libraryland. tigtog at Hoyden notes it, and Andy’s change.org petition got sent out on a huge scale. Short version of the controversy – Harper Collins wants to make libraries buy new copies of ebooks after they’ve been read 26 times. You know, because libraries are rolling in money and typically discard books after 26 reads. *eyeroll* There’s a ton of writing on this in the library blogosphere, just google it with some combination of Harper Collins, libraries, 26, ebooks.

The Abortioneers are talking about the stigma of multiple abortion, and there is some really good discussion in the comments, including from those gently pushing back against the OP for certain attitudes expressed in the post.

The Utah AIDS Drug Assistance Program is closing to new applicants due to a funding shortfall; supporters of the program are encouraged to contact their state and federal legislators.

This week’s title: I was in a car accident a couple of weeks ago, car three in a five-car wreck. I’m fine, although I was a little rattled and had a seatbelt bruise for about a week. The car, which is older and was in a previous accident, is totaled. The spouse and I are planning to go without a car, at least for the next few months. Tips and strategies for doing so are welcome. Depending on my mood, the situation gets framed as “car free” or “carless.”

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Adolescent Health, Birth, Contraception, Drugs, Ethics, Government, HIV/AIDS, Infectious Diseases, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Libraryland, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups, Pregnancy, Sex & Sex Education, Women’s Health

This post is late because I was busy taking the bus to get here.*

I wrote several times in 2008 about the case of Juana Villegas, an immigrant in Nashville who was arrested as the result of a traffic stop and ultimately ended up shackled to a hospital bed during labor, separated from her newborn for two days without seeing him, and denied a breast pump or cream for lactating women. This past week, a federal judge ruled in her favor that the shackling during labor and after delivery violated her civil rights. I have a full post up at Our Bodies Our Blog on this topic.

I also have a full post up at the OBOS blog on the Skin Deep database, which provides info on the safety and ingredients of skin care and cosmetic products.

I spent the last few days at the IHA Health Literacy conference. I intend to post on this separately later, including a list of a lot of good resources I learned about, but Siobhan has a few things up at her place. One thing I need to think about is the level at which this blog is written, and whether it is useful and helpful to make some adjustments so posts are more readable for a wider audience, and whether there would be interest in that.

The National Resource Center on LGBT Aging, which I think I also found out about from Siobhan, has information and guidance for providers, patients, and organizations on a number of topics, including ageism, HIV and aging, housing, legal support, Medicare, homelessness, and more.

Jodi Jacobson at RH Reality Check (which has a new look) asks, “What does it mean to be pro-choice?“

NPR, on Morning Edition and Talk of the Nation, aired several pieces on the local Magdalene/Thistle Farms, a residential program in Nashville, TN for women who have experienced violence, sex work, and addiction, and a bath and body products enterprise through which the women work and earn money. You can buy from them online at http://store.thistlefarms.org/.

A question at Good: Why isn’t birth control getting better?

Relatedly, I talked briefly with a representative of the California Family Health Council at the health literacy conference, and was told that they are trying to promote some longer term methods of birth control. This is among their other work, which includes the development of patient education materials on contraception, violence, cancer prevention, pregnancy, STIs, and other sexual and reproductive health topics. I always kind of get the willies when people talk about “promoting” long term contraception, because of the problematic history of how it has been used to assert control over the reproduction of women of color and poor women – regardless of what may be good methods, ethics and intent from whoever is talking about it. I’ll have to contact them and find out what the motivation for this is and how they are approaching it, because I didn’t have time to follow up at the event. In the meantime, anybody familiar with this group?

In the comments at Aunt B’s place, the topic of “gender parties” comes up. I have an appeal to saucy bakers to incorporate the message, “Now you know the sex, not the gender” into the design of these ill-conceived “gender party” cakes.

Here in Tennessee, Stacey Campfield has been pushing his “don’t say ‘gay’” bill, which – despite an intro that talks generally about home being the appropriate place for discussions of sexuality – provides specifically that “no public elementary or middle school shall provide any instruction or material that discusses sexual orientation *other than heterosexuality*” – which is not at all the same as “teachers shouldn’t be discussing sexuality in schools at all.

I picked up a weekly paper in Orange County this week and noticed that Dan Savage mentioned the bill in his 5/4 column, pointing readers to wesaygay.com, a site ostensibly set up by a couple of teenagers opposing the bill and gathering petition signatures in opposition – it’s nice to see students being active in this way.

The bill passed the House committee and is scheduled for a full Senate vote on May 9, although it has been reported that the state Senate will not take it up this year.

The wonderful Rev. Chris Buice of Knoxville argues in a commentary on the bill that prohibiting teachers from discussing homosexuality in school hinders them in acting against bullying and prevents them from having many educational discussions related to current events and legislation.

Apparently this coming week is National Women’s Health Week.

From the FDA:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) today announced a joint effort to remove products from the market that make unproven claims to treat, cure, and prevent sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Among the products targeted in today’s action are Medavir, Herpaflor, Viruxo, C-Cure, and Never An Outbreak.

The Harper Collins controversy has escaped the boundaries of libraryland. tigtog at Hoyden notes it, and Andy’s change.org petition got sent out on a huge scale. Short version of the controversy – Harper Collins wants to make libraries buy new copies of ebooks after they’ve been read 26 times. You know, because libraries are rolling in money and typically discard books after 26 reads. *eyeroll* There’s a ton of writing on this in the library blogosphere, just google it with some combination of Harper Collins, libraries, 26, ebooks.

The Abortioneers are talking about the stigma of multiple abortion, and there is some really good discussion in the comments, including from those gently pushing back against the OP for certain attitudes expressed in the post.

The Utah AIDS Drug Assistance Program is closing to new applicants due to a funding shortfall; supporters of the program are encouraged to contact their state and federal legislators.

This week’s title: I was in a car accident a couple of weeks ago, car three in a five-car wreck. I’m fine, although I was a little rattled and had a seatbelt bruise for about a week. The car, which is older and was in a previous accident, is totaled. The spouse and I are planning to go without a car, at least for the next few months. Tips and strategies for doing so are welcome. Depending on my mood, the situation gets framed as “car free” or “carless.”

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Adolescent Health, Birth, Contraception, Drugs, Ethics, Government, HIV/AIDS, Infectious Diseases, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Libraryland, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups, Pregnancy, Sex & Sex Education, Women’s Health

Last week it was announced by Tennessee’s new Republican Governor, Bill Haslam, that three RVs have been bought to address joblessness in this state. From the announcement:

Governor Haslam and the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development today unveiled three vehicles designed to improve outcomes for those looking for work. Three “Career Coaches” were customized with 10 computer workstations with Internet access, printers, fax machines, and flat screen TV’s with SMART Board overlays to facilitate classroom instruction. The intent of these roving offices is to bring job matching and training to rural communities that have limited access to a Tennessee Career Center.

The vehicles will be based in Huntingdon, Nashville and Knoxville in order to cover all areas of the state. Each mobile unit will be staffed with three Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development employees who are trained in career counseling and unemployment benefits.

Those employees will do workshops on job search and interviewing skills, résumé preparation, administer GED Practice Tests, and the like.

In a long state with 95 counties, we are stationing mobile computer labs in RVs in *three* of them (two of which are urban), RVs which will then drive out to rural areas – and let’s remember that is not cheap – carrying equipment that is already on site in pretty much every county in the state, housed in public libraries.

Rather than buying the RVs, the gas required to drive three RVs all over the state, and inviting people to learn about job skills in the confines of said RVs (doesn’t that sound inviting?), the Governor could have elected to have Labor and Workforce Development employees drive smaller, regular cars – consuming less gas – to places where those computers and equipment already exist in more spacious environments with classrooms in place – our state’s many public libraries, already located in every county where these RVs will need to travel.

Some pretty nice efficiencies could have been realized, and they could have taken advantage of the computer skills training already in place in many if not most public libraries, at the same time connecting job seekers to a wealth of other educational resources (such as language learning and literacy resources). Some public libraries have already taken the initiative to provide job search, online application completion, and related training to library users – Haslam’s corps of experts could have supplemented that work by passing along knowledge for reuse, extending the utility of the programs beyond single visits. In some cases, it might have been necessary to provide additional equipment to a county’s public library – putting the money there instead of in fuel-guzzling RVs would have actually provided a benefit to those communities that would last beyond when the RV pulls out of town. Even with grant money funding the nearly $200,000 purchase cost of each RV, the ongoing and opportunity costs here are shameful.

Frankly, Governor Haslam should be embarrassed that somebody on his team didn’t already think of this. Public libraries and their staff could have done it better, for less money, in a way that would benefit residents of Tennessee for more time. Sure, an RV can go directly to the factory that’s shutting down and spend a day or a week there – but our public libraries are there every day in every county, providing the resources to make our communities smarter and stronger. Let’s support them, not the short-term Haslam gas-guzzling express.

[hat tip to newscoma, via twitter]

***************

Added: via a comment by Coble on B’s post, I learned that the idea for what we’re jokingly referring to as “Jobs Party Buses” came from former Governor Phil Bredesen (D). I don’t think that makes it any more sensible – Bredesen was short-sighted in suggesting it, and Haslam was short-sighted in not killing it. B addresses that aspect a bit in a comment over at Pith.

I also appreciated B’s hilarious response to Michael Silence, who suggested the TNDP had done a good job getting out talking points, and that’s what generated the posts.

Listen, I’m a lefty, super pro-choice, feminist. The TNDP has treated folks like me and B like we’re nonexistent in just about every election forever, and couldn’t get talking points out to people like us to blog on them on a non-Friday-afternoon if their lives depended on it. For my part, I never even saw that Ds had said anything about it until Silence himself linked to something, because I don’t really care about their half-hearted press statements that miss the real mistakes of the initiative. I care what they’re doing – and that is using resources in a way I don’t think is very smart or sustainable, as detailed above.

Filed under: Ethics, Government, Libraryland

The New England Journal of Medicine published a freely available Clinical Practice article, “Care of Transsexual Persons.” It covers hormones, surgery, and adolescents. Note that it does use the problematic gender identity “disorder” language as included in the DSM and it also promotes the standard psychological counseling hoops that transgender persons must jump through prior to obtaining treatment – Julia Serano‘s “Whipping Girl” provides a good primer on why those hoops can be problematic. It might be worth checking out what kinds of materials health care providers are seeing regarding these topics, including how they’re problematic.

Relatedly, there’s a possibility that “gender identity disorder” will be renamed “gender incongruence” in the DSM-V.

Laura Chapin at a US News politics blog asks why anti-choice extremism is so commonplace and continuous threats against providers are considered acceptable:

It’s the acceptance of a level of hatred directed at women, especially poor women, seeking reproductive healthcare and abortions. And it’s the acceptance of threats and violence directed at the doctors, staff, and healthcare workers trying to provide it to them.

The Boston Globe has a very brief story illustrating the problem of giving obesity too much focus and attention when diagnosing a patient.

In The Crocodile Tears of Anti-Choice Billboarders, Gaylon Alcarez outlines the failures and disingenuousness of anti-choice billboards targeting Black women. Just read it.

Relatedly, NARAL and SisterSong have partnered to fight such billboards in Texas.

The CDC notes April as STD Awareness Month (can we get that changed to STI?), including some resources for providers and for finding testing.

Studies presented at meetings always have the caveat that they need to be peer-reviewed and have the methods and data published in order for the public to fully review and understand them. However, I wanted to note this recent news item:

New Orleans residents were found to have three times the rate of heart attacks four years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina than before the storm and levee break that flooded the city, according to a study presented at a major heart meeting on Sunday.

I’ll be interested to see the paper when published; the news item focuses on psychiatric illness, stress, and employment, but I wonder how much people with more financial resources leaving the area and access to care generally play a role.

Via TransTalk, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Recommended Actions to Improve the Health and Well-Being of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Communities, which includes a summary of actions taken and recommendations for future actions. What do you think? Will this make a difference? Have they focused the right way?

The Institute of Medicine released a new report, The Health of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People: Building a Foundation for Better Understanding. It’s freely available if you read the PDF online; I haven’t read it yet, so I can’t vouch for how truly inclusive or useful it is.

Note to self: don’t ever move to the Dakotas. Most recently, North Dakota approved abstinence-only sex education.

A worthy rant from tigtog at Hoyden: Don’t mistake expressing contempt for taking offense.

Via Siobhan (who I’ll get to see at a health literacy conference in May – yay!) at BHIC, HHS Launches New Consumer-Focused Immunization Website. The new site is vaccines.gov.

Shameless Self-Promotion: at work, we’re posting staff profiles to our Facebook page leading up to an open house event; here’s mine. I’d appreciate if any personal comments were left here or on my own Facebook page instead of there.

Unrelated to health, except for the insurance aspect: an employer of 500+ people in my hometown is closing. The employees (largely hourly, relatively low wage) of this furniture factory were called together and basically told that – in addition to the upcoming closing – their health insurance was ending effective immediately. If that doesn’t illustrate a major problem with employer-based insurance, I don’t know what does. The county already has an unemployment rate over 10% so I expect those folks will have a hard time finding work; the company had been in town for more than 70 years.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Events & Observances, Heart Health, Infectious Diseases, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Libraryland, News Round-Ups, Sex & Sex Education, Shameless Self-Promotion, Web Resources

Assorted items of interest collected over the last week or so; as usual, the Sunday round-up is more socially than medically oriented, this week with several items on transgender women and related rights, issues, and prejudices as I’ve been trying to read more about these topics.

Scientific American has an excerpt from a new book, Demand Better! Revive Our Broken Health Care System. It’s a pretty clear explanation of how little doctors apply the best, most current evidence to medical treatment, and might be pretty shocking for folks who are not involved in evidence-based medicine issues. For example:

Even though clinical guidelines exist…physicians get it right about 55 percent of the time across all medical conditions. In other words, patients receive recommended care only about 55 percent of the time, on average…. How well physicians did for any particular condition varied substantially, ranging from about 79 percent of recommended care delivered for early-stage cataracts to about 11 percent of recommended care for alcohol dependence. Physicians prescribe the recommended medication about 69 percent of the time, follow appropriate lab-testing recommendations about 62 percent of the time and follow appropriate surgical guidelines 57 percent of the time. Physicians adhere to recommended care guidelines 23 percent of the time for hip fracture, 25 percent of the time for atrial fibrillation, 39 percent for community-acquired pneumonia, 41 percent for urinary-tract infection and 45 percent for diabetes mellitus.

Friends and family members who I encourage to question your physicians, to find out more, to not accept decisions based on simple authority? See above.

Renee at Womanist Musings calls out Bitch magazine for their focus on middle class white women in an article on “mommy bloggers” and their inclusion of women of color only as (literal) footnotes in the piece. She points out that in general women of color are not thought of when people thing of “mommy bloggers” and “mommies,” and that white women who blog on these topics are much more likely to receive recognition, book deals and other rewards – and it’s not because they’re just inherently better writers or more experienced moms.

Apparently some obstetricians in Tennessee are upset about a plan to have the state’s Medicaid program reimburse cesareans at the same rate as vaginal deliveries, in part to influence physicians to do fewer cesareans that are not medically indicated.

One physician interviewed tries to make a claim that physicians have to do more cesareans now because physicians are doing more cesareans…making a distinction between elective procedures and elective procedures done so physicians can avoid risks without working patients into that equation:

“It is very true that the rate of cesarean deliveries is increasing, but it is not increasing just because of convenience. It is increasing because of the repeat cesarean deliveries that occur…Many doctors now don’t want to face the liability of doing a vaginal birth after a cesarean section.”

Some repeat cesareans are obviously going to be medically indicated, but repeat after me: physician’s desire to avoid potential legal liability /= medical indication.

Becoming Johanna — A Trans Youth’s Story (VIDEO) – video focuses on an adolescent transgender Latina kid Johanna whose mother committed her to a mental hospital in order to prevent her from transitioning. A trailer is available; they’re part of a larger project.

Guest Post: Transmisogyny is Misogyny Against All Women at Transarchism. Includes discussion of what a woman’s body “should” have in order to be considered “woman” by other people:

What the hell does a woman’s body possess that makes it a woman’s body? What does it NEED to have to be female. Did you immediately think of breasts, ovaries, vaginas? Gross. Think about that for more than two minutes and you’ll see why it’s gross. Still don’t get it? Well then go down to the nearest breast cancer walk and tell every single woman with a double mastectomy she’s not a woman. When you’re done with that, go down to your local hospital, ask the nurse where the OR is, and wait outside until you can find a woman fresh out of her hysterectomy surgery, and tell her the news. Yeah, that sounds evil, doesn’t it? Well it’s basically what you’re doing when you’re policing trans women’s bodies. You’re telling all women what they have to have on/in their bodies to be a woman. Which, obviously, is totally gross.

Monica at TransGriot notes that while white feminists called out George Lopez for his body size-related remarks on Kirstie Alley, they were silent about transphobic comments directed at woman of color Wendy Williams. You don’t have to be a fan of any of those three to note the difference in handling.

The blogger at Lollygagging and Lassitude reacts to the reaction to the misogynistic, ableist, and ageist nonsense of Scott Adams of Dilbert by talking to feminists about picking targets – “But do not forget there are women who will die for reasons that have nothing to do with Scott Adams’ words” – including trans women. I have noted my dislike of “shouldn’t you be focused on more important things?” arguments in the past, and they are often cited as a derailing tactic when employed by external parties. In this case, though, it’s worth talking amongst ourselves about whether there are systemic privileges that focus what we talk about as feminists – nobody’s saying we shouldn’t talk about Scott Adams, I think the author is saying that we can talk about Scott Adams but we need to also remember not to use all of our fighting energy on people like him.

Audacia Ray explains that “You” probably couldn’t be arrested in New York City under provisions that allow condoms to be counted as evidence of sex work, that “Policies like this one exist solely to uphold the ability of police to harass people of color, poor people, and often trans women who are profiled as being sex workers or nabbed for ‘walking while trans.’”

Queerty has a bit on challenging the New York City requirement that trans men and women have genital surgery in order to change their birth certificate.

TransTalk points to the “Two Spirits” documentary to be aired by Independent Lens (PBS) in June. The website for the film is at http://twospirits.org/.

Rep. Henry Waxman demands answers from Ther-Rx about Makena – There’s a drug meant to help prevent preterm birth that was approved by the FDA as an “orphan drug” at which point the company that got the approval hiked the price from about $10-$20 a dose to $1500/dose. There is also commentary on the March of Dimes’s response, and a call to boycott Makena in favor cheaper compounded preparations.

AARP has a piece on inaccuracies in translated drug labels, citing a study (I haven’t read yet) that “Fifty percent of all prescription labels translated from English to Spanish are wrong or incomplete.”

The FDA may start regulating mobile medical software/apps.

Women’s eNews has a bit on maternal deaths in New York City.

Ron Paul introduced the Sanctity of Life Act for 2011 (HR 1096), which would define human life and personhood “from the moment of conception.” I hardly need to get into the fetus>woman, miscarriage, detectability of non-implanted fertilized eggs, and gross misogyny issues, right?

Some things from libraryland:
We need to work together to save the Statistical Abstract of the United States.

And the Nashville Public Library is compiling a digital history of our May flood.

For emergency responders, WISER has been updated – it’s “a system designed to assist first responders in hazardous material incidents” from the National Library of Medicine.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Birth, Drugs, Ethics, Government, Libraryland, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups, Pregnancy, Women’s Health

This a topic that bears further discussion later, but I wanted to share this analogy I came up with after talking to a friend who experienced hostility when asking her doctor about information found online. I posted it to Facebook a while ago, but wanted to put it here where I will be able to find it again, too.

Warning patients away from “the internet” because some sources are bad is like telling patients to avoid all medications because some/most would be inappropriate or dangerous for that patient. Both miss opportunities to educate, collaborate, and improve care.

People – including patients! – use the internet. Period. It’s my opinion that doctors and nurses who immediately scoff at any mention of the internet – rather than appreciating the wide web of information, good, bad, helpful, worthless, dangerous, and in between – are more interested in being gatekeepers and authority figures than in helping patients understand their conditions and get good care.

I feel like there’s a teenagers/sex metaphor in here, too. Blanket prohibitions and authoritarian grandstanding do nothing but put a wall between people and what they need to know to be safe.

I would love to hear your experiences with health care providers and their attitudes toward information in the comments.

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

This a topic that bears further discussion later, but I wanted to share this analogy I came up with after talking to a friend who experienced hostility when asking her doctor about information found online. I posted it to Facebook a while ago, but wanted to put it here where I will be able to find it again, too.

Warning patients away from “the internet” because some sources are bad is like telling patients to avoid all medications because some/most would be inappropriate or dangerous for that patient. Both miss opportunities to educate, collaborate, and improve care.

People – including patients! – use the internet. Period. It’s my opinion that doctors and nurses who immediately scoff at any mention of the internet – rather than appreciating the wide web of information, good, bad, helpful, worthless, dangerous, and in between – are more interested in being gatekeepers and authority figures than in helping patients understand their conditions and get good care.

I feel like there’s a teenagers/sex metaphor in here, too. Blanket prohibitions and authoritarian grandstanding do nothing but put a wall between people and what they need to know to be safe.

I would love to hear your experiences with health care providers and their attitudes toward information in the comments.

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

This a topic that bears further discussion later, but I wanted to share this analogy I came up with after talking to a friend who experienced hostility when asking her doctor about information found online. I posted it to Facebook a while ago, but wanted to put it here where I will be able to find it again, too.

Warning patients away from “the internet” because some sources are bad is like telling patients to avoid all medications because some/most would be inappropriate or dangerous for that patient. Both miss opportunities to educate, collaborate, and improve care.

People – including patients! – use the internet. Period. It’s my opinion that doctors and nurses who immediately scoff at any mention of the internet – rather than appreciating the wide web of information, good, bad, helpful, worthless, dangerous, and in between – are more interested in being gatekeepers and authority figures than in helping patients understand their conditions and get good care.

I feel like there’s a teenagers/sex metaphor in here, too. Blanket prohibitions and authoritarian grandstanding do nothing but put a wall between people and what they need to know to be safe.

I would love to hear your experiences with health care providers and their attitudes toward information in the comments.

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

This a topic that bears further discussion later, but I wanted to share this analogy I came up with after talking to a friend who experienced hostility when asking her doctor about information found online. I posted it to Facebook a while ago, but wanted to put it here where I will be able to find it again, too.

Warning patients away from “the internet” because some sources are bad is like telling patients to avoid all medications because some/most would be inappropriate or dangerous for that patient. Both miss opportunities to educate, collaborate, and improve care.

People – including patients! – use the internet. Period. It’s my opinion that doctors and nurses who immediately scoff at any mention of the internet – rather than appreciating the wide web of information, good, bad, helpful, worthless, dangerous, and in between – are more interested in being gatekeepers and authority figures than in helping patients understand their conditions and get good care.

I feel like there’s a teenagers/sex metaphor in here, too. Blanket prohibitions and authoritarian grandstanding do nothing but put a wall between people and what they need to know to be safe.

I would love to hear your experiences with health care providers and their attitudes toward information in the comments.

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

A bit of what I’ve been reading this week, when I haven’t been outside getting a mild sunburn. In February.

Via fellow librarian Bobbie Newman, I learned of this piece, “The Hazards of Leading Culture Change” (click on the download link for the PDF). It’s kind of oriented toward businesses/organizations instead of movements/activism, but there were a few points I thought were relevant:

“When you are up to your backside in alligators,” goes the oft-quoted line, “it is hard to remember you were there to drain the swamp.” Organizations under pressure are fraught with alligators-those seemingly never ceasing crises that keep leaders up at night. But, if all the energy goes into simply fighting alligators, there will always be alligators. Culture change is about focusing on source, not symptom—cause, not contest.

the illusion of advancement is far worse than none at all

Three turtles sat on a log in the edge of the swamp. One decided to jump in. How many are now on the log? Nope, there are still three. Deciding and doing are not the same thing.

Culture change is hard work and requires enormous patience. Many leaders are by nature impatient people who think results can be produced with the snap of a finger and completed by the end of the week. Culture change takes a long time because it is complex and disruptive. Culture change involves unlearning old habits and acquiring new ways of thinking and behaving.

Lunapads has a couple of suggestions For the Bookworm On Her Period.

The New Black Woman asks, Why are white feminists silent on Limbaugh’s attacks on FLOTUS? Apparently Limbaugh criticized what Michelle Obama was eating on a trip (while completely misrepresenting her nutrition message, of course), and basically called her fat, saying she “does not project the image of women that you might see on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.”

Honestly, I don’t pay any attention to Limbaugh. His comments are clearly problematic because, at the very least, they misrepresent her message (hello, healthy eating does not mean you never ever eat anything unhealthy – it means awareness, better choices most of the time, and balance – not “roots and tree bark” as Limbaugh suggested), they put him in the position of policing what she eats and looks like, and they hold up an unreasonable (and not even real; Limbaugh, meet photoshop) standard and call it “healthy.” They basically say, “if she’s not an object of sexual desire in my estimation, her opinions aren’t valid.” And that, my friends, is utter bullshit.

Renee at Womanist Musings has more on this issue, and writes:

There is nothing about her physical body that needs to change, and the fact that she isn’t willing to starve herself, or engage in harmful eating practices to attain a figure that is unnatural for her, sends a positive message to young girls and more specifically young girls of colour, that they are fine they way they are.

I have to say, too, that I’ve also been troubled by the comments that are basically, “Limbaugh’s fat, so he can’t say anything.” No, if Michelle Obama were saying everybody should try to eat better and she was eating ribs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day, Limbaugh could say something. No matter his size, no matter how much we might dislike him. But that is not the case. I don’t think the way to respond to body size policing is with more body size policing. Let me be 100% clear that this is not in any way to defend Limbaugh. I think his comments were crap. But I think that if people are going to respond to his crap comments, the way to do it is to criticize the substance, not to attack another body. It just sounds like some version of “so’s your mom” – and doesn’t get us anywhere.

Also on body image, Marianne at The Rotund has this to say:

“Real women have curves” was a marketing slogan thought up to sell people overpriced, ill-fitting pants. It does NOT promote body positivity – it only perpetuates body policing by turning the tables on people who don’t fit into yet another arbitrary ideal.

The job is to BUST THE FUCKING PARADIGM APART, not shift it a little bit toward the fat side. The job is to remind people, bodies are not public property and your opinion about an individual’s body is only an opinion, not a valid judgment of their worth as a human being. The JOB is to destroy systemic oppression of nonconforming, rebellious bodies no matter what those bodies look like.

Trans woman Tyra Trent was found murdered in Baltimore, reminding us once again of the violence trans women and men are too often subjected to. The Baltimore Sun covered the story, but included several quotes from Trent’s family members calling her “he,” and a cousin used the word “flaunt.” Tyra was also called a “sex worker” in the piece, while the same piece notes she had not been arrested since 2008. Argh. Other coverage, were it exists, is no better.

The Vanderbilt Medical School is hosting its annual LGBT health week this year from March 14-19. Overall it looks more LG than T, although Friday’s “Case Presentations in Adolescent Hormonal Therapy” might be relevant to trans health (no additional description is available at the moment – here’s the site).

I don’t think there’s a chance in hell this Georgia bill will hold up, but here it is. HB 1 would make “prenatal murder” illegal/a felony. It excludes “naturally occurring expulsion of a fetus known medically as a ‘spontaneous abortion’ and popularly as a ‘miscarriage’ so long as there is no human involvement whatsoever in the causation of such event.” Most miscarriages are unexplainable and so it would be impossible to prove that there was absolutely no human involvement in it. There is a lot of scientific debate about what may or may not increase a woman’s risk of miscarriage, so that’s a huge potential can of worms that could criminalize the smallest of everyday choices, not only abortion. Aside from which, there is necessarily human involvement, given that a fetus resides *inside* another human! It also defines a fetus as a person from “the moment of conception” (nevermind that at conception, it’s not a fetus. biology, whatever!). Amie and Jill at RHRC have more.

I haven’t watched them yet so I can’t say anything about them, but Dr. Nicholas Fogelson (Academic ob/gyn) has provided video of a recent talk he did on delayed cord clamping.

Next time I wonder why people call out online feminism for ageism, I’m going to remind myself that somebody who is 32 said she should pull back in order to make sure there was “a place for younger feminists to build their careers and platforms.” Okay, then. Kathy at Her Five Dollar Radio brings this up and asks “what you do “graduate” to when you feel you’ve aged out of the feminist blogosphere?” Over 30 as “old” is a huge problem; so’s the focus on “careers and platforms” instead of social change.

Things to learn more about: “The Native Women’s Association of Canada reports that 582 indigenous women and girls have disappeared or were murdered over the last five years.” For a U.S. update, the Seattle Weekly points to a new federal task force set up to address violence against native women. Here’s the press release from the Justice Department.

The New York Times has an editorial on recent abortion and family planning-focused legislation, The War on Women.

From libraryland, library folks are talking this week about Harper Collins’s completely absurd approach to ebooks.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Birth, Body Image & Eating Disorders, Government, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups

A bit of what I’ve been reading this week, when I haven’t been outside getting a mild sunburn. In February.

Via fellow librarian Bobbie Newman, I learned of this piece, “The Hazards of Leading Culture Change” (click on the download link for the PDF). It’s kind of oriented toward businesses/organizations instead of movements/activism, but there were a few points I thought were relevant:

“When you are up to your backside in alligators,” goes the oft-quoted line, “it is hard to remember you were there to drain the swamp.” Organizations under pressure are fraught with alligators-those seemingly never ceasing crises that keep leaders up at night. But, if all the energy goes into simply fighting alligators, there will always be alligators. Culture change is about focusing on source, not symptom—cause, not contest.

the illusion of advancement is far worse than none at all

Three turtles sat on a log in the edge of the swamp. One decided to jump in. How many are now on the log? Nope, there are still three. Deciding and doing are not the same thing.

Culture change is hard work and requires enormous patience. Many leaders are by nature impatient people who think results can be produced with the snap of a finger and completed by the end of the week. Culture change takes a long time because it is complex and disruptive. Culture change involves unlearning old habits and acquiring new ways of thinking and behaving.

Lunapads has a couple of suggestions For the Bookworm On Her Period.

The New Black Woman asks, Why are white feminists silent on Limbaugh’s attacks on FLOTUS? Apparently Limbaugh criticized what Michelle Obama was eating on a trip (while completely misrepresenting her nutrition message, of course), and basically called her fat, saying she “does not project the image of women that you might see on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.”

Honestly, I don’t pay any attention to Limbaugh. His comments are clearly problematic because, at the very least, they misrepresent her message (hello, healthy eating does not mean you never ever eat anything unhealthy – it means awareness, better choices most of the time, and balance – not “roots and tree bark” as Limbaugh suggested), they put him in the position of policing what she eats and looks like, and they hold up an unreasonable (and not even real; Limbaugh, meet photoshop) standard and call it “healthy.” They basically say, “if she’s not an object of sexual desire in my estimation, her opinions aren’t valid.” And that, my friends, is utter bullshit.

Renee at Womanist Musings has more on this issue, and writes:

There is nothing about her physical body that needs to change, and the fact that she isn’t willing to starve herself, or engage in harmful eating practices to attain a figure that is unnatural for her, sends a positive message to young girls and more specifically young girls of colour, that they are fine they way they are.

I have to say, too, that I’ve also been troubled by the comments that are basically, “Limbaugh’s fat, so he can’t say anything.” No, if Michelle Obama were saying everybody should try to eat better and she was eating ribs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day, Limbaugh could say something. No matter his size, no matter how much we might dislike him. But that is not the case. I don’t think the way to respond to body size policing is with more body size policing. Let me be 100% clear that this is not in any way to defend Limbaugh. I think his comments were crap. But I think that if people are going to respond to his crap comments, the way to do it is to criticize the substance, not to attack another body. It just sounds like some version of “so’s your mom” – and doesn’t get us anywhere.

Also on body image, Marianne at The Rotund has this to say:

“Real women have curves” was a marketing slogan thought up to sell people overpriced, ill-fitting pants. It does NOT promote body positivity – it only perpetuates body policing by turning the tables on people who don’t fit into yet another arbitrary ideal.

The job is to BUST THE FUCKING PARADIGM APART, not shift it a little bit toward the fat side. The job is to remind people, bodies are not public property and your opinion about an individual’s body is only an opinion, not a valid judgment of their worth as a human being. The JOB is to destroy systemic oppression of nonconforming, rebellious bodies no matter what those bodies look like.

Trans woman Tyra Trent was found murdered in Baltimore, reminding us once again of the violence trans women and men are too often subjected to. The Baltimore Sun covered the story, but included several quotes from Trent’s family members calling her “he,” and a cousin used the word “flaunt.” Tyra was also called a “sex worker” in the piece, while the same piece notes she had not been arrested since 2008. Argh. Other coverage, were it exists, is no better.

The Vanderbilt Medical School is hosting its annual LGBT health week this year from March 14-19. Overall it looks more LG than T, although Friday’s “Case Presentations in Adolescent Hormonal Therapy” might be relevant to trans health (no additional description is available at the moment – here’s the site).

I don’t think there’s a chance in hell this Georgia bill will hold up, but here it is. HB 1 would make “prenatal murder” illegal/a felony. It excludes “naturally occurring expulsion of a fetus known medically as a ‘spontaneous abortion’ and popularly as a ‘miscarriage’ so long as there is no human involvement whatsoever in the causation of such event.” Most miscarriages are unexplainable and so it would be impossible to prove that there was absolutely no human involvement in it. There is a lot of scientific debate about what may or may not increase a woman’s risk of miscarriage, so that’s a huge potential can of worms that could criminalize the smallest of everyday choices, not only abortion. Aside from which, there is necessarily human involvement, given that a fetus resides *inside* another human! It also defines a fetus as a person from “the moment of conception” (nevermind that at conception, it’s not a fetus. biology, whatever!). Amie and Jill at RHRC have more.

I haven’t watched them yet so I can’t say anything about them, but Dr. Nicholas Fogelson (Academic ob/gyn) has provided video of a recent talk he did on delayed cord clamping.

Next time I wonder why people call out online feminism for ageism, I’m going to remind myself that somebody who is 32 said she should pull back in order to make sure there was “a place for younger feminists to build their careers and platforms.” Okay, then. Kathy at Her Five Dollar Radio brings this up and asks “what you do “graduate” to when you feel you’ve aged out of the feminist blogosphere?” Over 30 as “old” is a huge problem; so’s the focus on “careers and platforms” instead of social change.

Things to learn more about: “The Native Women’s Association of Canada reports that 582 indigenous women and girls have disappeared or were murdered over the last five years.” For a U.S. update, the Seattle Weekly points to a new federal task force set up to address violence against native women. Here’s the press release from the Justice Department.

The New York Times has an editorial on recent abortion and family planning-focused legislation, The War on Women.

From libraryland, library folks are talking this week about Harper Collins’s completely absurd approach to ebooks.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Birth, Body Image & Eating Disorders, Government, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups

Via Siobhan, a project intended to train volunteer interpreters to provide services to survivors of torture, trauma, and sexual abuse.

Lyon-Martin Health Services in San Francisco, which serves a lot of people of color, gay and lesbian and transgender people, is raising money to try to stay open.

Vivir Latino is going to be tweeting on Monday from a media breakfast hosted by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America and Latina Magazine, on issues and inequalities in reproductive health care affecting Latinas.

I’m not terribly familiar with abortion laws in Mexico, but the Latin American and Caribbean Women’s Health network reports on the case of a woman apparently sentenced to a 23-year jail term for murder/abortion for what she states was a miscarriage.

The Ovarian Cancer National Alliance has news on Medicare coverage of Avastin for ovarian cancer.

Pamela Merritt at RH Reality Check has a great commentary about racist anti-choice billboards.

Also at RHRC, Tiffany Campbell writes about a disturbing bill in South Dakota to require women seeking abortions to first visit a crisis pregnancy center that pretty explicitly promotes an anti-abortion agenda to hear about other options and to ensure the woman is not being coerced (which reputable abortion providers already do). I don’t know what would prevent CPCs from just stalling on that required appointment until a woman was no longer gestationally eligible for abortion. The bill is HB 1217 in South Dakota.

Reuters on the pay gap between male and female doctors, *even though* women *are* choosing high-paying specialties.

Trans Talk has info on an upcoming National Transgender Health Summit.

The FDA approved a drug to prevent preterm births. News here, FDA release here.

The Disability Compendium with 2010 stats has been released, covering employment, poverty, disparities, health care coverage, and other data.

At AlterNet, 11 Women Found Murdered in Albuquerque Desert — Why Was This Not Treated As a National Tragedy?

I’m not going to provide the whole background on the Penny Arcade/Dickwolves controversy. To catch up, the best timeline/resources is at The Pratfall of Penny Arcade – a Timeline. Be warned that the materials will involve discussions of rape and rape culture, the hostility of gamer culture to women and assault survivors, and a near-fatal overdose of “you don’t have a sufficient sense of humor” and “let me explain it to you as though you hadn’t considered this….” It has included some pretty vile comments directed at rape survivors. Melissa at Shakesville depressingly points out why the whole thing was always going to go down the way it did, once it started. Unfortunately, I think there’s a lot of truth to that.

There was also a lot of controversy this week over Bitch magazine’s feminist YA booklist, including criticism of how Bitch responded to calls for books to be removed from the list and how the list was created in the first place. Someone in the comments points out that they could have referred folks to the Amelia Bloomer project list, an annual booklist of feminist works for young readers. The Amelia Bloomer folks have clear criteria you can evaluate, with information on the plot of each recommended title and its recommended age group. Sexual assault/rape is a factor in the discussions on the Bitch post, too; it also includes some interesting discussion of how people should act if they’re going to make booklists and refer to themselves as a “library.”

And so this seems like the natural place to link to this thing B has us mulling over, the conversations on feminist blogs, how often the leaders of those conversations fail, and how we should respond to that on an ongoing basis.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Birth, Cancer, Drugs, Global Issues, Laws, Legislation, & Courts, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

“Library Day in the Life” is an annual event in which librarians use Twitter, blog posts, and other avenues to share a bit about their daily work. It’s rather misnamed, as it has now become a week-long observance, but the idea is to better share the variety of services provided by and activities performed by librarians. This week was the 6th observance of LDitL, hence the #libday6 hashtag you may have seen on Twitter this week.

My own #libday6 tweets, in reverse chronological order, and with some notes in brackets:

rachel_w: Yes, you can have food in (certain areas of) this library – someone right now has a loaf of bread & jar of PB, is chowing down. #libday6

rachel_w: Earlier in wk: added items to MLA gov’t relations committee blog, participated in intern’s training verification, project planning #libday6

rachel_w: Talking to biomedical researchers this morning about library tools and services, then some web updates, and more EPC lit search #libday6
[the talk included NIH public access compliance, chat help through Meebo, our installation of the PolyMeta search tool and embedded PubMed search tool, finding e-resources, making online training requests, genetics/biochem assistance, and more]

rachel_w: getting data from ClinicalTrials.gov into Word table I have to use all the time would be so much easier w/ an @EndNoteBlog filter #libday6
[I asked an EndNote rep about please, please! adding a ClinicalTrials.gov filter at MLA last May. We still don't have one. I will keep trying.]

rachel_w: heard from science2.0 online group that important website was down, whois no help, found cached version for info & contacted them. #libday6
[this was the PRISMA Statement site; they responded promptly, and the site is back up]

rachel_w: Today: prepping for Fri talk to researchers on lib resources/services, more work on AHRQ EPC topic triage lit searching. #libday6
[the talk went well - had good audience questions and let people know about many library services that I don't think they knew how to fully take advantage of]

rachel_w: Yesterday: attended staff CE session where we worked w/ entrez gene, pharmGKB, PubMed & dbSNP to find gene, associated drug effects #libday6
[welcome to the new medical librarianship]

rachel_w: Came in early for great meeting with certified diabetes educators #libday6

rachel_w: Feedback given to one trainee on a learning exercise, still wading through sources for review of a screening/treatment topic #libday6
[can't really talk about this last one yet, but it *is* a women's health topic]

rachel_w: now to continue on topic triage work for AHRQ EPC systematic review topic, seeing what lit already exists #libday6

rachel_w: also sent poster made by @knilob for new patient health info service up the chain for approval #libday6
[one of the last things before we launch a new service]

rachel_w: So far: reviewed new colleague’s search strategy work; outlined friday talk to researchers on new library site/resources/services #libday6

Of course, there is more that I was up to in my medical library this week than I chose to or am able to share, but I think you can get the idea. Some things I also did and can share were to attend emergency medicine’s weekly case conference (I’m their librarian at present), provided a trainee with some feedback on her search strategies, met with other trainees about their progress on their learning plans (we have very structured staff training to make sure everybody gets to the same baseline), took some surveys to help inform a colleague’s research, and updated some of our web content on copyright and starting points for funding sources.

Like many other librarians, I also spent at least a minute delighting in this post by Wil Wheaton, “librarians are awesome.”

For a look at what other librarians are up to, check out this list of #libday6 participants and #libday6-tagged tweets.

Filed under: Events & Observances, Health, Libraryland

I don’t often blog about hyper-local issues that aren’t completely focused on health or reproductive rights, but this story brought to my attention via B’s blog is an important one, I think, for people who care about how government is run and appropriate funding of important and necessary services.

The Nashville City Paper reports that a former government employee has essentially been asked to work a part-time, made-up position in the Nashville’s Department of Finance, for an estimated $60,000 a year. The Finance Director is quoted in the article saying things that make it explicitly clear that this was not an existing job opening, one with clearly defined responsibilities and needed qualifications, that other people were able to compete for.

“We’ll assign him projects as they arise on a case basis.” Because they were “just talking” (hello, good ole boy network), and thought he could help.

You know who actually knows what they’re supposed to do and could use more money? Who would just love to have somebody around to do whatever needed doing, or at least the $60,000 a year?

The Nashville Public Library.

Or the Metro Department of Health.

Or schools, or any number of other departments with real missions to help real people. Real services that people of Nashville need and deserve, in departments that struggle to do everything that needs doing with the limited-and-being-cut funds available.

The Finance Director who is bringing this guy on asked other Metro departments this week to look at a 3% budget cuts. $60,000 a year might be a drop in the bucket compared to 3% of the budget of Metro departments, but it’s the principle of the thing. When a man who is who is buddies with a lot of other men in government – and who is already getting a pension from that government – can get a part time job paying $60,000 a year to do whatever while vital services are being asked to make cuts, something is seriously wrong.

I don’t blame the guy who’s being offered so much money to do who-knows-what – he might be a great guy, and it probably sounds like a pretty good deal to him. I do blame Metro Finance Director Rich Riebeling, and of course Mayor Karl Dean, who should really put a stop to this. Even if the reporting on this is not the full story, it’s unconscionable to me that somebody could be offered a job that was made up, that nobody else got to apply for, that might pay $60,000/year for whatever, when other vital departments are being asked to make cuts. It’s an insult to people like the public librarians who try to make every dollar stretch to meet the growing needs of the community. Mayor Dean, make it stop.

Filed under: Access, Rights, & Choice, Ethics, Government, Health, Libraryland, Miscellaneous

My favorite books for 2010, consisting of books I *read* this year – most of these were not *published* in 2010. Links are to WorldCat records so you can find a copy in your local library.

First, the relevant-to-the-blog titles, loosely defined as encompassing health, feminism, science, sexuality, and the like:

Willing and Unable: Doctors’ Constraints in Abortion Care, by Lori Freedman – This book explores the issue of healthcare professionals who are trained to provide abortion and not opposed to the practice — the willing — but who for various personal and structural reasons are unable to do so. This is a thought-provoking work, and I recommend it for all pro-choice activists and advocates. My full review is here.

Dispatches from the Abortion Wars: The Costs of Fanaticism to Doctors, Patients, and the Rest of Us, by Carol Joffe – Stories and information about the effects of anti-choice activism and legislation on women and abortion providers.

Nobody Passes: Rejecting the Rules of Gender and Conformity, by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore – I really liked this book, a collection of essays on passing, gender, race, and identity. Some of the essays are better than others, but the whole book is worth a read for an interesting meditation on dominant narratives, the ways in which so many individuals don’t perfectly fit our assumptions about who/what people are, and how we create and convey our identities along the way.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot – This book, published in 2010, is on pretty much everybody’s year-end list of the best non-fiction. The author explores the case of Henrietta Lacks, whose cells were collected and distributed for research without the knowledge or consent of Lacks or her family, raisin issues of medical/research ethics, race, consent, and more. A brief overview of a talk I attended by Skloot is here.

Ties That Bind: Familial Homophobia and Its Consequences, by Sarah Schulman – This is not my absolute favorite Sarah Schulman book, but I think it’s well worth a read for people contemplating how their own families perpetuate homophobia and how their own actions can either suppress or encourage homophobia.

My Own Country: A Doctor’s Story, by Abraham Verghese – This non-fiction work explores the experiences of a physician in east Tennessee in the early days of AIDS, and the effects of homophobia, rural life, and fear.

Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Graphic Novels:
(which I read a lot of this year)
The Walking Dead, by Robert Kirkman – I’ve read 10 volumes of this zombie apocalypse title – it’s grim, tragic, and fantastic. I haven’t read it with any critical eye on issues of sex, sexuality, race, or other social issues, except to note that the one character who expresses a same-sex desire is viewed by the recipient of her affections as weird and misguided, and is repeatedly portrayed as somewhat mentally unhinged and unwilling to accept that someone might not alter their own sexuality to suit her. There is also an incredibly brutal series of rape scenes in one of the volumes which I think could be problematic for many readers – I don’t want to spoil it here, but ask in the comments and I’ll tell you which volume it is.

Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, by Scott McCloud – This is a great instructive work on reading and appreciating comics, a description that doesn’t quite do it justice. I highly recommend it for comics readers and those interested in general art appreciation and improving their skills at seeing.

Warbreaker, by Brandon Sanderson – Fiction work by the author selected to finish out the Wheel of Time series. I also liked Sanderson’s Alcatraz vs. the Knights of Crystallia (third in the series in which protagonist Alcatraz battles evil librarians) and Elantris, but couldn’t really get into Way of Kings. I also found the first half of Alcatraz vs. the Shattered Lens just plain annoying, but the second half was enjoyable.

Maus, by Art Spiegelman – Yes, I just got around to reading this. If you are just starting on graphic novels, this Holocaust tale is a classic.

Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card – I really loved this book as pure sci-fi entertainment, but the story suffers if you look too closely at key assumptions of the plot. I’ve been told by a reader I respect that things go downhill from here – I made it through Ender’s Shadow (a parallel story from Bean’s perspective) before flipping through a couple of other related titles and deciding to just stop here.

A City of Ghosts, by Betsy Phillips – This book of new Nashville-centric ghost stories is a wonderful read from the writer at Tiny Cat Pants, and an excellent choice for ghost story read-alouds. My full review is here.

Robot Dreams, by Isaac Asimov – I just finished this books of short stories, and really enjoyed almost every story in the book. One of them includes a brief description of a medical library, which I have excerpted here.

Everything is Miscellaneous:
B is for Beer, by Tom Robbins – Some people didn’t really like this book, but I found it just perfect, from concept to cover to content. It’s described as a children’s book for grown-ups, or a grown-up book (about beer) for children, and really succeeded at copying the style of writing in children’s reading instruction books while incorporating humor about beer and drinking. It’s a quick read, and one of my favorite Robbins works.

A few other good reads from the year:
Night, by Elie Wiesel
Hear Me Out: True Stories of Teens Educating and Confronting Homophobia, from Planned Parenthood of Toronto
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, by Max Brooks
Infections and Inequalities: The Modern Plagues, by Paul Farmer
Say Everything: How Blogging Began, What It’s Becoming, and Why It Matters, by Scott Rosenberg
Cutting for Stone, by Abraham Verghese
Black Like Us: A Century of Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual African American Fiction, edited by Devon Carbado, Dwight McBride, Donald Weise, and Evelyn White
The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times of Harvey Milk, by Randy Shilts
Rubyfruit Jungle, by Rita Mae Brown
Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, by Allison Bechdel

I keep up with the books I’m reading and want to read on a continuous basis at Goodreads, and would love to get recommendations for things to read in the coming year.

Filed under: Libraryland, Miscellaneous, Reviews

First things first: the Senate voted on Saturday to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. Hurray! The roll call vote for all of the Senators is here, reflecting the 65 votes for repeal and 35 votes against. The votes for repeal came almost exclusively from Democrats, with just eight Republicans voting yes. My own Senators, Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander, were unsurprisingly among the Republicans who voted against repeal; I’m disappointed in them for voting their party and their prejudice to be on the wrong side of history, the wrong side of human rights and dignity.

The repeal will not become active for at least 60 days; HRC has a Pathway to Final Repeal document [PDF] that explains the necessary next steps, and warns service members about the interim:

The Human Rights Campaign issues this critical warning to service members: Repeal of DADT is not effective immediately and service members are still at risk of being discharged on the basis of their sexual orientation until certification occurs and 60 days have passed.

Also, as @polerin was clearly pointing out yesterday, the repeal of DADT does not protect trans service members, and passage of ENDA is still needed to protect trans workers everywhere. Trans Talk has a copy of a statement on this issue from the Transgender American Veterans Association.

Of course, the Senate also failed to pass the DREAM Act, which would have provided some avenues to education and citizenship for young immigrants brought here as children. I keep reading the “DREAM Act defeated” headlines as “DREAM Act deferred…”

In other news, Kate Harding has a completely amazing post, Some Shit I’m Sick of Hearing Regarding Rape and Assange. You really just need to read it if you have heard the commentary that Wikileaks’ Assange *just* didn’t use a condom, are tired of that commentary, or don’t yet understand what’s so problematic about that line of Assange defense. It’s a crash course in recognizing and combating rape apology.

Relatedly, Sady of Tiger Beatdown has had some internet drama related to Michael Moore’s reaction to the Assange situation and his minimizing comments related to the rape accusations – Sady has been demanding that rape victims’ stories not be thrown under the bus of Wikileaks worship. It involves a Keith Olbermann Twitter flounce. Thanks to Sady for tirelessly afflicting the powerful. Just go catch up over there. Kate Harding has also posted her support in Why I’m On Board With #mooreandme.

I just finished reading “Nobody Passes: Rejecting the Rules of Gender and Conformity,” a collection of essays on passing, gender, race, and identity. Some of the essays are better than others, but the whole book is worth a read for an interesting meditation on dominant narratives, the ways in which so many individuals don’t perfectly fit our assumptions about who/what people are, and how we create and convey our identities along the way.

I have issues with this story and the reactions it has generated that probably need to be explored in a longer post. I never saw the “Is She A Hero Or A Danger?” language CNN purportedly used to discuss this woman who had a home VBAC after three cesareans (VBA3C); that’s not the headline now, but I think the answer is probably “neither,” and “these are the very cases against which we test our principles about what a woman can and cannot be compelled to do with her body for the sake of another person’s body.”

New sexually transmitted infection treatment guidelines are out from the CDC; they also include screening and prevention recommendations.

Renee at Womanist Musings shares a video about images of women in advertising.

Cara at The Curvature points to a local story I’d missed: Nashville Police Officers Charged With Domestic Violence Get to Keep Their Jobs. Ugh. This reminds me that I need to contact Nashville police to follow up on an incident of police action I witnessed/reported.

In other local news, the story of Coach Howe’s dismissal from Belmont University because of her sexual orientation made the New York Times. For ongoing coverage, the Belmont Vision student newspaper and Pith in the Wind (blog of the local alt-weekly) seem to be doing the best job.

At Feministe, Hospital saves woman’s life; is told by Catholic leadership not to do it again, Oops, I forgot to have babies!, and two posts related to the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers – It’s not just violent clients who abuse sex workers, and Whore Stigma Makes No Sense.

RHRC is also hosting a series to explore and combat violence against sex workers.

Perhaps I’m entirely too skeptical, but I find it hard to buy this official story that the 36 LGBT books damaged with urine in a Harvard library were “accidentally” damaged by a staff member who just *happened* to spill a nearby open bottle of urine on said books. I’m a librarian, and a spilly/messy one at that, but this really strains my credulity.

As always, please check out Our Bodies Our Blog – this week we’ve been talking about genetic testing and privacy, and Avastin.

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Birth, Ethics, Events & Observances, Government, Infectious Diseases, Libraryland, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups, Pregnancy, Reviews

I’m reading Isaac Asimov’s “Robot Dreams,” and found this decription of a medical library in the short story, “Hostess.” The copyright date for the piece is 1951. In the relevant excerpt below, our protagonist, Rose, is doing a bit of surreptitious research. Certain aspects will be familiar to librarians now:

The New York Academy of Medicine had been enlarged both vertically and horizontally in the past two decades. The library alone occupied one entire wing of the third floor. Undoubtedly, if all the books, pamphlets and periodicals it contained were in their original printed form, rather than in microfilm, the entire building, huge though it was, would not have been sufficient to hold them. As it was, Rose knew there was already talk of limiting printed works to the last five years, rather than to the last ten, as was now the case.

Rose, as a member of the Academy, had free entry to the library. She hurried toward the alcoves devoted to extraterrestrial medicine and was relieved to find them unoccupied.

It might have been wiser to have enlisted the aid of a librarian, but she chose not to. The thinner and smaller the trail she left, the less likely it was that Drake might pick it up.

Our print volumes go back 35 years, but we’d never tell your creepy husband what you were looking up.

Filed under: Libraryland

A few things of interest:

Nikki has notes from a recent Twitter chat on health literacy, including a bunch of suggested resources on the topic.

PF Anderson points to a great presentation (embedded there) on using social media for sharing family planning messages. It’s a useful introduction to tools like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube with examples of how they’re being used by groups like Planned Parenthood.

A nice response to the ridiculous “i like it…” statuses on Facebook that are inexplicably supposed to make people feel like they’re doing something about women’s health: I like it without pinkwashing

Weight loss drug Meridia was taken off the market, “because of clinical trial data indicating an increased risk of heart attack and stroke.” An FDA person said, “Meridia’s continued availability is not justified when you compare the very modest weight loss that people achieve on this drug to their risk of heart attack or stroke.”

RH Reality Check has good posts on lawsuits resulting from misrepresentations in anti-abortion political ads, and an example of how reproductive choice is not always about abortion.

Last week was National Midwifery Week; there are several relevant posts at Midwife Connection. The whole month is National Medical Librarians Month; I’m kind of bummed that there seem to only be websites for librarians (posters and materials to use), rather than a central site/page/anything that promotes the month to *non-librarians.* Maybe I should volunteer for that.

Science & Sensibility has a thing about emergency funds for pregnant women on bedrest who are experiencing financial difficulties because of the bedrest – such as being fired from their much-needed jobs.

Some high school girls decided to organize a campaign in their school for girls to not wear make-up one day each week as an empowerment thing. It’s kind of cool. I’ll be over here waiting to see how many expand that to the rest of the week, whether the girls who were already not wearing make-up every day or otherwise conforming to social standards are being embraced or still shunned, and whether anybody is going to ask why girls are expected to wear make-up at all when their male peers obviously aren’t. *one step at a time*

Something I would not have thought of if it weren’t for seeing this post, and that’s what I love about FWD/Forward – discussion of how the switch from physical buttons to touch screens at cash register card self-swipe machines creates difficulties for blind and low-vision consumers.

Via Siobhan at BHIC, info on a new government helpline for folks affected by the oil spill.

Finally, there have been some great videos posted at http://www.youtube.com/itgetsbetterproject, http://www.youtube.com/trevorprojectmedia, and elsewhere to try to combat the bullying and despair lgbt teens experience, particularly in reaction to recent suicides. My favorite thus far is from Sarah Silverman on how kids learn to be so cruel, embedded below. Warning for an f-bomb.

[Relatedly, Renee reminds us that "anti-bullying is not solely the fight of the LGBT community", and Cara talks about anti-trans violence in jail]

Filed under: Abortion, Abuse, Rape, & Safety, Access, Rights, & Choice, Adolescent Health, Body Image & Eating Disorders, Boobs, Cancer, Drugs, Events & Observances, Government, Libraryland, Midwifery, Miscellaneous, News Round-Ups

Just over a year ago, I wrote Improving the Findability of Evidence & Literature on Doulas, and complained about the lack of a proper subject term for doulas in the MeSH vocabulary used in PubMed.*

I submitted the suggestion to add “doula” to the vocabulary, and some of you also submitted the term for addition to MeSH – at least one of you even received a rather rude reply to stop suggesting the term.

Today, I checked out the newly released 2011 MeSH updates, and found that “Doulas” has been added as a new term!

This *should* make it easier to identify literature about doulas in PubMed in the future. Thanks to everyone who suggested it! We can’t know, of course, whether our suggestions specifically influenced the addition, but I’m going to assume they did and thank you all anyway.

Some other new additions that caught my eye as potentially useful: Airway Management; Bleaching Agents; Bullying; Carbon footprint; Catheters; Counterfeit drugs; Drug-Seeking Behavior; Epigenomics; Exsanguination; Examination Tables; Food, Organic; Gestational Sac; Hair Bleaching Agents; Gynecological Examination; Lost to Follow-Up; Nasal Sprays; Pets; Recyling; Sex Reassignment Procedures; Sex Reassignment Surgery; Social Stigma; Watchful Waiting; Wireless Technology.

They also included Apathy. And “Confederate States of America” – I’m not sure what the need for that term was!

*See this post for background on the doula terminology issue and why PubMed/MeSH was kind of lacking on this concept. See the MeSH site for more detail on that system overall.

Filed under: Libraryland, Miscellaneous