Administration’s Transgender Proposal Not Based on Medical Science

Legacy Community Health, the largest community health center in Texas, today opposed the Trump Administration’s effort to re-write the way transgender Americans are treated under civil rights law.  The Administration is looking into making the legal definition of sex as a “biological, immutable condition,” thereby cutting transgender people out of civil rights protections. “Stigma and …

When Others Don’t Understand Your Mental Health Condition

By Meg Duke, Behavioral Health Consultant, Legacy Fifth Ward When you are dealing with depression or any mental health condition, it can be difficult to talk about it.  Offhand comments—whether born of ignorance or arrogance—can cut to the bone.  That is why it is important to have a group of family and friends to support …

Legacy Pediatrics: Your Child and the Flu Vaccine

By Carolina Boyd The flu is more dangerous than the common cold for children. That’s why the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a yearly flu vaccination for all children six months and older. Last year’s flu season was one of the deadliest. More than 2,150 people died from the flu in the …

Today is National Latino AIDS Awareness Day

By Barrett White According to the CDC, nearly one quarter of all new HIV diagnoses in the United States were among Latino individuals, and yet Latino people make up only 3% of those receiving PrEP, the pill to prevent HIV, according to the CDC’s current estimates. Launched in 2009, Greater Than AIDS is an organization …

WATCH: Who gets hurts the most under the new proposal limiting health care for legal, taxpaying immigrants? Harris County taxpayers

By Kevin Nix Many legal immigrants in Houston – those in the U.S. legally, who play by the rules, have jobs and pay taxes – work for employers who don’t offer health insurance. For decades, they have been able under “public charge” policies to utilize health insurance programs like Medicaid and the Medicare prescription drug …

Depression: Breast Cancer’s Forgotten Side Effect

By Winderlyon Hebert, Associate Therapy Director A diagnosis of breast cancer can bring a wave of different emotions for a woman. Feelings of sadness, fear, anger and grief are considered normal.  The shock of receiving such life changing news qualifies as a major stressor, so it’s no surprise that depression and anxiety are common among …

HIV goes overlooked in Dallas, on the rise in Houston

By Barrett White   In a study led by Zachary Most, MD, of the Pediatric Infectious Disease department at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, it was revealed that in adolescent patients living with HIV, there were a significant number of MOEs, or “missed opportunity encounters”. These MOEs mean that these patients could have …

Obamacare Enrollment for 2019 is approaching: What’s changed and what’s new

By Barrett White Are you ready to sign up for health insurance made possible by the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare? The marketplace enrollment begins on November 1 and will work like it has in previous years. The period will be 45 days, leaving you with little time to decide on your healthcare …

These immigrants are legal. It’s unbelievable that they are being penalized for this basic human need

This op-ed originally appeared in the Houston Chronicle on October 5, 2018. By Katy Caldwell Texans, like the rest of America, don’t agree on much these days. But when it comes to the cost of health care, no matter income or political party, many believe it’s too expensive. Like Houston traffic, people just deal with …

Where are we in the fight against breast cancer?

By Carolina Boyd As Breast Cancer Awareness Month kicks off for 2018, progress is being made in the battle against the disease. According to the American Cancer Society (ACS) breast cancer related deaths in the United States dropped 39 percent between 1989 and 2015. This good news is credited to increasingly stable incidence rates, improved …