Q&A with Physician Researcher of the Year: Dr. Michael Fassett
Michael J. Fassett, MD, came to work at Kaiser Permanente in 2000. Since then, his dedication to his patients through research has grown. He’s published more than 50 research papers in peer-reviewed journals. Now, as the regional physician-in-charge for Maternal-Fetal Medicine and the area research ...
Featured News
Five questions for … Dr. Annette Langer-Gould
Annette Langer-Gould, MD, PhD, is a translational neuroscientist with the Southern California Permanente Medical Group. She treats people with multiple sclerosis (MS) at the Kaiser Permanente ...
COVID bivalent booster protects well against hospitalization
A Kaiser Permanente study shows the Pfizer-BioNTech BNT162b2 BA.4/5 bivalent mRNA vaccine helped protect against a range of COVID symptoms and was effective against the COVID XBB strain sublineages. ...
Kaiser Permanente Southern California to lead CDC-funded center to improve outbreak and disease prediction
Kaiser Permanente Southern California has been tapped to lead an innovation center that will develop advanced modeling approaches to better predict disease outbreaks and prepare the United States ...
5 questions for … Dr. Nana Mensah
September 19, 2022A maternal and child health epidemiologist, Nana Mensah, PhD, MPH, is in the first year of her postdoctoral program at the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation. Through her research working with the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Pregnancy Registry, she seeks to understand how clinical guidelines and practices shape birth outcomes in ...Read more...5 questions for … Dr. Lewei Duan
September 16, 2022A health economist, Lewei Duan, PhD, MS, is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation. She has special interests in improving health care delivery systems, specifically in maximizing health and well-being for older adults and underserved populations. Prior to her current position, Dr. Duan worked as a ...Read more...Remdesivir may reduce hospital readmissions for COVID-19 patients
September 15, 2022A study of Kaiser Permanente Southern California members who were hospitalized for COVID-19 identifies key factors associated with lower chances of readmission — including treatment with the medication remdesivir and delaying discharge until 10 days have passed since COVID-19 symptoms began. “This study supports a continued role for remdesivir in treating COVID-19,” said the study’s lead ...Read more...Antidepressants linked to lower risk of prostate cancer recurrence
September 9, 2022In a study of more than 10,000 Kaiser Permanente members diagnosed with both prostate cancer and depression, those who used antidepressants had a lower risk of cancer recurrence. These findings appeared September 9, 2022, in Cancer Causes & Control. “Our research highlights how important it is for patients with prostate cancer to be screened and treated ...Read more...Fewer hospitalizations for home-based cardiac rehabilitation patients
August 25, 2022Patients who participated in in-home cardiac rehabilitation had fewer hospitalizations over 12 months than patients who participated in center-based cardiac rehabilitation, according to a Kaiser Permanente study published August 25, 2022, in JAMA Network Open. “The remarkable thing we found in this study of more than 2,500 diverse patients was that health advantages of home-based cardiac ...Read more...Increased health care use among patients after COVID-19
August 12, 2022A study led by Kaiser Permanente in Southern California of patients from 8 health care organizations across the United States showed that COVID-19 was associated with a 4% increase in use of health care services over the 6 months after initial infection. The study was published August 12, 2022, in JAMA Network Open. Some people who were ...Read more...Child abuse–related emergency department visits increased after pandemic lock-down
August 8, 2022The rate of emergency department visits associated with child abuse or neglect at Kaiser Permanente Southern California hospitals doubled immediately after the March 2020 stay-at-home order. This increase in the rate of child maltreatment visits was highest among younger children, girls, and children who were Black or Hispanic. Over the following year and a half, ...Read more...COVID-19 boosters shown to be effective for adolescents
August 3, 2022Adolescents who received 3 doses of the Pfizer–BioNTech COVID vaccine were better protected against infection with SARS-CoV-2 — the virus that causes COVID-19 — than adolescents who received only 2 doses, according to a study of more than 3,000 Kaiser Permanente Southern California members ages 12 to 17 and published on August 3, 2022, in ...Read more...5 questions for … Dr. Jennifer Ku
July 28, 2022An infectious disease epidemiologist, Jennifer Ku, PhD, MPH, is in the first year of her postdoctoral program at the Department of Research & Evaluation. Her research includes vaccine safety and effectiveness projects on shingles and COVID-19 vaccines. Dr. Ku is also involved in other infectious diseases studies on influenza, SARS-CoV-2, and other respiratory viruses. Please tell ...Read more...Public policy can improve pandemic masking adherence
July 25, 2022A year-long study of mask adherence and social distancing among more than 100,000 people in 126 U.S. cities found people were 3 times more likely to wear masks correctly in places where a mask mandate was in place. The study was published recently in the American Journal of Infection Control. “City, county, and state leaders can ...Read more...