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 ...
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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 ...
Young children gained weight during the pandemic
August 27, 2021A Kaiser Permanente study of nearly 200,000 children showed that children gained excess weight during the COVID-19 pandemic, especially those between 5 and 11 years old. The study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. “When we compared the weight gain among children from 2019 to 2020, we found that there was more ...Read more...5 questions for … Dr. Darryl Palmer-Toy
August 26, 2021Darryl Palmer-Toy, MD, PhD, is the physician director of the Regional Reference Core Laboratories for Kaiser Permanente Southern California. He has been in this position for 5 years. In this role, Dr. Palmer-Toy oversees the ancillary, clinical chemistry, and immunochemistry departments, which perform about 20 million tests per year. A student of proteomics (the study ...Read more...Bariatric surgery associated with better health for mothers
August 13, 2021A study of more than 20,000 Kaiser Permanente members in Southern California showed that women with obesity who underwent bariatric surgery prior to pregnancy experienced improved outcomes such as a reduced risk of serious pregnancy-related blood pressure conditions, and lower instances of a newborn needing to be sent to the neonatal intensive care unit, or ...Read more...Risk of severe COVID-19 higher for patients who recently needed asthma care
August 10, 2021A study of Kaiser Permanente Southern California members diagnosed with COVID-19 found that patients who needed clinical visits for asthma care in the 12 months prior to infection faced a higher risk of severe COVID-19 outcomes than patients who did not have asthma. Of patients who had recent asthma-related visits, those who also received medications for ...Read more...5 questions for … Dr. Sonya Negriff
August 10, 2021Sonya Negriff, PhD, is a developmental psychologist with expertise in the effects of child maltreatment on physical and mental health. She has been with the Department of Research & Evaluation for 3 years. Dr. Negriff examines the pathways linking child maltreatment to negative outcomes such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, substance use, obesity, and sexual ...Read more...Where you live may affect your long-term survival after heart attack
August 2, 2021A study of more than 31,000 Kaiser Permanente members in Southern California showed that Black patients from disadvantaged neighborhoods were significantly more likely to die within 5 years of surviving a heart attack than white patients. In contrast, there was no difference in rates of death between white patients and Black patients who lived in ...Read more...COVID-19 vaccine trials for children are underway
July 30, 2021When their parents asked if they wanted to be part of a COVID-19 vaccine trial for children, Aidan and Avery Shih didn’t have to think about it for long. Both were eager to help end the pandemic. “The vaccine does help you not get COVID, of course, but then also it helps you so you don't spread COVID. So, if enough people get the vaccine, COVID will slow and hopefully eventually stop,” said Aidan, 11.Read more...New protocol allows teen to go home same day as chest surgery
July 27, 2021About 5 years ago, John Connell, now 16, was at a water park when a friend pointed his index finger at John’s bare chest and asked, “Were you in a car accident or something?” John looked down at his chest, and then at the chests of the other boys around him, and realized for the first ...Read more...Risk of blood clots more than 3-fold higher in hospitalized adults with COVID-19
July 23, 2021Hospitalized adults who have COVID-19 are more than 3 times as likely to develop a blood clot than adults who do not have COVID-19, according to new research from Kaiser Permanente Southern California and Kaiser Permanente Northern California. The study published July 20 in CHEST found Black patients as well as patients who had obesity, liver ...Read more...5 questions for … Dr. Erin Hahn
June 28, 2021Erin E. Hahn, PHD, MPH, is a health services researcher and implementation scientist. Her primary research interests are quality of care in oncology and the implementation of evidence-informed practices. She is particularly interested in the care of cancer survivors after their initial cancer treatment. Dr. Hahn joined the Department of Research & Evaluation as the ...Read more...