Only two health-insurance companies offer 2018 individual plans on exchange; asking for rate increases averaging 27.5 percent

Update 8/11/17: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has extended the rate filing deadline for 2018 Obamacare marketplace plans un...

Three Kentucky journalists among 12 chosen in six-state region for Health Journalism Fellowship program

Three Kentucky journalists have been chosen by the Association of Health Care Journalists to participate in the 2017-18 Regional Health Jou...

Baptist Health Paducah opens nationally accredited cancer center

Grand opening of the Ray and Kay Eckstein Regional Cancer Care Center. (Photo by Ryan Hermens, The Paducah Sun) Baptist Health Paducah '...

Danville paper looks at how the proposed health law would affect the local community

Danville's newspaper,  The Advocate-Messenger , broke down and localized the potential impacts of the latest health bill in Congress. Re...

Number of drug overdose deaths in Kentucky continues to rise: 1,404 in 2016, a 7.4 percent increase from 2015

By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky saw a 7.4 percent increase in drug-overdose deaths in 2016, largely driven by heroin and a ...

Form for religious exemption from vaccination can now be obtained online, with no role for any health-care provider

By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky parents who don't want their children vaccinated for religious reasons can now get the ...

McConnell pulls health bill for redrafting to get votes, warns Republicans that they might have to compromise with Democrats

McConnell and Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., leave a meeting with President Trump. (Washington Post photo by Jabin Botsford) Kentucky Health News ...

Study finds women aged 25 to 44 are driving the increase in opioid-related emergency room and hospital stays in Kentucky

By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky is a national leader in yet another measurement of the painkiller epidemic: the number of o...

Legal battle over Kentucky's only abortion clinic widens; state imposes emergency rules, Planned Parenthood joins suit

State officials have filed emergency regulations "that some abortion providers say are designed to shut them down," The Associated...

McConnell would phase out Medicaid expansion funds by 2024, cut old Medicaid after that; bill short of votes; Paul not on board

By Melissa Patrick and Al Cross Kentucky Health News Senate Republicans' bill to repeal and replace the Patient Protection and Affordabl...

Grant County coalition wins passage of 'complete street' policies to improve the health of its citizens

Grant County High School student Brookynn Scudder urged the Crittenden City Council to adopt a complete-streets policy. A Grant County coali...

Attorney General Beshear joins multi-state effort to investigate role of drug manufacturers in opioid crisis

By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Attorney General Andy Beshear announced June 21 that he is working with attorneys general from acros...

Bevin declines to join bipartisan group of governors' call for continuation of formula used to fund state Medicaid programs

By Al Cross and Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News A bipartisan group of governors, including Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, is asking Congress...

Senate GOP health bill would dramatically roll back Medicaid

Kentucky Health News The health bill that Senate Republicans will unveil Thursday "would reshape a big piece of the U.S. health-care sy...

Louisville senator hopes third time is charm for his bill to allow marijuana to be used to alleviate suffering of the terminally ill

Kentucky should join the states that have authorized marijuana for medical use, and allow it to be used to relieve suffering of the terminal...

Ky. leads nation in opioid-addiction diagnoses for privately insured people, and in the rate of doctors prescribing medication for it

By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky doctors diagnosed more cases of opioid addiction for privately insured people than in any o...

Senate health bill expected Thur., McConnell says; could stretch Medicaid expansion but then cut program more than House bill

By Al Cross and Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Senate Republicans plan to make their repeal-and-replace-Obamacare bill public on Thurs...

Post's chief fact-checker gives McConnell an upside-down Pinocchio for a flip-flop the senator won't acknowledge

"It has become a regular feature of the U.S. political system that the politicians in the minority accuse the politicians in power of c...