1. Provide the title of your story or series and the names of the journalists involved.
"Insurance Claims Approved, Payments Denied"
"Treatment Brings New Hope for Hand Disease"
"Law Curbs Teen Tanning"
"Generics Cheaper, But Not Often Cheap"
2. List date(s) this work was published or aired.
"Insurance Claims Approved, Payments Denied," May 8, 2010
"Treatment Brings New Hope for Hand Disease," Dec. 8, 2010
"Law Curbs Teen Tanning," March 4, 2010
"Generics Cheaper, But Not Often Cheap," March 17, 2010
3. Provide a brief synopsis of the story or stories, including any significant findings.
"Insurance Claims Approved, Payments Denied": The article on health insurance focused on how health insurance companies can approve claims but then drag their feet in paying the claim, especially in situations where the onus was on the policyholder to make sure their treatment provider was paid in a timely fashion.
"Treatment Brings New Hope for Hand Disease": The article focused on how hand surgeons who were considered the authorities on a specific hand-related disease were withholding information on another treatment option that would be provided by another type of specialist and that would result in business being driven away from their practice. The withholding of information put patients in a position where they were unable to learn about all the options for treatment for their condition.
"Law Curbs Teen Tanning": The article focused on how lawmakers and cancer doctors were using misleading statistics to drive home the message that indoor tanning is highly dangerous to consumers. The article was not focused on the benefits and disadvantages of indoor tanning as much as it was a focus on the irresponsible use of statistics to frighten people.
"Generics Cheaper, But Not Often Cheap": This article focused on the wide differences in the cost of the same generic medicines. Generics can cost $200 more at one pharmacy than another but the only way customers will find out is by actively shopping for generics the same way they do for other products.
4. Explain types of documents, data or Internet resources used. Were FOI or public records act requests required? How did this affect the work?
No FOIA documents were needed. Data for the tanning article was determined by exhaustively reading the 60-plus page World Health Organization report on the cancer effects from indoor tanning. The generics article involved calls to every major pharmacy in the state of Delaware.
5. Explain types of human sources used.
Human sources were used for each article. The article on insurance delays showed how cumbersome it can be for policyholders to attempt to ensure that their treatment provider gets paid. The article on tanning showed how customers of indoor tanning felt upon learning that statistics were being misused to emphasize a point. The article on generics included a customer who has found the benefits of shopping for deals. The article on the hand disease profiled a patient who had found success through a treatment option that was not given to her by her hand surgeon.
6. Results (if any).
The result from the article on insurance delays was that New Jersey's insurance commissioner ordered the insurance company to immediately pay the money it had owed to the treatment provider for about two years. The insurance commissioner also ordered, as required by New Jersey law, for the insurance company to pay thousands of dollars in interest to the treatment provider for the delay in payment. The result of the tanning article was that AHCJ (due to my prompting) used the article in a lesson plan on reporting responsibly on statistics. The article was referenced in several news sites and a university used the article as an example in how to properly interpret statistics. As for the hand disease article, I heard from numerous patients considering surgery for their disease who were unaware of radiation as a treatment option until they read my article. I do not recall hearing from anyone who read the generics article.
7. Follow-up (if any). Have you run a correction or clarification on the report or has anyone come forward to challenge its accuracy? If so, please explain.
There were no corrections or challenges to the accuracy of any of the four articles.
8. Advice to other journalists planning a similar story or project.
Always question conventional wisdom. That means that you should take actions to find out how the statistics are derived. I also found out about the insurance delay article while working on a separate article, and I arrived to observe Mr. Fine make the calls and I tracked the length of his calls. That helped illustrate the frustration he experienced.