Patti Neighmond
Award-winning journalist Patti Neighmond is NPR's health policy correspondent. Her reports air regularly on NPR newsmagazines All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and Weekend Edition.
Based in Los Angeles, Neighmond has covered health care policy since April 1987. She joined NPR's staff in 1981, covering local New York City news as well as the United Nations. In 1984, she became a producer for NPR's science unit and specialized in science and environmental issues.
Neighmond has earned a broad array of awards for her reporting. In 1993, she received the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award for coverage of health reform. That same year, she received the Robert F. Kennedy Award for a story on a young quadriplegic who convinced Georgia officials that she could live at home less expensively and more happily than in a nursing home. In 1990, Neighmond won the World Hunger Award for a story about healthcare and low-income children. She received two awards in 1989: a George Polk Award for her powerful ten-part series on AIDS patient Archie Harrison, who was taking the anti-viral drug AZT; and a Major Armstrong Award for her series on the Canadian health care system. The Population Institute, based in Washington, DC, has presented its radio documentary award to Neighmond twice: in 1988 for "Family Planning in India" and in 1984 for her coverage of overpopulation in Mexico. Her 1987 report "AIDS and Doctors" won the National Press Club Award for Consumer Journalism, and her two-part series on the aquaculture industry earned the 1986 American Association for the Advancement of Science Award.
Neighmond began her career in journalism in 1978, at the Pacifica Foundation's DC bureau, where she covered Capitol Hill and the White House. She began freelance reporting for NPR from New York City in 1980. Neighmond earned her bachelor's degree in English and drama from the University of Maryland, and now lives in Los Angeles.
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Many women and even doctors underestimate a woman's heart attack risk, research shows, as they focus on weight and breast health instead. Tiny damaged arteries in the heart may not show up in scans. -
Researchers from Oregon State University find that when healthy adults work one year past the typical retirement age of 65, they increase their odds of living longer.
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Choosing a heart-healthy lifestyle can help protect your brain as you age, research suggests. And it's not just memory skills that benefit. Problem-solving abilities and judgment are preserved, too.
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Half of states require that women who get mammograms be notified if they have dense breasts because they increase cancer risk. But the letters are often jargony and hard to understand, a study finds.
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Children with a depressed parent do worse in school than peers, a study finds. But other research shows that early diagnosis and treatment can help turn that around for the whole family. -
Look around any office and you'll see them: standing desks. They're a craze in workplace fitness. A new study finds these desks may be fashionable but they're not proven good for your health.
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Go to any pharmacy or grocery store and stand in front of the toothpaste aisle and you will face an overwhelming array of choices. Each brand has a plethora of options
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A recent poll shows 27 percent of Americans have visited an urgent care center in the past two years. Why? Most cite convenience. -
A man's testosterone level drops as he ages, but boosting it with supplements has been controversial. The first year of data from a big study now suggests a modest boost in libido for some men. -
Most breast cancer cases are in women, so treatment and support are geared toward them. Men with breast cancer can feel isolated. One man was given a pink ice pack.
