Police are investigating the circumstances of an Oregon car crash involving two pick-up trucks and a semi-trailer that left one of the pick-up drivers dead, according to The Oregonian. The accident took place last week in Dallas, west of Salem. According to the newspaper, a pick-up driven by a 58-year-old…
A story from Northern California offers a vivid reminder for us here in Oregon that drunk driving can lead to all kinds of trouble above and beyond car crashes. According to a recent account in the Red Bluff Daily News, a man is now in prison after what appears to…
A poignant reminder of the long-term effects of concussions on football players cane over the weekend when Terry Bradshaw revealed in a blog post that “he is suffering from deficits in short-term memory and impairments in his hand-eye coordination,” according to the Los Angeles Times. The newspaper reports that the…
Following up a story I wrote about in February, The Oregonian reports that federal regulators have cleared Portland Adventist Medical Center of wrongdoing in a high-profile case in which a man died of a heart attack in the hospital’s parking lot. As regular readers will recall, 61-year-old Birgilio Marin-Fuentes suffered…
On March 30 a case was argued before the US Supreme Court that has the potential to impact the use of nearly every generic prescription drug sold in America. The court heard oral arguments in a case involving generic drug manufacturers and their contention that they should be held to…
A surprising – and heartening – article in the sports section of the New York Times last week revealed that heightened awareness of the serious nature of sports-related concussions and other traumatic brain injuries has turned up in an unexpected forum: video games. The paper reports that “Madden NFL 12,…
Oregonians could learn some lessons about the dangers of drunk driving accidents from an incident unfolding to our south, in Northern California. A 64-year-old retired La Selva Beach man is facing serious charges after what media reports describe as a classic drunk driving hit-and-run accident. The Santa Cruz Sentinel, quoting…
A Florida judge has issued a key ruling in a closely watched wrongful death case that may have implications for student athletes here in Oregon and elsewhere. The case concerns the death of Ereck Plancher, a 19-year-old student and football player at the University of Central Florida. Plancher died in…
In terms of violence and physical contact baseball is a far cry from football or hockey, but today’s news brought word that the National Pastime is following in the footsteps of higher-impact competitions in seeking to address concussions and other traumatic brain injuries. According to an analysis published by Bloomberg…
A trial now underway in Washington is raising serious questions about railway safety. According to TV station KGW, the Longview, Washington trial focuses not only on safety policies at the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Company, but on how carefully those policies are enforced. The Washington rail crash trial stems…