Para Pacientes y Médicos Nacidos en el Extranjero, el Miedo a las Políticas Migratorias Se Convierte en una Barrera para Acceder a la Atención Médica

Versión en inglés En una clínica dental rodeada de tiendas y restaurantes latinos en Round Rock, la Dra. María Teresa Rodríguez empezó a notar algo diferente entre sus pacientes.  La dentista dominicana, mejor conocida por sus pacientes como Tere, ha vivido en Tejas por más de una década y, durante los últimos ocho años, ha […]

For Foreign-Born Patients and Doctors, Immigration Fears Become a Barrier for Care

byErika Gonzalez and Noemi Castanon

After more than a decade of running a dental clinic in Round Rock, Dr. Maria Teresa Rodriguez began noticing something different among her patients. More patients are arriving with advanced infections after avoiding clinics for weeks. Others are trying to pull their own teeth at home. Families terrified of filling out basic medical forms because they fear it could affect their immigration status.
“People are coming in extremely scared,” Rodriguez said. “And when people are afraid, they stop doing things they never should stop doing.”
Doctors, community clinics and public policy experts say the United States’ increasingly restrictive immigration climate and recent federal changes in public health insurance programs are affecting both immigrant patients and foreign-born physicians working here.

New Texas Abortion Guidance Aims to Clarify the Law, but Uncertainty Remains for Doctors, Patients

bySamantha Rubin and Erika Gonzalez

By the time patients arrive at the Women’s Reproductive Clinic of New Mexico, many have already spent hours on the road from Texas, sometimes traveling overnight after arranging child care and scraping together money for the trip to access care that is no longer available in their state.
Now, for the first time since Texas banned abortions, the Texas Medical Board has issued formal training intended to clarify when physicians can legally provide abortion care under the medical emergency exception. The guidance follows legislative changes in 2025 that required the board to create educational materials for physicians about the law.

SNAP Recipients Decry Texas’ New Limits on Foods They Can Buy

byDestiny Lewis

Candy and sugary drinks are now off-limits for Texas SNAP recipients — a change that’s fueling debate over who should decide what low-income families can buy.
Texas officials say the new policy is meant to improve public health by limiting access to certain foods, but critics argue it places additional restrictions on people already facing financial hardship.
But critics say the policy gives the government too large a role in shoppers’ choices.

In an Age of ‘Protein Maxxing’ and ‘Boy Kibble,’ Experts Urge Caution

bySamantha Rubin

Protein popcorn. Protein water. Even protein coffee.
Across grocery stores and social media feeds, marketers are pushing protein — especially among young men seeking muscle, discipline and an idealized physique.
Online, the trend has taken on names like “protein maxxing” and “boy kibble,” and focuses on meals built almost entirely around protein intake. But nutrition experts say the surge is less about actual dietary needs and more about marketing, misinformation and shifting body image standards.

Ketamine Clinics for Treating Mental Health Issues Are Booming. But Is the Drug Effective?

byAJ Muonagolu

With around 13 clinics in Austin alone, ketamine clinics are rising as an alternative to traditional psychotherapy. Increasingly, Texans are exploring psychedelic therapy in hopes of treating depression, anxiety or other chronic mental health issues. But experts worry about ketamine being used as a one-size-fits-all approach to psychiatric care because of concerns over safety and […]

As Gen Z Struggles to Navigate Sex, Texas Makes It Harder to Get Information in Schools

byOisakhose Aghomo

Experts say Gen Z, the generation born between 1997 and 2012, is struggling to navigate real-life sex and dating culture in a digital age, and research points to this generation having less sex. Now, their teenage counterparts will have less access to information about sex after parents’ rights groups successfully lobbied for a new law that restricts Texas schools from teaching sex education or providing student health services unless parents have specifically authorized it.

Pyramid or Diagram? Whole Milk or Low-Fat? Dietitians Assess the Impact of New Dietary Guidelines

byAJ Muonagolu

Weeks after the federal government announced new dietary guidelines, Texas schools and food assistance programs are studying how the changes might affect their services.School districts like Austin’s are waiting to see how the new guidelines will shape their programs – especially when it comes to costs and federal reimbursement rates for student meals.

Nurses Rally Against ICE after Slaying of One of Their Own

byNoemi Castanon

Over 100 people, many of them nurses, moved by the death of one of their own, gathered outside Ascension Seton Medical Center for a candlelight vigil to honor Alex Pretti, the Minneapolis nurse killed by federal immigration officers.

On the Edge of Closure: The Daily Struggle of Rural Hospitals in Texas

byErika González

Hundreds of workers in Texas’ rural hospitals face long shifts but without any certainty that their hospital will still be there next year. 
Texas leads the nation in rural hospital closures, according to the Texas Organization of Rural and Community Hospitals. In the past 20 years, 26 rural hospitals have shut their doors.

UT Students Help to ‘Crush’ $1.5 Million in Medical Debt

byRachel N. Madison

In 2020, Austin resident Zachary Cook was run over by a car while walking down a sidewalk. After several weeks in a hospital for severe injuries, he returned home to find a $78,000 medical bill in the mail. Unable to pay, Cook searched for assistance online and found Dollar For, a national nonprofit that helps patients navigate medical debt and health care expense reduction programs.  Cook’s story is one of many that  inspired UT students to form Let’s Crush Medical Debt, an Austin chapter of Dollar For.

Amid Crisis in Veterans Care, Texas Embarks on a ‘Psychedelic Revolution’

byMichael Karlis

The staggering number of veteran suicides, combined with Texas’ large population of former service members, has led the state to becoming what some experts are calling the center of the “psychedelic revolution.”
A slew of bills in the Texas Legislature have garnered broad, bipartisan support, including House Bill 3137, which would mandate the largest appropriation of public funds for psychedelic research in U.S. history.

Lunches for Texas Students Expected to Suffer After USDA Pulls Plug on Local Food for Schools Program

byMadeline de Figueiredo and Rebecca Butler

The Local Food for Schools initiative was set to distribute $660 million to state agencies in fiscal 2025, aiming to help schools and child care facilities buy locally grown food in 40 states.

A Conference on UT Campus for ‘Pro-Natalists’ Draws Ire

byAlex Lamb

In April 2024, state and local police cracked down on University of Texas students protesting Israel’s invasion of Gaza, following calls for intervention by university administrators. As with protests on other college campuses, university and political leaders accused the pro-Palestinian protesters of antisemitism.
Almost a year later, one of the same groups involved in those protests, the Austin Chapter of Students for a Democratic Society, took part in another protest — this time to oppose the presence of alleged neo-Nazis and eugenicists at a conference held on the UT campus. The activists highlighted what they called a disconnect between the treatment of two groups accused of connections to antisemitic views

Texas’ Suicide Hotline, Overburdened and Underfunded, Could Get Support from a Proposed Bill.

byMadeline De Figueiredo

Each month, thousands of Texans reach out for support in difficult moments by dialing 988, the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. But, for some, their calls are met with long wait times and multiple transfers to out-of-state centers. Texas faces a $7 million shortfall in funding for the 988 system.

Texans Rally in Defense of Science and Against Trump Administration Cuts

byMadeline De Figueiredo

Hundreds gathered in front of the Texas Capitol for a “Stand Up to Science” rally Friday, demanding the defense of scientific integrity, expanded funding and the protection of diversity in research. The rally, one of 32 in cities across the country, was organized in response to the Trump administration’s cuts to scientific funding, the removal […]

Austin Schools’ Low Vaccination Rate Draws Concern Amid Measles Outbreak

byMadeline de Figueiredo

Travis County is ramping up its vaccination efforts, particularly for schoolchildren, as neighboring Hays County warned Sunday of possible measles exposure in San Marcos. 

In Rural West Texas, Measles Outbreak Signals Concerns over Federal Changes

byMadeline De Figueiredo

Amid concerns that Trump administration policies have reduced access to public health data, the Texas Department of State Health Services has confirmed a measles outbreak in Gaines County, which borders New Mexico, with six cases reported so far.

They provide for others. Now community attendants want the Legislature to provide a livable wage.

byMadeline de Figueiredo

Thomas Greenwell wakes up each morning and gets ready twice — he goes through the motions of brushing teeth twice, doing hair twice and getting dressed twice — once for himself and once for his client, Edgar. But Greenwell doesn’t know how much longer he will be able to afford to take care of Edgar as a community-based care provider under Medicaid. “The attendant care wages are not sustainable at all,” he says. The Legislature will revisit attendant wages in this spring’s legislative session as caregivers and advocacy groups push for more competitive and livable wages.

Advocates Race to Inform Immigrants, Hospitals as Abbott Demands Citizenship Reports

byMadeline de Figueiredo

In the leadup to the Nov. 1 implementation of Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order requiring Texas public hospitals to report on health care for undocumented immigrants, advocacy groups raced to inform affected communities and providers about the policy’s implications and limitations.