Charles Ornstein
Charles Ornstein is managing editor, local, overseeing ProPublica’s local initiatives. These include offices in the Midwest, South, Southwest and Northwest, a joint initiative with the Texas Tribune, and the Local Reporting Network, which works with local news organizations to produce accountability journalism on issues of importance to their communities.
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Charles Ornstein is managing editor, local, overseeing ProPublica’s local initiatives. These include offices in the Midwest, South, Southwest and Northwest, a joint initiative with the Texas Tribune, and the Local Reporting Network, which works with local news organizations to produce accountability journalism on issues of importance to their communities. From 2008 to 2017, he was a senior reporter covering health care and the pharmaceutical industry. He then worked as a senior editor and deputy managing editor.
Prior to joining ProPublica, he was a member of the metro investigative projects team at the Los Angeles Times. In 2004, he and Tracy Weber were lead authors on a series on Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, a troubled hospital in South Los Angeles. The articles won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for public service, the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, and the Sigma Delta Chi Award for Public Service.
In 2009, he and Weber worked on a series of stories that detailed serious failures in oversight by the California Board of Registered Nursing and nursing boards around the country. The work was a finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for public service.
Projects edited or co-edited by Ornstein have won the Pulitzer Prize for public service, the Selden Ring Award for Investigative Reporting, the Scripps Howard Impact Award, the IRE Award, the Online Journalism Award and other major journalism honors.
He previously worked at the Dallas Morning News, where he covered health care on the business desk and worked in the Washington bureau. Ornstein is a past president of the Association of Health Care Journalists and an adjunct journalism professor at Columbia University. Ornstein is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.
On Agent Orange, VA Weighs Politics and Cost Along With Science
Although veterans advocates say the VA should be guided by science as it makes benefit decisions, documents and interviews show that other considerations also come into play. One concern: Will other groups want benefits too?
Stung by Yelp Reviews, Health Providers Spill Patient Secrets
The vast majority of reviews on Yelp are positive. But in trying to respond to critical ones, some doctors, dentists and chiropractors appear to be violating the federal patient privacy law known as HIPAA.
University of California Regent Violated Ethics Rules, Review Finds
A secret 2015 report found that a doctor on the UC board of regents tried to negotiate a deal between his eye clinics and UCLA, and engaged in discussions in which he had a financial interest. He denied wrongdoing but resigned as chair of the regents’ health committee.
Vietnam Vets Push VA to Link Bladder Cancer to Agent Orange
The Department of Veterans Affairs is evaluating new research as it decides whether to extend benefits to exposed vets with the disease.
The Exceptions: A Rare Few Score Agent Orange Benefits for Bladder Cancer
While most vets’ claims for benefits are denied, some have figured out a way to win.
New York Hospital to Pay $2.2 Million Fine for Allowing Filming of Patients Without Consent
Federal action could spell the end of emergency room reality television.
Amid Public Feuds, A Venerated Medical Journal Finds Itself Under Attack
A widely derided editorial, a controversial series of articles and delayed corrections have prompted critics to question the direction of the New England Journal of Medicine.
New York Top Court Revives Suit Against Hospital That Let Man’s Death Be Filmed
Mark Chanko’s family sued NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and one of its doctors for allowing a TV crew to film his death without permission. A lower court had thrown the case out, but the New York Court of Appeals revived it.