Few people would choose to watch a slide show about brain surgery while eating their lunch, but perhaps that’s what distinguishes health journalists from the rest of humanity.

Eight students in the CUNY J-School’s Health & Science Reporting Program traveled to Philadelphia on April 16 with Prof. Emily Laber-Warren to attend the annual meeting of the Association of Health Care Journalists. The keynote speaker, who gave his talk in the banquet hall while attendees dined on filet mignon and mixed vegetables, was neurosurgeon G. Michael Lemole, who treated U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords after she was shot in the head on January 8 in Tucson.

The rest of the day was spent choosing from among many diverse and informative panel sessions. Here is a taste of what students learned:

*Guinea Pig Syndrome:
In a panel about the testing of new medications in humans, participants emphasized potential conflicts of interest. Some of the doctors who oversee these so-called clinical trials are paid huge sums for their efforts by pharmaceutical companies that have a stake in the outcomes, the experts said.

On a lighter note, Robert Helms, a self-described former professional test subject, said that he has participated in more than 70 such trials, for pay. Researchers typically aim to recruit fresh volunteers, but Helms said that he was one of thousands of people who make their living this way, and that professional test subjects possess needed experience and skills. “If you have a long study that includes unusual procedures like handing your feces to a researcher,” said Helms, “you have to have reliable people.”

*The Medical Spoils of War:
A panel about how the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are changing medicine unveiled high-tech solutions being developed to protect soldiers. Traumatic brain injury has become a trademark of today’s warfare, but often such injuries are not immediately apparent and can go untreated.

D. Kacy Cullen, a neurosurgery researcher at the University of Pennsylvania, described an experimental sensor that changes color in response to pressure. When integrated into military garb, such sensors would indicate when a soldier is at medical risk because of exposure to either a single large blast or multiple small ones.

Panelist Michael S. Weingarten, the chief of vascular surgery at Drexel University College of Medicine, spent time volunteering at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, the largest U.S. military hospital abroad. Here the freshly evacuated wounded from Iraq and Afghanistan come to get stabilized before being sent home to the States for further care.

Weingarten described the atmosphere in this highly guarded and high-tech facility, a place where medical and nursing staff work as a tight-knit team even though many stay for only short stints. He showed graphic photos of the kinds of war wounds he treated there. These were hard to look at, but demonstrated the challenges of covering violence.

*Investigative Reporting Awards:
At the conference, more than 30 journalists working in various media received awards for investigative health stories, many of which provoked changes in the health care system. The stories included “Seniors for Sale,” by Michael J. Berens of The Seattle Times and “Dialysis—High Costs & Hidden Perils of a Treatment Guaranteed to All,” by Robin Fields of ProPublica.

The authors spoke at a panel to share how they found the stories and followed them through to completion. Amazingly, Berens’s piece got its start when he saw an ad in the paper presenting senior care as a get-rich-quick scheme. Many of these writers searched through hundreds of documents or waited a year (if not longer) to receive necessary information through the Freedom of Information Act.

These winners showed true dedication and faith that the power of journalism can save lives. Hearing how they worked so hard to uncover their stories was really inspiring. It opened students’ eyes to a kind of health coverage that goes beyond simply interviewing doctors, and whetted appetites for the investigative reporting they will do in the fall.

The 2011 AHCJ award winners and their stories are here.

–Michelle Bangert, Channon Hodge, Monica Rozenfeld, and Emily Laber-Warren