MBTA data shows recovery

Data shows riders are returnign to the Boston Metro’s transit system since the pandemic began,
but hiring is essential to keep moving in the right direction

A trip into the future

Once a key ingredient of the 1960s anti-establishment, psychedelics are now being studied as therapy for depression and addiction.

Up in the air

Just off the Infinite Corridor, in the lobby of Building 10, at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a nearly 50-year-old juggling club open to students and community members.

Central Ohio Mumps Outbreak

In early 2104, the highly infectious mumps virus tore through central Ohio. A small-town newspaper provided an affected county with near-daily local coverage from a variety of angles.

Browse the portfolio

Take your time and peruse the entire portfolio at your leisure.

Welcome to my one-stop online portfolio of nearly two decades in journalism.

Throughout the site, you’ll find a smattering of what I consider my best work, along with some of my favorite pieces. If you click over to About Stacy, you’ll learn a little bit about how I came to be a health and medical reporter with a background in biology and registered nursing, what I’ve been doing the last five years, and I how I used my health reporting skills to solve my own person medical mystery.

Please feel free to email me at hello@stacykess.com, and find me on Mastodon or Twitter.

A portrait of a young woman with cancer at Nationwide Children's Hospital.

Two boys sit on a wooden bench painted teal blue-green eating shaved ice. One looks thoughtfully off camera, while the other studies his cup of shaved ice.

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When (health news is) done right and done well, it is the most important news in the newspaper. It can spread knowledge and calm.

I’ve spent the majority of my news career in health and medical news journalism.

Why is health journalism so important? Health, medical and healthcare journalists translate complex science, medicine and politics that effects the everyday life, health and budget of the Every Person into news that everyone can understand and use. When it’s done wrong and done poorly, it can spread misunderstanding, misinformation and fear. When it’s done right and done well, it is the most important news in the newspaper. It can spread knowledge and calm. More importantly, it makes a better informed populous about their own bodies, their own health and their community’s health. That’s powerful.

Those skills – that ability to inform on complex and often frightening information – translates to all areas of news, to mentoring and editing and to any kind of journalism.

AWARD WINNING WORK

Sarah's 2nd Chance

In spring 2005, reporter Stacy Kess and photographer Kim Brent followed a 6-year-old child and her family through the process of being listed for a transplant into the operating room for surgery and through the ups and downs of recovery. The 4-part series won a Michigan Associated Press Award.

Captive Memories

On the 60th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day, 92-year-old Polish immigrant and Monroe resident Zbigniew Orlowski remembered his time as a Polish officer in World War II and his days a a prisoner of war in a Nazi camp. The 2-part story published May 8 and 9, 2005, in The Monroe Evening News, was nominated for and won a Michigan Associated Press Award.

A Heart for Roman

This photo – a seemingly innocent, bucolic scene of a 3-year-old boy being pushed on a swing by his 5-year-old sister, accompanied by his mother, father and 8-year-old brother on the swing next to him – accompanied a story about the youngest child, Roman, who was celebrating not only his third birthday that day, Oct. 28, 2014, but also the continued beating of his heart. Roman received that heart as a transplant on May 7, 2012. The photo won an Ohio Public Image 2014 Disability Awareness award for photography.

Enlarge photo

Find more articles, photos and graphics by Stacy Kess in the Portfolio.