New York Gov. David Patterson is drawing fire for both his planned budget cuts as well as his plans to avoid raising taxes on the wealthy and focus instead on 88 new taxes that will disproportionately affect middle-income and lower-income workers.

Faced with a $15.4 billion deficit, Patterson is making cuts to everything from education to health and nursing home care in an attempt to balance the budget. He is also axing a proposed raise for state employees next year and eliminating more than 3,000 jobs, mostly through attrition.

Boston Medical Center announced that 240 employees will be laid off or have their work hours slashed because they have lost $114 million in state money.

Boston Medical Center is is laying off staff in primary care, OB/GYN, pediatrics, geriatrics and other departments. Officials say that patients will be affected by the changes, which will result in longer waits for treatment as well as longer waits before anyone answers the phone.

A federal court in Miami sentenced a doctor to 30 years in prison for bilking the government of $11 million by filing false claims with the Medicare in 2003.

Wednesday's sentence of U.S. District Court Judge Federico Moreno on Dr. Ana Alvarez-Jacinto, 54, was one of the stiffest punishments meted in a federal Medicare fraud case.

A pediatric neurosurgeon has found and removed a tumor with a tiny foot and other partially formed body parts from a newborn's brain.

Sam Esquibel is being nursed back to recovery by his parents, Tiffnie and Manuel Esquibel in Colorado after Dr. Paul Grabb operated on him at the Memorial Hospital for Children in Chicago on Oct. 3.

Childhood obesity in rural communities might be effectively treated with group-based programs, University of Florida researchers say.

The study was the first to measure the effectiveness of child weight-management programs for families in a community-based setting. More than 16 percent of rural children are obesed compared to 14 percent of urban children. Various factors contribute to that disparity including higher poverty rates in rural areas and difficulty in accessing medical care, healthy foods and facilities for physical activity because of distances.