McClellan seeks to lead charge for healthcare reform
September 1st 2007WASHINGTON, D.C.-Instead of going back to academia, former FDA Commissioner and Medicare Administrator Mark McClellan, MD, is setting up his own shop to tackle health reform and drug safety more actively. Dr. McClellan will head the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at the Brookings Institution, starting with $20 million in funding from Alfred Engelberg and Leonard Schaeffer.
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Surge in PFFS plans requires push for regulations (More on Special Report, Sep. 2007)
September 1st 2007Private fee-for-service (PFFS) plans are the fastest growing, and most controversial, aspect of the Medicare Advantage (MA) program. They account for approximately 18% of total enrollment, and according to MedPAC, they are receiving payments that average 19% more than payments to traditional Medicare.
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Integrated approach to Medicare Advantage may spell difference between profit and loss
September 1st 2007Leaders of Medicare Advantage (MA) organizations are concerned about maintaining the profitability of their MA products. To be successful, organizations should develop internal profitability best practices.
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Future of U.S. managed healthcare centers on simplicity and ease of use
September 1st 2007Healthcare reform has surfaced as a national topic. Intel co-founder Andy Grove outlined some noteworthy ideas on healthcare reform during a national speaking tour, and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger recently proposed a plan to cover the citizens of his state. Getting a head start on the 2008 Presidential race, Mitt Rommey is weighing in with proposals based on his experience as former Governor of Massachusetts. While all these ideas are coming from different sources, they all share a few basic themes: healthcare should be easy to find, to buy, and to understand.
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E-prescribing mixes policy, politics to create better healthcare
September 1st 2007Preventable medication errors are resulting in $3.5 billion in drug-injury related healthcare costs. To address this crisis, the IoM recommends that the entire system move to electronic prescribing (e-prescribing) by 2010.
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Study: Drug company evidence sent to plans is of variable quality
September 1st 2007NATIONAL REPORTS-An opportunity for drug companies to voluntarily provide detailed evidence of their products' cost effectiveness to existing alternatives is showing progress-but is still far from successful, according to industry experts.
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McClellan seeks to lead charge for healthcare reform
September 1st 2007WASHINGTON, D.C.-Instead of going back to academia, former FDA Commissioner and Medicare Administrator Mark McClellan, MD, is setting up his own shop to tackle health reform and drug safety more actively. Dr. McClellan will head the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at the Brookings Institution, starting with $20 million in funding from Alfred Engelberg and Leonard Schaeffer.
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Effects of transparency tools tough to determine
September 1st 2007If we are treating healthcare as a commodity, then why not determine its real value? That might be more easily said than done, but as more and more consumers demand transparency in healthcare, payers, providers and pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs) are sharing information on the cost of treatments, screenings and drugs.
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Chronic care crossroads: AAN CEO hopes to swing policy pendulum in favor of prevention
September 1st 2007Pat Ford-Roegner, MSW, RN, FAAN, CEO of the American Academy of Nursing (AAN), seems a natural fit for her latest appointment as a member of the new Washington, D.C.-based Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease (PFCD) Advisory Board. The board, led by Richard H. Carmona, MD, MPH, FACS, former U.S. Surgeon General, is comprised of 40 high-profile CEOs and presidents from the public and private sector.
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Decades of change: Rocky Mountain CEO John Hopkins has witnessed managed care's evolution
September 1st 2007John Hopkins, president and CEO of Rocky Mountain Health Plans, has a 20-year history with the organization and has witnessed the ongoing changes in the nation's healthcare delivery system from Rocky Mountain's headquarters in Grand Junction, Colo. Few CEOs can claim such a tenure with a single plan, but Hopkins has never been anxious to leave an organization that remains solid despite healthcare's constant transformation.
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Congress battles White House over SCHIP expansion
September 1st 2007The need to reauthorize the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by September 30, has evolved into a broader debate about the role of government in providing healthcare to Americans. The Bush administration wants to maintain a limited program for low-income children, while Democrats envision more open-ended coverage for more children and families.
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Waiter, there's Staphylococcus aureus in my soup: Infection prevention is common sense
September 1st 2007Coffee shops, restaurants and grocery stores have started getting serious about employees washing their hands to prevent the spread of germs. If the guy who steams my cafe latte remembers to scrub his hands for 30 seconds before getting behind the coffee counter, then why aren't more healthcare providers remembering to do it?
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Data from 2 identical double-blind phase 3 studies demonstrated that patients with migraine who were assigned to sumatriptan plus naproxen were more likely to be pain-free at 2 hours and more likely to experience relief from both traditional and nontraditional migraine symptoms compared with those assigned to placebo.
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The use of pioglitazone in patients with renal dysfunction, type 2 diabetes, and macrovascular disease can reduce the risk of death, nonfatal myocardial infarction (MI), and stroke according to results presented at the 67th annual scientific sessions of the American Diabetes Association.
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Bare-metal and drug-eluting stents yield similar cardiac event risks, according to pooled analysis
August 1st 2007A pooled analysis involving 1,748 patients in 4 randomized trials contradicts the results of recent trials that have demonstrated that the risks for death and myocardial infarction (MI) are potentially higher in patients receiving drug-eluting stents (particularlysirolimus-eluting stents) compared with patients receiving bare-metal stents.
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Patients with cancer and ACS, with or without thrombocytopenia, may benefit from use of aspirin
August 1st 2007In a small, retrospective, case-control study, it was demonstrated that aspirin (ASA) improved 7-day survival in patients with cancer who developed acute coronary syndrome (ACS), with or without thrombocytopenia.
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