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Hospitals shift business plans for waning economy, changing government policies

A sluggish economy, changing government regulation and court cases have prompted new business strategies at hospitals, according to news reports.

22 Jun 2010

Celator announces expansion of research agreement with Cephalon

Celator Pharmaceuticals today announced that it has expanded its research agreement with Cephalon, Inc.. The research agreement provides for the utilization of Celator's proprietary technology in an ongoing drug development and life-cycle management program at Cephalon.

22 Jun 2010

People who purchase insurance on their own faced premium hike rates around 20 percent, survey finds

People who purchase health insurance on their own were faced with premium increases averaging 20 percent when they last sought to renew their coverage, according to a survey released Monday by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

22 Jun 2010

Women who experience early menopause may have cardiovascular disease later in life: Study

Women who experience early menopause appear to have more than twice the risk of having a heart attack, stroke or other cardiovascular disease event later in life than do women who do not go through early menopause, a new study indicates. The results will be presented Saturday at The Endocrine Society's 92nd Annual Meeting in San Diego.

22 Jun 2010

Walgreens will stay in Caremark's prescription network

Los Angeles Times: Walgreens and Caremark announced Friday "they had settled a dispute that threatened to prevent thousands of people from filling their prescriptions at Walgreens stores." Caremark runs CVS stores and pharmacies. "At issue: the way Caremark, one of the nation's biggest prescription-plan operators, prices discounts for prescriptions filled at Walgreens pharmacies, which often compete fiercely with nearby CVS stores nationwide.

22 Jun 2010

Health reform implementation: Risk pool nears enrollment date; Seniors anxious about Medicare changes; Benefits reportable

As high-risk insurance pools are preparing to enroll the chronically ill July 1, officials should heed the Florida experience. "Plagued by exorbitant medical costs and skimpy revenue, the Florida Comprehensive Health Association, by order of the Legislature, stopped accepting new enrollees in 1991, eight years after it was created." The pool once covered about 7,000 Florida residents; now only a few hundred remain as premiums are double the standard rate.

22 Jun 2010

Congressional hearing examines administration's crack down on health care fraud

The feds have promised to turn up the heat on providers, real and phony, who steal from and game the system. ... Lawmakers and President Barack Obama are demanding that the CMS and their partners in law enforcement do more to stem the wasted healthcare dollars gushing out of the Treasury like oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

22 Jun 2010

FDA approves ARCHITECT HIV Ag/Ab Combo assay to aid in diagnosis of HIV-1/HIV-2 infection

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today approved the first assay to detect both antigen and antibodies to Human Immunodeficiency Virus. This assay is approved for use as an aid in the diagnosis of HIV-1/HIV-2 infection in adults including pregnant women. It is also the first assay for use as an aid in the diagnosis of HIV-1/HIV-2 infection in children as young as two years old.

22 Jun 2010

Reform law gives major boost to community health centers, medical homes

The Washington Post: "The health-care legislation signed into law in March provides a major boost to community health centers: $11 billion over five years. The first of these federally supported primary-care clinics opened in 1965." The law also provides funding designed to increase the supply of primary-care providers. And, "[o]n Wednesday, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius announced that the federal government will spend $250 million in programs to increase the number of doctors, nurses and other care providers.

21 Jun 2010

Hospitals and researchers test programs to stop readmissions

The Boston Globe reports on hospital readmissions: "In Massachusetts, more than 10 percent of patients are back in the hospital for the same or unrelated complaints within a month, according to the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, a Cambridge-based nonprofit think tank. Over two years, more than a quarter of all patients end up paying a repeat visit to the hospital, a new 12-state study by the US Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found.

21 Jun 2010

Millar, Telemetry Research partner to offer TRM53P implantable transmitters

Millar Instruments, Inc., a medical device manufacturing firm and developer of pressure sensing technology, has released the TRM53P implantable transmitter through the partnership with Telemetry Research, Ltd. The TRM53P is the world's first, fully implantable transmitter that combines Millar's gold standard solid-state pressure sensors with Telemetry Research's next generation telemetry technology.

21 Jun 2010

Malpractice reformers get grants, but fear of lawsuits remains ER scourge

A New York judge's unusual technique — listening to the families of injured people, knowing something about medicine — for dealing with difficult medical malpractice cases will be among 20 explored with $3 million grants as part of the health overhaul, The Associated Press reports. The judge, Douglas McKeon, said, "I don't discuss settlement offers with families right away. … I just say, 'Tell me a little bit about your loved one.'"

21 Jun 2010

Experimental cure for Type 1 diabetes

Researchers have developed an experimental cure for Type 1 diabetes, a disease that affects about one in every 400 to 600 children and adolescents. They will present their results in a mouse model of Type 1 diabetes on Sunday at The Endocrine Society's 92nd Annual Meeting in San Diego.

21 Jun 2010

Doctors, Pelosi pan Senate-passed 'doc fix' plan

USA Today: Doctors are limiting the number of new Medicare patients they are seeing, concerned about reimbursements pay from the federal program. "Recent surveys by national and state medical societies have found more doctors limiting Medicare patients, partly because Congress has failed to stop an automatic 21% cut in payments that doctors already regard as too low.

21 Jun 2010

Martek extends sole-source supply agreement with Mead Johnson for DHA and ARA for infant formula products

Martek Biosciences Corporation announced today that it has extended its sole-source supply agreement with Mead Johnson & Company, LLC, for DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and ARA (arachidonic acid) for infant formula products. Under the terms of the amendment, Martek will remain Mead Johnson's global sole-source supplier of DHA and ARA for all of its infant formula products through December 31, 2015, an extension of four years beyond the earliest possible termination date of the current agreement.

21 Jun 2010

Also in Global Health News: WHO scraps drug development group; Access to medication in Philippines; Yellow fever vaccine shortage; HIV-positive employee protection

Lancet World Report examines how "[d]isappointment over a long-awaited report on improving drug research and development for neglected diseases" led the WHO to form a new Consultative Expert Working Group (CEWG) to strategize around drug research and development. The formation of the new group comes after the report from the previous working group (EWG) was questioned due to "what some perceived to be a missed opportunity, unclear methods, a lack of transparency and signs of industry interference" and after "suspicions of impropriety" surfaced.

21 Jun 2010

Today's OpEds: Medicare reimbursements threaten health care; Battling health care fraud; A national standard on nurse-patient ratios

The Senate on Friday passed the annual "doc fix" -- but this short-term stay on the reimbursement rates for physicians who treat Medicare patients does not resolve the underlying problem: Those reimbursements are woefully below market. And if Congress does not address this, the much-heralded health-care reform is at risk (Dr. Michael Newman, 6/19).

21 Jun 2010

KHN column: Even with the 'grandfather clause' protection, change is coming to most health plans

In his latest Kaiser Health News column, done in collaboration with The New Republic, Jonathan Cohn writes: "Now that Karl Rove doesn't have a Republican president to advise anymore, he's been picking up some new hobbies. One of them is health care policy. In a recent column for the Wall Street Journal editorial page, Rove made the latest in a series of attacks on the new reform law.

21 Jun 2010

Palatin reports preclinical study results of PL-3994 in respiratory tissue for asthma indications

Palatin Technologies, Inc. today announced results of preclinical studies in respiratory tissue with PL-3994. In rat, guinea pig and human tissues, PL-3994 produced potent relaxation of isolated airway smooth muscle, indicating that PL-3994 may be a potent bronchodilator in humans.

21 Jun 2010

Essen BioScience, Nycomed partner to develop modulators of voltage-gated ion channels

Essen BioScience Inc. - a specialty provider of cell-based assay solutions and contract research services - and Nycomed - a privately owned global pharmaceutical company headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland - are pleased to announce a joint discovery agreement to identify novel small molecule ion channel modulators as pain therapeutics.

From Sartorius 21 Jun 2010

Research News and Research

Hospitals shift business plans for waning economy, changing government policies

Celator announces expansion of research agreement with Cephalon

People who purchase insurance on their own faced premium hike rates around 20 percent, survey finds

Women who experience early menopause may have cardiovascular disease later in life: Study

Walgreens will stay in Caremark's prescription network

Health reform implementation: Risk pool nears enrollment date; Seniors anxious about Medicare changes; Benefits reportable

Congressional hearing examines administration's crack down on health care fraud

FDA approves ARCHITECT HIV Ag/Ab Combo assay to aid in diagnosis of HIV-1/HIV-2 infection

Reform law gives major boost to community health centers, medical homes

Hospitals and researchers test programs to stop readmissions

Millar, Telemetry Research partner to offer TRM53P implantable transmitters

Malpractice reformers get grants, but fear of lawsuits remains ER scourge

Experimental cure for Type 1 diabetes

Doctors, Pelosi pan Senate-passed 'doc fix' plan

Martek extends sole-source supply agreement with Mead Johnson for DHA and ARA for infant formula products

Also in Global Health News: WHO scraps drug development group; Access to medication in Philippines; Yellow fever vaccine shortage; HIV-positive employee protection

Today's OpEds: Medicare reimbursements threaten health care; Battling health care fraud; A national standard on nurse-patient ratios

KHN column: Even with the 'grandfather clause' protection, change is coming to most health plans

Palatin reports preclinical study results of PL-3994 in respiratory tissue for asthma indications

Essen BioScience, Nycomed partner to develop modulators of voltage-gated ion channels

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