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Sec. of State Clinton addresses Afghan women's rights during visit to Kabul

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton "used part of her address to a key conference in Kabul on Tuesday to defend Afghan women concerned that peace efforts with the Taliban could jeopardise their rights," Agence France-Presse reports.

22 Jul 2010

Penn. official urges Bill to prohibit 'health profiling' and limit rate hikes; Nev., Ariz. wrestle with rising costs for public employees' benefits; McCollum releases health plan

"Pennsylvania's insurance commissioner is urging state legislators to pass a bill that would prohibit 'health profiling' and limit rate increases in advance of the 2014 enactment of the main provisions of the federal health-care reform law. Testifying before the House Insurance Committee, ... Joel Ario said he arrived at those recommendations following the department's investigation on the rating practices and premium increases of the top nine health insurance companies operating in Pennsylvania" (Toland, 7/21).

22 Jul 2010

Saskatchewan nursing homes to test improvement program to increase patient care time in hospitals

Three Saskatchewan nursing homes will be the first long-term care facilities to test the effectiveness of an improvement program that has been shown to increase the amount of time providers spend on direct patient care in hospitals.

22 Jul 2010

Calif.'s Anthem Blue Cross president resigns following sharp criticism of rate increases

The Los Angeles Times: Leslie Margolin, the president of California's Anthem Blue Cross, is resigning. "During her 2 1/2-year tenure at the helm of California's largest for-profit insurer, Margolin tried to cast Anthem as a responsible corporate leader that cared for customers and sought to contain costs by forging collaborative relationships with hospitals, doctors and other medical providers.

22 Jul 2010

New telepathology system connects UHN pathologists to Northern Ontario communities

Physicians in three Northern Ontario communities are now virtually linked at all times to pathology specialists at University Health Network (UHN), thanks to a revolutionary new way of diagnosing pathology cases over the Internet.

22 Jul 2010

Senate panel to focus on problems at continuing care retirement communities with large fees

The Wall Street Journal: A Senate Committee will hold hearings Wednesday about "continuing-care retirement communities," which charge large up-front fees to care for seniors for life. "CCRCs offer a range of care — from independent-living apartments to skilled nursing facilities — that allows seniors to 'age in place.'

22 Jul 2010

Accommodating patients may help reduce racial health disparities, improve patient satisfaction: Study

What if an emergency room patient wants a different doctor than the one who reports to their examination room? If the patient is a woman or a racial minority, emergency physicians are more likely to honor their request to see a doctor of their same gender, race or religious background.

22 Jul 2010

'Mystery patients' study says doctors can miss health's social determinants

Chicago Tribune: So-called "mystery patients" are showing that doctors often ignore or fail to ask about social determinants when it comes to health outcomes, a recent study suggests, for exampel, testing an emaciated patient for cancer before asking if he got enough to eat (he didn't).

22 Jul 2010

Hospital updates: ERs try to shorten waits, Florida Children's Hospital to join with Johns Hopkins

To attract patients, hospitals are increasingly posting wait times for their emergency rooms "on billboards, websites, social media outlets like Twitter and in text messages," The Salt Lake Tribune reports. "It's a competitive strategy, but also a tool for bending the wait-time curve and, hopefully, improving patient care, said Mary Joe Jones, chief clinical nursing officer at St. Mark's Hospital in Salt Lake City."

22 Jul 2010

Eli Lilly CEO says U.S. drugmakers' biggest challenge is sustaining innovation

USA Today/Indianapolis Star: Drugmakers are facing an array of challenges, like lawsuits and patent losses, but also new opportunities including global growth and an expected surge in the number of U.S. residents with health insurance. Eli Lilly CEO John Lechleiter comments in a Q&A: "The biggest challenge facing the industry is to be able to sustain the flow of innovative medicines from our pipelines that can effectively compete against the generic versions of our own products" (Chu, 7/21).

22 Jul 2010

Despite law, mental health coverage lacking in many insurance plans

Kaiser Health News staff writer Kate Steadman checks in with Andrew Sperling, the National Alliance on Mental Illness's director of federal legislative advocacy, for a progress report on the implementation of the new mental health parity law (Steadman, 7/21).

22 Jul 2010

Current myths vs. realities in global AIDS funding

Activists at the International AIDS Conference in Vienna are charging developed and developing country governments with writing checques that bounce to the millions of people in need of lifesaving HIV treatment. Despite the gains in treatment numbers reported by WHO, the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition's (ITPC), latest report, Rationing Funds, Risking Lives, documents early warnings of the global pullback on AIDS commitment and funding.

22 Jul 2010

Wal-Mart sued for limiting employee medical care

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is facing a class-action lawsuit in Colorado accusing the company "of conspiring to limit medical care for injured employees in a bid to save money," The Wall Street Journal reports.

22 Jul 2010

AU Pre-Summit on Gender concludes

The African Union (AU) Pre-Summit on Gender concludes Wednesday after three days of discussion about how African countries could improve progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) targeting women and children's health, the Independent reports.

22 Jul 2010

Severe state budget shortfalls trigger Medicaid program cuts

As states face severe budget shortfalls, many have cut home-care services for the elderly or the disabled, programs that have been shown to save states money in the long run because they keep people out of nursing homes. Since the start of the recession, at least 25 states and the District of Columbia have curtailed programs that include meal deliveries, housekeeping aid and assistance for family caregivers, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research organization.

22 Jul 2010

Enrollment jump helps UnitedHealth Group profits soar 31 percent

Health insurer UnitedHealth Group reported a second quarter profit jump of 31 percent as enrollment in the insurer's plans went up, The Associated Press/The New York Times reports. "The company's total enrollment grew about 1 percent, to 32.5 million compared with last year, with gains in Medicare and Medicaid businesses offsetting commercial health insurance losses." The company's commercial enrollment fell 440,000 as the sector deals with job cuts and the recession (7/20).

22 Jul 2010

Harvard cracks down on doctors' ties to industry

In the face of increased scrutiny of ties between industry and medical school faculty, Harvard is tightening its conflict-of-interest policies, The Boston Globe reports.

22 Jul 2010

Study identifies treatment strategies that can slow progression of eye disease associated with diabetes

The VA Maryland Health Care System participated in a landmark national study of more than 10,251 high-risk diabetic adults across the nation, testing if three complementary treatment strategies can reduce the high rate of heart disease and stroke associated with type 2 diabetes and if these treatment strategies can also slow the progression of eye disease associated with diabetes, the leading cause of blindness in working-age Americans.

22 Jul 2010

'Meaningful use' guidelines under fire from Republicans

NextGov: Recently released requirements for physicians and hospitals to earn cash rewards for the "meaningful use" of electronic medical records are not tough enough to justify an investment of billions of dollars, House Republicans said Tuesday. "In a hearing of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee, officials from the Health and Human Services Department defended the recently released standards.

22 Jul 2010

Lawmakers: Extend Medicaid subsidies to help African-American seniors

"Three black members of Congress on Tuesday said minority nursing home patients would be disproportionately affected if Congress fails to extend bonus payments to state Medicaid programs" (Galewitz, 7/20).

22 Jul 2010

Health Care News and Research

Sec. of State Clinton addresses Afghan women's rights during visit to Kabul

Penn. official urges Bill to prohibit 'health profiling' and limit rate hikes; Nev., Ariz. wrestle with rising costs for public employees' benefits; McCollum releases health plan

Saskatchewan nursing homes to test improvement program to increase patient care time in hospitals

Calif.'s Anthem Blue Cross president resigns following sharp criticism of rate increases

New telepathology system connects UHN pathologists to Northern Ontario communities

Senate panel to focus on problems at continuing care retirement communities with large fees

Accommodating patients may help reduce racial health disparities, improve patient satisfaction: Study

'Mystery patients' study says doctors can miss health's social determinants

Hospital updates: ERs try to shorten waits, Florida Children's Hospital to join with Johns Hopkins

Eli Lilly CEO says U.S. drugmakers' biggest challenge is sustaining innovation

Despite law, mental health coverage lacking in many insurance plans

Current myths vs. realities in global AIDS funding

Wal-Mart sued for limiting employee medical care

AU Pre-Summit on Gender concludes

Severe state budget shortfalls trigger Medicaid program cuts

Enrollment jump helps UnitedHealth Group profits soar 31 percent

Harvard cracks down on doctors' ties to industry

Study identifies treatment strategies that can slow progression of eye disease associated with diabetes

'Meaningful use' guidelines under fire from Republicans

Lawmakers: Extend Medicaid subsidies to help African-American seniors

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