Hospital News and Research

RSS

Heart disease patients may benefit from secondary preventive care

Research has shown that heart disease patients who make lifestyle improvements, take recommended medications and control risk factors such as high cholesterol and high blood pressure can prevent heart disease from worsening.

17 Mar 2010

Boosting radiation dose for prostate cancer patients does not increase severity of side effects

Boosting the radiation dose given to prostate cancer patients to a level that cut tumor recurrence in half did not increase the severity of side effects reported by patients up to a decade later. The study led by Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center researchers also found that patients characterized the impact of continuing side effects on their quality of life as considerably less bothersome than would be expected, based on earlier studies.

17 Mar 2010

California jury rules insurer should pay for out-of-state operation; Mass. probe shows insurers' payments can vary widely

The Los Angeles Times: "A Los Angeles jury concluded Monday that Anthem Blue Cross should cover the cost of an out-of-state liver transplant that a California man paid for after the insurer balked. In addition, the jury ordered Blue Cross to pay plaintiff Ephram Nehme's legal expenses, which could dwarf the $206,000 cost of the transplant. Blue Cross approved Nehme's liver transplant in late 2006, and he was on the waiting list at UCLA Medical Center.

17 Mar 2010

Obama makes a final overhaul pitch in Ohio

With a possible deciding vote on health care overhaul legislation nearing, President Obama traveled Monday to Ohio to make a last-minute plea for political "courage" to pass the legislation, The Washington Post reports. "Making an impassioned pitch in a part of the country where unemployment runs high and insurance coverage is uncertain, Obama said in a speech at a senior center here, 'I don't know about the politics, but I know what's the right thing to do'" (Slevin and Branigin, 3/15).

17 Mar 2010

Ascent's hospital partners save millions using medical device remanufacturing programs

Ascent, the market leader in the remanufacturing of medical devices in the U.S., announced today that its hospital partners realized hundreds of millions of dollars in cost savings through the use of medical device remanufacturing programs in 2009. On a per-hospital basis, some hospitals saved more than $600,000 per year.

17 Mar 2010

Catholic Bishops oppose health bill, while other Catholic groups offer support

McClatchy: "The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said Monday it opposes the Democratic health care plan heading for a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives because of its language on abortion. The group noted that it liked the House health care bill because it would continue the strict ban on federal financing of abortion.

17 Mar 2010

BioVigil's second generation hand hygiene monitoring system released

BioVigil LLC has released the second generation of the BioVigil hand hygiene monitoring system. The innovative system enables hospitals to more effectively combat Hospital-Acquired Infections (HAIs) by dramatically increasing hand hygiene compliance among healthcare workers.

16 Mar 2010

National, state efforts seek to reduce medical errors

The Wall Street Journal: "Errors made by doctors, nurses and other medical caregivers cause 44,000 to 98,000 deaths a year. Hospital infections, many considered preventable, take another 100,000 lives. ... Hospitals are taking what might seem like a surprising approach to confronting the problem: Not only are they trying to improve safety and reduce malpractice claims, they're also coming up with procedures for handling—and even consoling—staffers who make inadvertent mistakes."

16 Mar 2010

Human amniotic fluid skin cells "reprogrammed" to pluripotency

In a breakthrough that may help fill a critical need in stem cell research and patient care, researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have demonstrated that skin cells found in human amniotic fluid can be efficiently "reprogrammed" to pluripotency, where they have characteristics similar to human embryonic stem cells that can develop into almost any type of cell in the human body. The study is online now and will appear in print in the next issue of the journal Cellular Reprogramming, to be published next month.

16 Mar 2010

CareTech Solutions signs five-year infrastructure outsourcing contract with Sibley Memorial Hospital

CareTech Solutions, Inc., (www.caretech.com) an information technology (IT) and Web products and services company servicing U.S. hospitals and health systems, announced today that it has signed a five-year, comprehensive infrastructure outsourcing contract with Sibley Memorial Hospital, a full-service, 328 bed nonprofit acute care community hospital serving the Washington, D.C. area.

16 Mar 2010

PCI Biotech completes treatment of third dose group in phase I/II study of Amphinex in cancer patients

PCI Biotech reported today that it has completed the treatment of the third dose group in the phase I/II study of its proprietary photosensitiser Amphinex® used in combination with the cytotoxic agent bleomycin in cancer patients.

16 Mar 2010

Blocking RhoA enzyme increases survival in SMA mouse model

Scientists from the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI) and the University of Ottawa have identified a promising new approach for developing drugs to treat Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), the leading inherited cause of death in infants and toddlers. Dr. Rashmi Kothary and his doctoral student Melissa Bowerman have found that an enzyme called RhoA is overly active in a mouse model of the disease and blocking this enzyme can greatly increase survival. The study is published in Human Molecular Genetics.

16 Mar 2010

MD Pathways, TIPAAA announce five-year partnership

MD Pathways, LLC announced today a five-year partnership with The IPA Association of America (TIPAAA), the nation’s largest independent physicians association with over 700 IPA members representing more than 300,000 MDs nationwide.

16 Mar 2010

HCSC offers CareProfile tool to assist physicians, healthcare facilities identify health risks

Health Care Service Corporation is offering physicians and healthcare facilities access to a new tool that will assist them in identifying health risks for 9 million patients across the country. The CareProfile® is an electronic health record (EHR) created with the collaborative input of MEDecision, Availity and HCSC’s Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans in Illinois, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

16 Mar 2010

Mortality in CAD patients: Key predictor identified

Coronary Artery Disease (CAD) hospitalizes more than 160,000 Canadians every year, and almost one quarter of those patients die from this common form of heart disease. But now a team of Vancouver-based researchers has identified a key predictor of mortality in CAD patients, which means that specialists can better determine how to treat and improve outcomes for patients with CAD.

16 Mar 2010

First Edition: March 16, 2010

In today's headlines, ongoing efforts by President Obama and Democratic leaders to press and persuade wavering votes in support of health reform take center stage.

16 Mar 2010

Enrollment in patient study to evaluate Magellan DART System for Annular Repair completed

Magellan Spine Technologies, Inc. today announced it had completed enrollment in a twenty patient study to evaluate the Magellan DART (Disc Annular Repair Technology) System for Annular Repair following lumbar discectomy procedures. This first study demonstrates evidence that the DART technology is safe and patients implanted with the DART have excellent outcomes approaching one year follow-up.

16 Mar 2010

Hybrid revascularization procedure is safe and feasible for left main coronary artery stenosis

The left main coronary artery provides most of the blood to the heart, and current guidelines call for patients with blockages in this artery to undergo bypass surgery.

16 Mar 2010

New method may shed light on the mechanism behind folding and misfolding of proteins

Researchers at the Department of Chemistry at the Technische Universit-t M-nchen (TUM) have developed a method that allows the observation of local movements in proteins on a time scale of nanoseconds to microseconds.

16 Mar 2010

MRSA Survivors Network urges CDC to declare MRSA an epidemic

MRSA Survivors Network, the nonprofit organization, along with other advocates, urgently plead with the CDC – (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), along with the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to finally acknowledge the public health crisis to the public and take action.

16 Mar 2010

Hospital News and Research

Heart disease patients may benefit from secondary preventive care

Boosting radiation dose for prostate cancer patients does not increase severity of side effects

California jury rules insurer should pay for out-of-state operation; Mass. probe shows insurers' payments can vary widely

Obama makes a final overhaul pitch in Ohio

Ascent's hospital partners save millions using medical device remanufacturing programs

Catholic Bishops oppose health bill, while other Catholic groups offer support

BioVigil's second generation hand hygiene monitoring system released

National, state efforts seek to reduce medical errors

Human amniotic fluid skin cells "reprogrammed" to pluripotency

CareTech Solutions signs five-year infrastructure outsourcing contract with Sibley Memorial Hospital

PCI Biotech completes treatment of third dose group in phase I/II study of Amphinex in cancer patients

Blocking RhoA enzyme increases survival in SMA mouse model

MD Pathways, TIPAAA announce five-year partnership

HCSC offers CareProfile tool to assist physicians, healthcare facilities identify health risks

Mortality in CAD patients: Key predictor identified

First Edition: March 16, 2010

Enrollment in patient study to evaluate Magellan DART System for Annular Repair completed

Hybrid revascularization procedure is safe and feasible for left main coronary artery stenosis

New method may shed light on the mechanism behind folding and misfolding of proteins

MRSA Survivors Network urges CDC to declare MRSA an epidemic

Discover how SciY empowers scientists

Why use light scattering to analyze proteins and viral vectors?

Changing the landscape of R&D to build clinical success from the ground up

Latest News