Healthcare News and Research

Latest Healthcare News and Research

Penny-wise and pound-foolish: Proposal to eliminate funding for New Jersey's tobacco prevention program

Governor Christie has let down New Jersey's kids and taxpayers with his proposal to eliminate funding for New Jersey's tobacco prevention and cessation program. This proposal will lead to more kids becoming addicted to tobacco, fewer tobacco users getting the help they need to quit, more lives being lost and New Jersey taxpayers paying the bill for higher tobacco-caused health care costs. It is truly penny-wise and pound-foolish budgeting.

20 Mar 2010

U.S to face potential outbreak of hyperinflation by 2015

The National Inflation Association - http://inflation.us - today issued a warning to all Americans of a potential outbreak of hyperinflation in the U.S. by year 2015 caused primarily by the healthcare bill and rising interest payments on our national debt.

20 Mar 2010

Merge Healthcare commences tender offer for all outstanding common stock shares of AMICAS

Merge Healthcare, a health IT solutions provider, announced today that it has commenced a tender offer for all of the outstanding shares of common stock in AMICAS, Inc., a leader in image and information management solutions. The tender offer is being commenced as provided in the previously announced definitive merger agreement between Merge and AMICAS dated as of February 28, 2010, under which a subsidiary of Merge will acquire all of the outstanding shares of AMICAS, Inc.

20 Mar 2010

SHEA, APIC awarded first Partnership in Prevention Award to National Guard Health Affairs in Saudi Arabia

During the Fifth Decennial International Conference on Healthcare-Associated Infections, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America and the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology awarded their first Partnership in Prevention Award to the National Guard Health Affairs in Saudi Arabia.

20 Mar 2010

Haiti rebuilding assessment calls for health improvements; U.S., international donors continue long-term reconstruction efforts

"An assessment [for rebuilding Haiti after the January earthquake] prepared by foreign experts for the U.N. ... calls for a system that guarantees universal access to primary care, quality services and essential medication," the Wall Street Journal reports.

20 Mar 2010

Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center awarded ECRI Institute Health Devices Achievement Award

Masimo, the inventor of Pulse CO-Oximetry™ and Measure-Through Motion and Low Perfusion pulse oximetry, is pleased to report that Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (Lebanon, New Hampshire) has received the 4th Annual ECRI Institute Health Devices Achievement Award yesterday for an innovative patient monitoring project that uses its Masimo SET pulse oximetry and Masimo Patient SafetyNet remote monitoring and clinician notification system.

20 Mar 2010

Investigation on spread of illegal drug use in social networks

Recent studies have shown that behaviors such as happiness, obesity, smoking and altruism are "contagious" within adult social networks. In other words, your behavior not only influences your friends, but also their friends and so on.

20 Mar 2010

Hospital costs for treating septicemia increased from $4.1 billion in 1997 to $12.3 billion in 2007

The hospital costs for treating septicemia increased by an average of nearly 12 percent each year from 1997 to 2007, according to the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Treating this potentially deadly blood infection increased from $4.1 billion in 1997 to $12.3 billion in 2007.

20 Mar 2010

House Democrats prepare for Sunday vote on health reconciliation bill

The Associated Press: "In seeking enough votes to overhaul the nation's health care system, President Barack Obama is telling nervous Democratic lawmakers that their political fates are linked to the bill's passage, discouraging the notion that they can save themselves by opposing it, House members say." White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs "who said the president has spoken with more than three dozen Democratic lawmakers since Monday, repeatedly sidestepped questions of whether Obama has told them his presidency's fate depends on the legislation's passage" (Babington, 3/19).

20 Mar 2010

ITDS can be effective for screening fever during H1N1 influenza pandemic: UNMC researchers

Researchers at the University of Nebraska Medical Center found an Infrared Thermal Detection System to be a fast and effective fever screening tool in clinical settings during the H1N1 influenza pandemic. The ITDS detected fever in patients through split-second, non-contact skin temperature measurements.

20 Mar 2010

For undecided lawmakers, health care bill is personal

Politico: The decision on how to vote on the health care overhaul affects members differently than nearly any other issue. "[N]o other single issue — civil rights, Medicare, even war in this age of professional armies — quite matches the personal side of health care's stubborn details. … Everybody gets sick; everybody dies.

20 Mar 2010

LiftSeat to distribute Hygie Hygienic Cover Systems in the U.S.

LiftSeat Corporation, a leading healthcare toileting solutions company, is now the exclusive distributor in the United States of the Hygie Hygienic Cover System, which is proven to help prevent the spread of potentially fatal healthcare-associated infections. The joint announcement was made today at the Fifth Decennial International Conference on Healthcare-Associated Infections 2010.

20 Mar 2010

High dose of Zocor could lead to muscle injury, warns FDA

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today warned patients and healthcare providers about the potential for increased risk of muscle injury from the cholesterol-lowering medication Zocor (simvastatin) 80 mg.

20 Mar 2010

CCAGW calls upon Congress to vote against healthcare bill

The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste today called upon Congress to reject any attempts to alter the nation’s healthcare system using parliamentary gimmicks and urged members to vote against the bill.

20 Mar 2010

SoCalBio to host forum on latest medical devices for treating obesity

The Southern California Biomedical Council will host a discussion on the latest medical devices for treating obesity during its networking forum on Thursday, March 25th (7:00 - 9:30 am) at the UC Irvine University Club.

20 Mar 2010

Student loan provisions help offset health costs in reconciliation bill

"Without the inclusion of a student loan overhaul, the healthcare reconciliation bill would likely have been blocked in the Senate, according to an analysis of preliminary CBO estimates," Congress Daily reports.

20 Mar 2010

Divisions within pro-life groups on overhaul ease opposition

A previously steadfast coalition opposed to abortion - which feared that the health overhaul could divert federal money to support the procedure - is beginning to crack, The Christian Science Monitor reports. "Increasingly, abortion foes - including high-profile Catholic organizations and members of Congress - are saying that while the language aimed at preventing use of federal funds for abortion is not perfect, the bill is still worth passing as a first step."

19 Mar 2010

Comprehensive community-based solution to help achieve 'meaningful use'

Navigating the Challenges of Meaningful Use to Identify Benefits, March 31, 2010, 2 p.m. CT, a Webinar hosted by Informatics Corporation of America, will explore how to practically implement a community-wide solution that assists its healthcare participants to achieve the proposed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act’s criteria for meaningful use and bridge gaps in the adoption of electronic health records by its provider community.

19 Mar 2010

CIO Healthcare Summit to be sponsored by Zanett Healthcare

Zanett Healthcare is pleased to announce that it will sponsor the CIO Healthcare Summit, a leading gathering for CIOs, analysts and industry-thought leaders within healthcare information technology. The CIO Healthcare Summit will be held at the InterContinental Montelucia Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona on May 9-12, 2010.

19 Mar 2010

Comprehensive healthcare reform: March Madness in Congress

"It's March Madness in Congress as well as on the nation's basketball courts this week, so let's look at the past performance charts to see how the two teams have performed on the big challenge of comprehensive healthcare reform.

19 Mar 2010