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UVA acquires Extend to broaden the potential for Gamma Knife Perfexion

Patients with overly large benign skull base tumors, lesions too close to critical anatomy and those with multiple brain metastases are among those who will benefit first from a new "frameless" device for use with Leksell Gamma Knife Perfexion systems.

From Elekta 18 Dec 2009

Wisconsin cuts $600 million from Medicaid budget, still faces deficit

The Associated Press reports that the top Wisconsin health official said Thursday that the state is "on track to cut more than $600 million from Medicaid, but even with those reductions, high demand from the poor for insurance benefits could result in up to a $150 million shortfall."

18 Dec 2009

Laid-off workers may get COBRA help before Christmas

Kaiser Health News staff writer Jenny Gold writes about a COBRA extension moving through Congress. "A proposal to extend the health insurance subsidies for Americans who have lost jobs as a result of the recession is one step closer to gaining congressional approval.

18 Dec 2009

Health overhaul could worsen doctor shortages

BusinessWeek: "Presuming Congress passes some version of a health-care bill and it is signed into law, some 30 million currently uninsured people will suddenly find themselves with access to doctors. But there may not be enough doctors to see them."

18 Dec 2009

STERIPLEX HC kills MRSA and other pathogens in record time

STERIPLEX® Health Care (HC) is a new Sterilant/Sporicide, Tuberculocide, and Bactericide, which has recently received Federal EPA Registration. STERIPLEX® HC sets new standards, killing MRSA, spores and other pathogens in a fraction of the time of competing products while remaining safe to people and the environment.

18 Dec 2009

VA apologizes for faulty prostate-cancer program in Pa. but denies radiation violations

"The Department of Veterans Affairs yesterday apologized repeatedly for a prostate-cancer program that gave incorrect radiation doses to veterans for six years at its main Philadelphia hospital," The Philadelphia Inquirer reports.

18 Dec 2009

Roundup of health policy research and analyses

Urban Institute/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation: What Would Health Care Reform Mean for Small Employers and Their Workers? - "Small employers and their workers face a broad assortment of barriers to obtaining health insurance coverage today," such as "high administrative costs, limited ability to spread health care risk, and a low-wage workforce."

18 Dec 2009

Health industry revenue up 5.7 percent, some seniors head south for care

The Dallas Morning News reports that the U.S. Census released a report Thursday that showed health care industry's revenues grew 5.7 percent in 2008 to $1.75 trillion. The number represents 30 percent of economic activity in the U.S., according to a Census official. "The Census Bureau cites Texas as one of the most expensive states for health care.

18 Dec 2009

Medtronic launches its SOVEREIGN Spinal System in the U.S.

Medtronic, Inc. today announced the U.S. launch of the SOVEREIGN™ Spinal System.

18 Dec 2009

The backstories of politicians scrambling on health legislation

Politico: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has kept his legislative strategy for the health overhaul under wraps, even from his closest lieutenants. "As Reid works furiously to line up the 60 votes he needs for the most sweeping health care bill in generations, the majority leader is playing an insider's insider's game. He's having private, one-on-one conversations with colleagues, and he's not sharing the contents with others.

18 Dec 2009

COBRA extension moves forward - in defense appropriations bill

Modern Healthcare: "The Senate is expected to vote on a fiscal 2010 Defense appropriations bill by this weekend that would extend a health insurance subsidy for laid-off workers through February 2010. The House has approved the subsidy extension for the COBRA program, which was tucked into the $636.3 billion Defense appropriations bill."

18 Dec 2009

A selection of today's opinions and editorials

No one has guaranteed ways to slow the growth of health-care spending and ... the pending bills include most of the ways experts believe are likely to succeed (Henry J. Aaron, 12/18).

18 Dec 2009

Mannatech patent infringement: U.S. Judge grants injunction against Green Life and Xiong Lo

Mannatech, Incorporated, a global pioneer in the development of high-quality health, weight and fitness, and skin care solutions based on nutritional science, obtained a judgment finding that Green Life, LLC (Green Life), and Xiong Lo (Lo) infringed Mannatech patents (U.S. Patents 6,929,807; 7,157,431; 7,196,064; 7,199,104; and 7,202,220).

18 Dec 2009

Republicans oppose military spending to delay health bill

Senate Republicans attempted last night to block a $626 billion defense bill in hopes that stalling the military spending legislation would delay Democrats' work on the health overhaul, The Washington Post reports. By a 63-33 vote early Friday morning, the defense measure cleared a key procedural hurdle that should now allow it to gain passage and, as a result, allow the Senate to return to the health bill.

18 Dec 2009

Labor leaders term Senate health bill 'inadequate'

CBS News: "Labor leaders from two influential unions today called the Senate health care bill 'inadequate,' but they stopped short of pulling their support for the bill. Instead, they are pressing the White House and Congress to modify the bill more to make it more like the House health reform package. After a meeting yesterday with leaders of the Service Employees International Union and a meeting today with its members, SEIU President Andy Stern said the union does not think the Senate is willing or able to make any more progress on its bill.

18 Dec 2009

GSK receives European CHMP positive opinion for Revolade

Ligand Pharmaceuticals Incorporated today announced that its partner GlaxoSmithKline has received a positive opinion for Revolade® (eltrombopag/Promacta®) from the European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) for the oral treatment of thrombocytopenia (reduced platelet count) in adults with the blood disorder chronic immune (idiopathic) thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP).

18 Dec 2009

Senate health bill relies on government regulation to expand coverage

The Los Angeles Times: "When Senate Democratic leaders agreed this week to remove a public insurance plan from their massive healthcare bill, they did more than quash a liberal dream of expanding the government safety net. They effectively pinned their hopes of guaranteeing coverage to all Americans on a far more conventional prescription: government regulation.

18 Dec 2009

White House stung by Liberal health bill backlash

The Wall Street Journal reports on the criticism emanating from the left regarding the Senate health bill. "Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean is mounting a campaign of sorts against the initiative in its current form.

18 Dec 2009

EMA's CHMP issues positive opinion for Cangene's Human Hepatitis B Immunoglobulin product

Cangene Corporation today reports that it has received a positive opinion from the EMA's Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use ("CHMP") regarding the immunoprophylaxis indication of Cangene's ImmunoGam(TM) (Human Hepatitis B Immunoglobulin).

18 Dec 2009

Senate leaders in hot pursuit of the elusive 60th vote: Ben Nelson

The Associated Press: "With just days remaining to prove that they can meet a self-imposed Christmas deadline and pass President Barack Obama's signature initiative through the Senate, Democrats seeking a rendezvous with history instead detoured to an intraparty brawl. ... All eyes were on the only known Democratic holdout, moderate Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, whose primary concern is that abortion funding restrictions in the bill were too lax.

18 Dec 2009