January 2010
Mayo: Hold the Medicare
- Thu, 1/21/10 - 11:48am
- 0 Comments
- 2660 reads
Pilot Project Excludes Medicare Payments for Primary Care
Capping off a year of hard-fought debate over reforming healthcare, and specifically health insurance, the Mayo Clinic made holiday-season headlines with the initiation of a 2-year pilot project involving a 5-physician family practice clinic in Glendale, Arizona, that has opted out of accepting Medicare payments for primary care starting January 1. Initially announced in October, the decision to temporarily stop accepting Medicare reimbursement for primary car
Flat Growth in Healthcare Spending, Drug Approvals
- Thu, 1/21/10 - 12:05pm
- 0 Comments
- 1175 reads
Increases in total national healthcare costs have slowed
along with the rest of the economy, but health spending continues to grow
faster than gross domestic product (GDP). New National Health Expenditure
Accounts (NHEA) data released by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
(CMS) show that health spending in the United States grew by 4.4% in 2008, and
the portion of GDP devoted to healthcare continues to increase. Meanwhile, the
number of new pharmaceuticals approved by the US Food and Drug Administration
(FDA) remained stable in 2009, and spending on pr
Screening for Breast Cancer and Prostate Cancer: An Alternative View
- Thu, 1/28/10 - 3:09pm
- 0 Comments
- 881 reads
In an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association [2009;302(15):1685-1692], Laura Esserman, MD, MBA, Yiwey Shieh, and Ian Thompson, MD, offer insight into the thinking behind screening for breast cancer and prostate cancer. They note that those 2 cancers account for 26% of all cancers in the United States, with approximately 194,280 patients diagnosed with breast cancer and approximately 192,280 patients diagnosed with prostate cancer each year.
The outcomes for localized versus advanced disease are widely different: breast cancer 5-year survival rates are
Efficacy and Safety of Nilotinib Compared with Imatinib in Patients with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia
- Thu, 1/28/10 - 3:34pm
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- 675 reads
New Orleans—During a late breaking abstract session at the ASH conference, Giuseppe Saglio of the University of Turin, San Luigi Hospital, Orbassano, Italy, presented results of the ENESTnd (Evaluating Nilotinib Efficacy and Safety in Clinical Trials-Newly Diagnosed Patients) trial, a phase 3, randomized open-label, multicenter study that compared the efficacy and safety of 300 or 400 mg twice a day of nilotinib with 400 mg imatinib daily in patients with newly diagnosed Philadelphia chromosome chronic myeloid leukemia (Ph + CML) in chronic ph
Product Spotlight - Saphris
- Thu, 1/28/10 - 3:39pm
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- 2409 reads
Saphris
(asenapine)
Saphris (asenapine) is an atypical antipsychotic indicated for acute treatment of schizophrenia in adults and acute treatment of manic or mixed episodes associated with bipolar I disorder in adults. Asenapine is administered via 5-mg or 10-mg sublingual tablets that are placed under the tongue and allowed to dissolve completely. For schizophrenia, the recommended starting dose of asenapine is 5 mg twice daily. For bipolar disorder the recommended starting dose is 10 mg twice daily, and the dose can be decreased to 5 mg twice daily if pati
Genetic Link Found between High Saturated Fat Diet and Obesity Risk
- Thu, 1/28/10 - 3:47pm
- 0 Comments
- 548 reads
Researchers have identified a genetic marker that makes carriers more susceptible to increased body mass index (BMI) and obesity when consuming diets high in saturated fat, according to a report in the Archives of Internal Medicine [2009;169(20):1897-1906].
Participating investigators were associated with Tufts University, Boston University, the University of Valencia, the University of Alabama, Jaume I University (Castellón,
Product News
- Thu, 1/28/10 - 4:14pm
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- 811 reads
New Drug for Rheumatoid Arthritis
The FDA has approved tocilizumab (Actemra) for the treatment of adults with moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis who have not adequately responded to or cannot tolerate other approved drug classes for rheumatoid arthritis. Recommendations for the use of tocilizumab is limited to patients who have failed other approved therapies because of serious safety concerns that were noted in clinical studies. These safety concerns include elevated liver enzymes, elevated low-density lipoprotein (LDL) or bad cholesterol, hypertension, and gastr
