Thursday, October 18, 2018
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services wants drug manufacturers to disclose how much drugs cost when they advertise on television. The proposed rule only applies to the cost Medicare or Medicaid beneficiaries pay, and only if the price tops $35 for a month’s prescription. Critics of the rule say that patients with insurance (commercial or public coverage) don’t pay the sticker price, anyway, so the rule isn’t helpful for consumers. PhRMA, the trade group representing the pharmaceutical industry, tried to avert the requirement by announcing a voluntary set of principles that would direct people to get pricing information from a website, but CMS moved forward with the rule anyway. There’s likely to be a court challenge citing freedom of speech from the industry about the rule, but they’re already required to list side effects in TV ads. (
VOX
;
Axios
;
the regulation
)
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Americans with serious illness experience far more than can be explained in merely clinical terms, a new study finds. The sickest of the sick lose independence, control over their life and how they spend their time, and often suffer isolation from friends. Many experience significant financial loss. Illness is made worse by a health care system that unnecessarily duplicates tests, offers conflicting recommendations and drowns patients in inscrutable paperwork. The Commonwealth Fund partnered with
The New York Times
and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health to dig deep into the lives of nearly 1,500 people experiencing serious illness.
(
The New York Times
;
Commonwealth Fund report
,
Health Care in America: The Experience of People with Serious Illness
)
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Innovation & Transformation
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Organizations are tapping into pharmacists’ expertise to manage chronic disease or complex health care issues. In hospitals like Brigham and Women’s and in VA medical centers, pharmacists are part of the clinical team, ensuring medications are safe, appropriate and not a burden for patients to take. Pharmacists can recommend cost-effective solutions, working with patients to understand their overall health needs and reasons why some medications don’t fit their budget or lifestyle. In a related study, 92 percent of older patients are willing to stop taking one or more of their medications if their doctors said they could, and two-thirds want to reduce the number of drugs they take.
(
Forbes
;
JAMA Internal Medicine
)
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Data alone—even big quantities—won’t improve quality unless you engage the humans who can analyze what it means and then collaborate to identify and broadly adopt best practices. That’s what the University of Texas hospital system discovered through its health intelligence platform venture. “You have to walk with your partners. As they mature in their understanding of data, you mature in your understanding of their needs,” says John Frenzel, an anesthesiologist leading his colleagues in quality improvement. (
UT Health
)
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It’s a lot easier to find information about hospitals with a patient safety deficiency found during an accreditation validation survey. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services created a website listing hospitals with “recent substantial deficient practices” discovered during a CMS inspection; consumers (and lawyers) can now find a summary of CMS findings and the hospital’s plan to correct the problems. CMS inspections are triggered by a complaint. But when they come within a short time of a hospital’s accreditation visit, CMS thinks accreditors should take note and remove seriously deficient hospitals from their accreditation lists. The Joint Commission now requires hospitals that use its services to notify them when CMS removes its stamp of approval because of noncompliance. If it’s within 60 days of an accreditation survey, they can go back to the hospital and revise their findings, too.
(
HealthLeaders
;
CMS-Certified Hospitals with Recent Substantial Deficient Practice
)
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Unapproved antidepressants, designer steroids and erectile dysfunction drugs were among the unlisted ingredients tainting nearly 750 dietary supplements over a 10-year-period, a new study finds. Because the supplements are considered food rather than medicine under the law, they’re exempt from pre-market safety testing—or even to prove they work as they say they do. The Food and Drug Administration did not require any of the 146 companies that made the supplements take them off the market, and only urged the supplement makers in seven instances to voluntarily take them off store shelves. Some 23,000 emergency room visits are linked to supplements every year; some of the trace drugs found in them can raise blood pressure or pose a risk from interactions with other drugs.
(
National Public Radio
)
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Brave new world for same-sex genetics
:
For the first time, scientists successfully bred mammals (mice) with two genetic fathers, but they didn’t survive to adulthood. Earlier experiments with two genetic mothers bred mice that lived to produce young of their own. The Chinese researchers admit they had to massively manipulate the cells to make the embryos, and most of those didn’t reach live birth. Mice are a far cry from humans, but “This research shows us what’s possible,” said Wei Li, a senior author of the study.
(
Stat
)
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Too many C-sections
:
Only 10 to 15 percent of births medically call for a cesarean-section birth, but at least 15 countries use it 40 percent of the time. The C-section rate nearly doubled worldwide between 2000 and 2015. Researchers believe that it’s overused in richer countries, but it’s not used enough in poorer ones. A C-section can increase the risk of complications and side effects.
(
Reuters
)
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1500+ providers participating in new APM
:
A new advanced payment model, Bundled Payments for Care Improvement, kicked off Oct. 1 with 832 acute care hospitals and 715 physician group practice participants. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services payment model requires participants to use certified electronic health records and risk lower payments if they don’t perform up to standards on 32 clinical episodes of care.
(
Health Data Management
)
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Crackdown on e-cigarettes
:
The Food and Drug Administration believes some e-cigarette manufacturers aren’t being honest about when their products hit the market. The FDA sent letters to 21 manufacturers that recently launched new products similar to the Juul e-cigarette. If they started selling them after the FDA banned the sale of new versions of the product in August 2016, the manufacturers will face fines and product seizures.
(
Reuters)
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The rate of health care cost growth may have slowed, but it’s still a steep climb. And for those with employer-sponsored benefits, there’s significant sticker shock that comes with retirement because most retirees shoulder the whole cost. According to a new chart, health care costs will consume nearly half (48 percent) of a 66-year-old couple’s lifetime Social Security benefits and 72 percent of the benefits earned by the lucky 45-year-old couple that wants to retire early.
(
Money
)
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MarketVoices...quotes worth reading
“This is fast and easy to find the hospitals in any individual state. Consumers might read it, and attorneys who have litigation planned or pending might read it. Hospitals should be prepared with a communications strategy for each state survey report at the same time as they are working on their Plan of Correction."— Kurt Patton of Patton Health Care Consulting and The Joint Commission’s former director of accreditation services, as quoted in
HealthLeaders
story.
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Editor
Sandy Mau
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