New healthcare thread...

[NationalTitles18]

https://www.axios.com/2024/03/06/health-care-cyberattack-spawns-threat-of-patient-lawsuits

The cyber attack on Change Healthcare that's reverberated across the medical system is now spawning threats of litigation from patients.
Why it matters: Patients left scrambling to determine if insurance will cover drugs or treatments could seek damages from the UnitedHealth Group subsidiary, whose stricken payment network is a mainstay of hospitals, pharmacies and physician offices and processes 15 billion transactions annually.

Driving the news: Gibbs Law Group is thought to be the first to test the waters, by seeking out patients who were forced to pay out of pocket for prescriptions or delay their refills.

• "Some of these medications cost thousands of dollars," Rosemary Rivas, a partner at Gibbs, told Axios.
• Gibbs' website states that it's seeking "money back for patients who were unexpectedly forced to pay for expensive medications due to this cyberattack."

 

[NationalTitles18]

Scientists found tiny microplastics in people’s arteries. Their presence was tied to a higher risk of heart disease.

The new research is the first to associate such plastics inside the body with heart attack, stroke or death.

www.nbcnews.com

Doctors found tiny nanoplastics in people’s arteries. Their presence was tied to a higher risk of heart disease.
The new research is the first to associate such plastics inside the body with heart attack, stroke or death.
...
After adjusting for age, sex, body mass index and health conditions such as diabetes and abnormal cholesterol, the patients with detectable levels of plastics had “nearly a five times greater risk of a cardiovascular event” than the other patients, Marfella said.

...


“We know that cardiovascular disease, particularly myocardial infarction, is usually triggered by an inflammatory response,” Gulati said, using another term for heart attack. The Italian researchers measured markers for inflammation in patients and found that those markers increased as the level of plastics in the plaque rose.

Still, “is the inflammation due to the nanoplastics or something else?” Gulati asked.

 

[crimsonaudio]

Scientists found tiny microplastics in people’s arteries. Their presence was tied to a higher risk of heart disease.

The new research is the first to associate such plastics inside the body with heart attack, stroke or death.

www.nbcnews.com

Doctors found tiny nanoplastics in people’s arteries. Their presence was tied to a higher risk of heart disease.
The new research is the first to associate such plastics inside the body with heart attack, stroke or death.
...
After adjusting for age, sex, body mass index and health conditions such as diabetes and abnormal cholesterol, the patients with detectable levels of plastics had “nearly a five times greater risk of a cardiovascular event” than the other patients, Marfella said.

...


“We know that cardiovascular disease, particularly myocardial infarction, is usually triggered by an inflammatory response,” Gulati said, using another term for heart attack. The Italian researchers measured markers for inflammation in patients and found that those markers increased as the level of plastics in the plaque rose.

Still, “is the inflammation due to the nanoplastics or something else?” Gulati asked.

We're literally polluting ourselves to death.

 

[NationalTitles18]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/07/health/lsd-anxiety-fda-breakthrough-therapy-wellness/index.html

A clinical trial’s encouraging results won US Food and Drug Administration breakthrough therapy status for an LSD formulation to treat generalized anxiety disorder, Mind Medicine Inc. announced Thursday. The biopharmaceutical company is developing the drug.

“A breakthrough designation is a recognition that a drug has demonstrated evidence of clinical efficacy in meeting an unmet medical need with morbidity and mortality associated with it,” said Dr. Daniel Karlin, assistant professor of psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston and chief medical officer for MindMed.


MindMed’s MM120 will still go through the standard FDA approval process, including phase III trials.



The designation, however, “is an offer from the agency to engage more closely in drug development,” Karlin said. “It affects timelines of response and our ability to get more interactions with the agency so that we can be sure that we’re in lockstep agreement as we move forward.”

Two other companies have also received FDA breakthrough therapy status: psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression and to MDMA, (3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine) commonly known as ecstasy or molly, for post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD.

 

[Alogan1983]

Give 'em guns, step back and watch them kill each other.

That's the conservative approach to Healthcare. Always will be, until we spend more on saving lives than killing each other.

 

[selmaborntidefan]

Some of you know where I am now but please do not disclose it on here after the next thing I tell you.

The Joint Commission showed up for an inspection of our laboratory on Monday.

Today I sat in a stunned room with the inspector, the entire hospital management staff (including my boss of a week) - and along with one of my co-workers answered in the affirmative when the CEO asked, "Are you suggesting the night shift be terminated?" That is something I've never done (only once previously would I have suggested it in - can you believe it - a similar situation).

The problem isn't that they didn't do their validation paperwork for 22 or 23; it's the fact that despite knowing the inspector is in town, they violated standard first-day lab protocol THIS MORNING and (potentially) could have hurt patients - because they don't care, they're just there for a paycheck.

When we were summoned today, the other (also new - began 2/12) lab tech was trembling and shaking and saying over and over, "What are we going to do, they may fire us for this in retaliation." I looked at her nonjudgmentally (because I "get" the fear) and said, "Do you want to be here the day we kill someone?"

It was like you gave someone a tranquilizer. She went in and made a passionate case for what I said from a far more dangerous section of the lab (transfusions). I told her I can look myself in the mirror and if someone fires me, well, guess what? There's a lot of places out there that would like to have me, three of which have begged me to come back.

 

[NationalTitles18]

Florida's Medicaid call center's wait times are hindering health care access, study warns

8 in 10 calls were automatically disconnected from the phone system, according to a report by the national Latino group UnidosUS.

www.nbcnews.com

Florida's Medicaid call center's wait times, disconnection rates are hindering health care access, study warns
Eight in ten calls were automatically disconnected from the phone system, according to a report by the national Latino group UnidosUS.

 

[NationalTitles18]

A "freak accident" left a nurse crushed by an MRI machine at the Kaiser Permanente hospital in Redwood City. KTVU 2 Investigates.

 

[NationalTitles18]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/08/health/wegovy-heart-benefits/index.html

Wegovy’s not just for weight loss anymore.

The US Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved drugmaker Novo Nordisk’s application to add cardiovascular benefits to the medicine’s label, making it the first weight-loss drug to also be cleared to reduce the risk of heart attack, stroke or heart-related death in people at higher risk of these conditions.

 

[NationalTitles18]

A complete mess.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/09/tech/medical-supply-chain-cybersecurity/index.html

‘We’re hemorrhaging money’: US health clinics try to stay open after unprecedented cyberattack



For more than two weeks, a cyberattack has disrupted business at health care providers across the United States, forcing small clinics to scramble to stay in business and exposing the fragility of the billing system that underpins American health care.

“We’re hemorrhaging money,” said Catherine Reinheimer, practice manager at the Foot and Ankle Specialty Center in the suburbs of Philadelphia. “This will probably be the last week that we can keep everybody on full-time without having to do something,” she told CNN. The center is considering taking out a loan to keep the lights on.

The cyberattack disrupted the computer networks of Change Healthcare, which serves thousands of hospitals, insurers and pharmacies nationwide. It prevented some insurance payments on prescription drugs from processing, leaving many care providers effectively footing the bill without reimbursement.



Change Healthcare, part of UnitedHealth, is one of handful of companies that make up the central nervous system of the US health care market. Its services allow doctors to look up patients’ insurance, pharmacies to process prescriptions, and health clinics to submit claims so they can get paid.

 

[DzynKingRTR]

My medical insurance has determined that my daily asthmatic inhaler is not medically necessary. I now have to get Mt doctor to call them and tell them it is necessary.

 

[Go Bama]

My medical insurance has determined that my daily asthmatic inhaler is not medically necessary. I now have to get Mt doctor to call them and tell them it is necessary.

Yesterday, I had a patient tell me her insurance company considered TMJ surgery a cosmetic surgery.

I could write a book on what insurance companies have denied.

 

[Huckleberry]

‘What’s My Life Worth?’
The Big Business of Denying Medical Care

Should your insurance company be allowed to stop you from getting a treatment — even if your doctor says it’s necessary?
Doctors are often required to get insurance permission before providing medical care. This process is called prior authorization and it can be used by profit-seeking insurance companies to create intentional barriers between patients and the health care they need.
At best, it’s just a minor bureaucratic headache. At worst, people have died.
Prior authorization has been around for decades, but doctors say its use has increased in recent years and now rank it as one of the top issues in health care.

To produce this Opinion Video, we spoke to more than 50 doctors and patients. They shared horror stories about a seemingly trivial process that inflicts enormous pain, on a daily basis. The video also explains how a process that is supposed to save money actually inflates U.S. health care costs while enriching insurance companies.

Prior authorization has come under intense scrutiny in Congress in the past few years, but bipartisan proposals have repeatedly stalled. Under public pressure, some insurance companies — like United Healthcare and Cigna — have said they would reduce the use of prior authorization. And in January, the Biden administration finalized a plan to put limited guardrails around this practice. But doctors say that these efforts only scratch the surface and should go further.
This issue is ultimately about the role of insurance companies in American health care: Should they have more power than your doctor to decide what’s medically best for you?

NYT gift link

 

[NationalTitles18]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/18/health/otc-birth-control-opill-online-orders/index.html

Online orders begin for first over-the-counter birth control pill in the US

 

[NationalTitles18]

Health workers fear it's profits before protection as CDC revisits airborne transmission

The agency is developing a crucial set of guidelines that health care facilities will use to control the spread of infectious diseases for years to come.

www.nbcnews.com

Health workers fear it's profits before protection as CDC revisits airborne transmission
The agency is developing a crucial set of guidelines that health care facilities will use to control the spread of infectious diseases for years to come.

 

[NationalTitles18]

A new type of bacteria was found in 50% of colon cancers. Many were aggressive cases.

Scientists discovered that a common type of bacteria has two distinct subspecies. One of them shields tumor cells from cancer treatment.

www.nbcnews.com

A new type of bacteria was found in 50% of colon cancers. Many were aggressive cases.
Scientists discovered that a common type of bacteria has two distinct subspecies. One of them shields tumor cells from cancer treatment.

 

[NationalTitles18]

The story of how the life-saving cervical cancer test became an ordinary part of women’s lives is as unusual and remarkable as the coalition of people who ultimately made it possible: a Greek immigrant, Dr. George Papanicolaou; his intrepid wife, Mary; Japanese-born artist Hashime Murayama; Dr. Helen Dickens, an African American OBGYN in Philadelphia; and an entirely new class of female scientists known as cyto-screeners.

 

[NationalTitles18]

Syphilis surge: The great imitator strikes again

HIVMA Board member Joseph Cherabie, MD, MSc (@JncherabieMD), provides a front-line perspective on the surge in syphilis cases and shares practical tips for clinicians.

www.idsociety.org

In late January, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed what many of us who provide care for people with sexually transmitted infections already knew: We are in the midst of a surge in syphilis cases. How big is the surge exactly? Between 2018 and 2022, syphilis cases increased 80% with a total of 207,255 cases of primary and secondary syphilis reported in the U.S. in 2022. Even more startling is the rise in the cases of congenital syphilis, which totaled 3,755 in 2022, a 183% increase since 2018. (1)

Now let’s put this into perspective: Few people in training now likely know that in the year 2000, we had only 5,789 cases of primary and secondary syphilis, representing an all-time low. (2) CDC at the time had a Syphilis Elimination Effort. (3) Yes, that is right — we were near eliminating syphilis in the U.S. in the early 2000s, and now we are seeing the highest rates since the 1950s.

Have seen it and can confirm.

The Penicillin G shortage is concerning.

 

[CrimsonJazz]

Lunchables found to contain relatively high lead levels

The popular kids snack Lunchables contains relatively high levels of lead and sodium, a consumer watchdog group warned Tuesday. Consumer Reports (CR), a consumer advocacy group, said it tested 12 s…

thehill.com

The popular kids snack Lunchables contains relatively high levels of lead and sodium, a consumer watchdog group warned Tuesday.

Consumer Reports (CR), a consumer advocacy group, said it tested 12 store-bought versions of Lunchables — which are made by Kraft Heinz — along with similar lunch and snack kits and found “relatively high levels of lead and cadmium” in the Lunchables kits.

Cadmium is a chemical element linked to negative effects on the kidney and the skeletal and respiratory systems and is classified as a human carcinogen, according to the World Health Organization.

There is not a safe level of lead for children, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes.

Processed food is poison.

 

[jthomas666]

My medical insurance has determined that my daily asthmatic inhaler is not medically necessary. I now have to get Mt doctor to call them and tell them it is necessary.

You got that letter too, huh?

Whoever came up with this "prior authorization" nonsense should be drawn and quartered. So, you want a note from my doctor saying that I really need the medication that he wrote the prescription for? THAT'S WHY HE WROTE THE PRESCRIPTION IN THE FIRST PLACE.