What Does an Ideal Healthcare System Look Like?
By ASHISH JHA, MD
Austin Frakt and Aaron Carroll recently approached me about a New York Times UpShot piece aiming to rank eight healthcare systems they had chosen: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Singapore, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This forced me to think about a pretty fundamental question: what do we want from a healthcare system?
I would argue that most people want a healthcare system where they can get timely access to high quality, affordable care and one that also promotes innovation of new tests and treatments. But underlying these sentiments are a lot of important issues that nee...
Source: The Health Care Blog - September 20, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: John Irvine Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: blogs
The BCRA Is An Improvement Over Obamacare. Here ’ s why..
ANISH KOKA MD
Dr. Jha writes on these pages in typically stirring fashion about his views on the recent health care kerfuffle and rightly so fingers what the real focus of our efforts should be: Cost. He ends by slaying both sides because of their refusal to confront the hospital chargemonster – the fee schedule hospitals make that remarkably only really applies to the uninsured.
Unfortunately, the solution proposed ensures hospital fee schedules for the uninsured are no greater than Medicare reimbursements, which is far from perfect. Consider that the Medicare reimbursement for a stent placed to an ischemic limb is ...
Source: The Health Care Blog - July 10, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: anish_koka Tags: Economics Repeal Replace Uncategorized Anish Koka BCRA Obamacare Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, May 1st 2017
In this study we demonstrate the use of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)-based epigenome editing to alter cell response to inflammatory environments by repressing inflammatory cytokine cell receptors, specifically TNFR1 and IL1R1. This has applications for many inflammatory-driven diseases. It could be applied for arthritis or to therapeutic cells that are being delivered to inflammatory environments that need to be protected from inflammation."
In chronic back pain, for example, slipped or herniated discs are a result of damaged tissue when inflammation causes cells to create molec...
Source: Fight Aging! - April 30, 2017 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Op-Ed in The Hill on Allowing Medicare to Directly Negotiate Drug Prices
Conclusion
There is no denying that Medicare and other government-funded programs are facing a serious funding crisis and that changes to the programs are long overdue. However, it is important to review history and not make the same mistakes that have already been made in attempting to resolve the issue. Instead, Dr. Fonseca believes that “Medicare beneficiaries should have more freedom to choose the coverage and services that best meet their individual needs and preferences.”
Related StoriesCMS Releases Report on Drug RebatesMedPAC Considers Revised Approaches to Part B Drug P...
Source: Policy and Medicine - March 16, 2017 Category: American Health Authors: Thomas Sullivan - Policy & Medicine Writing Staff Source Type: blogs
WIRED Health 2017 London: Looking Into The Future of Healthcare
Last week WIRED Health gathered hundreds of leaders and influencers from across the globe in London to discuss the field of health innovation and technology. In addition to their long lists of honors and historic accolades, the unrivaled lineup of speakers brought an infectious enthusiasm for action in healthcare.
Peter Piot of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine set the scale of the challenge, charging the audience to strive for truly global health when he spoke about epidemics. Co-discoverer of the Ebola virus and a pioneering researcher in HIV/AIDS, Peter imparted the wisdom that human behavior and pr...
Source: Medgadget - March 16, 2017 Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Tom Peach Tags: Exclusive Source Type: blogs
The Future Of Precision Medicine: Great Promise, Significant Challenges
Editor’s note: This post is part of a series stemming from the Fifth Annual Health Law Year in P/Review event held at Harvard Law School on Monday, January 23rd, 2017. The conference brought together leading experts to review major developments in health law over the previous year, and preview what is to come.
In his 2015 State of the Union address, President Obama launched the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI), which is intended to help move medicine from the traditional “one-size-fits-all” approach where treatments are designed for the “average” patient, to one that “takes into account individual diffe...
Source: Health Affairs Blog - February 28, 2017 Category: Health Management Authors: Jonathan Darrow, Aaron Kesselheim and Jessica Lasky-Su Tags: Costs and Spending Featured Quality 21st Century Cures Act cancer moonshot cancerr Precision Medicine Research The Health Law Year in P/Review Source Type: blogs
A Million Jobs in Healthcare ’ s Future
By PRAVEEN SUTHRUM
“The Future is Here. It’s Just Not Evenly Distributed.”
It’s true.
Science fiction writer William Gibson said that right. We simply have to look around enough – now – to find out what the future holds.
The future may never be evenly distributed. But it’s surely becoming the present faster.
What would you do when…
Here are a series of what-would-you-do-when questions to think about. Each of these are a reality today, somewhere.
There’s more medical data than insight
Kaiser Permanente presently manages 30 petabytes of data. Images. Lab tests. EHRs. Pat...
Source: The Health Care Blog - February 21, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: John Irvine Tags: Tech Uncategorized Source Type: blogs
The Latest on Chimeric Antigen Receptor Therapy for Leukemia
The use of chimeric antigen receptors (CAR) to create engineered T cells to attack specific varieties of cancer cell, identified by their surface chemistry, is so far proving to be effective for leukemia, a cancer of the immune system. Researchers are also making inroads in adapting the therapy for use in solid tumors. While an initial group of patients treated several years ago with the first pass at CAR T cell therapy remain in remission, the news here focuses on the results from a more recent trial:
The 24 patients had undergone most standard therapies available to them and yet their chronic lymphocytic leukemi...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 6, 2016 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs
Nivolumab with chemotherapy improves response, survival in AML study patients
The immunotherapy drug nivolumab in combination with standard chemotherapy more than doubled reaction rates and improved overall success in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), according to preliminary findings by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.
Related Posts:CTCA at Western Regional Medical Center advances combinationImmunotherapy with live bacterium improves response rate in…Adjuvant chemotherapy improves overall survival in patients…Drug shows surprising efficacy as therapy for chronic…Experts propose new staging for HPV-related oropharyngeal…The post ...
Source: My Irritable Bowel Syndrome Story - December 5, 2016 Category: Gastroenterology Authors: Ken Tags: IBS News Source Type: blogs
Health Affairs ’ September Issue: Payment Reforms, Prescription Drugs, And More
The September issue of Health Affairs, a variety issue, includes a number of studies examining aspects of payment reform, the impact of certain ACA provisions, the value of some high-cost anticancer drugs, and more. It also includes a DataGraphic examining aging and health.
DATAWATCH: New evidence of rapid physician practice consolidation, 2013–15
In the past few decades, group physician practices have become more of the norm, and the proportion of physicians in larger groups has grown. David Muhlestein and Nathan Smith, with Leavitt Partners in Salt Lake City, Utah, looked at Medicare’s Physician Compare data for the ...
Source: Health Affairs Blog - September 7, 2016 Category: Health Management Authors: Lucy Larner Tags: Elsewhere@ Health Affairs Featured Health Affairs journal Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, July 25th 2016
This study builds on preliminary findings from the first phase of the INTERSTROKE study, which identified ten modifiable risk factors for stroke in 6,000 participants from 22 countries. The full-scale INTERSTROKE study included an additional 20,000 individuals from 32 countries in Europe, Asia, America, Africa and Australia, and sought to identify the main causes of stroke in diverse populations, young and old, men and women, and within subtypes of stroke.
To estimate the proportion of strokes caused by specific risk factors, the investigators calculated the population attributable risk for each factor (PAR; an esti...
Source: Fight Aging! - July 24, 2016 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, June 27th 2016
In conclusion, we showed for the first time that 7-KC induces oxidative stress via lysosomal dysfunction, resulting in exacerbation of calcification.
CHIMERIC ANTIGEN RECEPTOR CANCER THERAPIES CAN NOW TARGET SOLID TUMORS
https://www.fightaging.org/archives/2016/06/chimeric-antigen-receptor-cancer-therapies-can-now-target-solid-tumors/
If the research community is to win in the fight to cure cancer, and win soon enough to matter for all of us, then the focus must be on technology platforms that can be easily and cheaply adapted to many different types of cancer. The biggest strategic problem in the field is t...
Source: Fight Aging! - June 26, 2016 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, June 13th 2016
FIGHT AGING! NEWSLETTER
June 13th 2016
Fight Aging! provides a weekly digest of news and commentary for thousands of subscribers interested in the latest longevity science: progress towards the medical control of aging in order to prevent age-related frailty, suffering, and disease, as well as improvements in the present understanding of what works and what doesn't work when it comes to extending healthy life. Expect to see summaries of recent advances in medical research, news from the scientific community, advocacy and fundraising initiatives to help speed work on the repair and reversal of aging, links to ...
Source: Fight Aging! - June 12, 2016 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
New study: early-stage MGUS/SMM/CLL patients test arabinoxylan rice bran and curcumin
This study was carried out on cells, though, not human beings.
But today, about five years later, we have the results of a small study carried out on 20 curcumin-taking human beings with stable, early-stage MGUS, SMM, and CLL (chronic lymphocytic leukemia).
And it’s a Terry Golombick (et al) study, to boot.
Here’s the link to the full study, which is available for free online (love that!): http://goo.gl/6n2X3U
The Golombick team tested Ribraxx, a combination of a rice bran and shiitake mushroom extract (too bad it isn’t chocolate with almonds!!!), together with a form of C3 Complex curcumin called Cur...
Source: Margaret's Corner - May 24, 2016 Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Margaret Tags: Blogroll Golombick Source Type: blogs
Why I Became a Cancer Advocate: Amy
by Amy Mattes, LIVESTRONG Leader
Walking out of a friend’s funeral that had lost her battle with leukemia, and watching her three young daughters, husband, family and community grieving, felt very unnecessary. In addition, her twin sister had stage IV lymphoma. I was forever changed that day.
I vowed to use my experience and knowledge and advocate in the fight against cancer. As a cancer registrar, I have witnessed almost every aspect of cancer. A very insightful aspect of my job has been participating on a multidisciplinary team of physicians, nurses, social workers, and pastoral care staff. We discuss our patient...
Source: LIVESTRONG Blog - May 7, 2016 Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: LIVESTRONG Staff Source Type: blogs
