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New recommendations aim to improve safety of pain-relieving spinal steroid injections
More and more people are seeking injections of anti-inflammatory steroid medications for back and neck pain. In 2011, the last year for which complete information is available, doctors pushed the plunger on 2.3 million steroid injections into the spine — and that’s just among people covered by Medicare. These injections deliver drugs that mimic the effects of two hormones, cortisone and hydrocortisone, to reduce inflammation and help relieve pain. When they work — they don’t always — such injections can bring profound relief. “If you are in severe pain with a ruptured spinal disc and you get a stero...
Source: New Harvard Health Information - May 7, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Daniel Pendick Tags: Back Pain Drugs and Supplements anti-inflammatory steroid medications spinal injections spine steroid injections Source Type: news

Readmission after spinal cord injury: analysis of an institutional cohort of 795 patients.
CONCLUSIONS: Weekend admission did not increase perioperative complications or hospital length of stay. After discharge, patients with Medicaid and Medicare show higher rates of 30 day readmission, as do African-American patients. The effect of race on readmission is multifactorial, and may partially explained by the increased rate of Medicaid coverage in African-Americans in our institutions catchment area. PMID: 27152452 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Journal of Neurosurgical Sciences - May 8, 2016 Category: Neurosurgery Tags: J Neurosurg Sci Source Type: research

Neurological Diseases Cost The U.S. $800 Billion Each Year
Over 100 million Americans ― close to a third of the total population ― suffer from neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis, migraines, epilepsy and spinal cord injury.  These conditions put an enormous financial strain on the health care system, totaling nearly $800 billion in annual costs, according to a new report published in the journal Annals of Neurology. To put that into perspective, the figure exceeds the U.S. military budget by over $100 billion.  That number reflects the total cost of the nine most common neurological diseases, but the total costs related to th...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - March 30, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news