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FDA Approves Roche/Genentech Drug Erivedge to Treat Advanced Skin Cancer Not Treatable with Surgery
Basal cell carcinoma is rarely fatal and in many cases surgery is the cure but in some patients is can spread beyond the skin area in to other areas of the body and this is where the new oral drug comes in to help fight and shrink tumors. When the cancer has metastasized, this is about the only o…
California Federal Judge Issues Tentative Rule that Blocks Cutting Medicaid Payments
In November of last year the CHA also filed suit against the cutting of Medicaid in California. Do you know how hard it is to find doctors in California who will honor Medicaid? Ask a doctor trying to find a referral for a child, it’s hard. California Hospital Association Sues HHS With Kathleen S…
Komen Foundation Cuts of Funds to Planned Parenthood - Wall Street Was Lit up in “Pink” Last Week For Fund Raising from Hedge Funds and Other Financial Companies
This makes you wonder where in the world philanthropy is going today and how much will remain. The reasoning is very strange here and if they don’t want to spend the money, be honest and say so. Planned Parenthood said it was all the anti abortion talk that caused them to withdraw. We all know …
Freddie Mac Found to be Betting Against Home Owners Being Able to Refinance - “Attack of the Killer Algorithms” On Consumers Part Nine–Home Mortgage Style
Ok in the real world today everyone lives off of behavioral analytics so of course they might just have a ton of information to leverage to make their bets, right? If you look and see how this phenomena is taking place today, it’s not just Facebook, but Hedge Funds, High Frequency Traders and so…
State of Virginia Attaches Amendment to Bill Requiring Women to Have an Ultrasound Before an Abortion That Requires Men to Have A Rectal Exam Before Obtaining A Prescription For Erectile Dysfunction Drugs
Here we are back to the old “default” topic of the digital illiterates, abortions and this is pretty funny as it mocks the ridiculousness of a bill requiring an ultrasound. You know what, there will be more rectal exams going on I bet than abortions:) Sad that the amendment didn’t make it through …
Context is Everything–More About the Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception–Professor Siefe Lecture Given at Google’s New York Office–Big Healthcare Focus
A great video from Charlie Siefe, Professor at NYU and in his talk at Google. If you read here enough then you know I am a fan because he’s right and breaks this down to what reality is. He may have sold a few books from this blog too come to think of it:) What do you think of what you read in th…
GE Discontinues Centricity Advance EHR for Small Practices
Doctors using the current Centricity for small practices will have to upgrade and of course I’m sure that mean money and cost. The GE EHR is probably one of the most expensive products out there for a small practice to purchase. Just a couple months ago software problems created issues for doctors…
Nurse At Arizona Hospital Has Licensed Threatened And Was Fired for Educating Patient on Hospice Care–If You Are A Nurse or a Patient Be Sure and Read This One
This is a post from the Nerdy Nurse and really you must read the entire article and see what has happened here. When you read through here and see the story as told with the nurse educating the patient about a hospice choice as I am guessing it was near that time, the doctor was upset that the surg…
FTC Says No to Omnicare Take Over of PharMerica and Files Lawsuit to Block as The Combined Company Would Control 60% of Drugs Supplied to Nursing Homes
Omnicare on its own had revenues of over $6 billion and Pharmericas is just under 2 billion so this would be big financially as well. We all know what lack of competition does in the pharma world and this probably would be no exception. Just a few months ago we had Walgreens swap businesses with O…
FDA Approves First and Only Weekly Diabetes 2 Shot Therapy in the US
Bydureon took three tries to make it through approval with the FDA. The active ingredient comes from a synthetic version of saliva from the Gila Monster. I am originally from Arizona and I know what those are and way back in 2007 the talk was in the exploration of saliva with lizards. Bydureon is…
Aneesh Chopra US Chief Technology Officer Resigns to Possibly Pursue A Political Career
Well here’s one more and Mr. Chopra was good and got everybody motivated but time to move into the next phase with implementation and perhaps a little different leader is needed to pass the baton. We have had the word “innovation” up to our ears and now it’s time to begin some serious efforts with …
Over 100 Cardiac Patients in Pakistan Have Died from Tainted Heart Medicine
This is sad and scary and makes you appreciate the FDA for sure. I read elsewhere that the chemical content of the drug was ok but now we are left with other compounds, coatings, etc. to be checked as well. The government shut down 3 companies where the drugs are made and by the way they also expo…
Wellpoint to Begin Paying Family Practice Doctors a “Little” More–Enough to Make A Difference? Pay For Their Full Time Billing Expenses and A Lot of Doctors Would Happy
Ok so I made my point in the title and this article too dissects the potential demographics of the situation too as if only 10-20% of the patients are covered by Blue Cross, is there enough incentive for the doctors to make a difference? On the other hand if the insurer paid all their insurer overh…
California Legislature Urging Health Insurance Companies to Cover Chemotherapy–Especially With Breast Cancer Treatments
The bill in the legislature will force insurance companies to cover oral cancer chemotherapy instead of making patients take a trip to the hospital for each treatment. This is especially important with breast cancer as patients can take the medication in the privacy of their own home. This would a…
Stem Cells Used to Build a Better Reconstructed Rat Penis
The article states this is clearly for reconstruction and not for growing one from scratch. The next level up is to test with primates and then hopefully lead to where procedures as such will evolve for humans. However, if you go over to Wake Forest they might be ahead of the game as far as buildi…
Kaiser Permanente finally finished the study requested by the CDC and there was nothing to indicate a cause. As you can read below the study was not cheap and I have covered a few stories about it and is has been perplexing and mysterious. It is somewhat rare with the feeling of bugs running under…
FDA Approves Picato Topical Skin Gel For Treatment of Actinic Keratosis Which Can Lead to Skin Cancer
This is great news as it can be used for as little as 2 or 3 days and be effective as you don’t really know which AK will turn into cancer or not. In clinical trials more treated with the gel were cleared from the actinic keratosis than those with a placebo. BD FDA approved ingenol mebutate …
Hospital To Pay Garth Brooks $1 Million For Not Building Woman’s Health Center In Honor of His Mother With His $500,000 Donation
This is a strange case indeed but with half a million dollars and no name anywhere for Mom, I guess this is where the lawsuit came from and the donation goes back to 2005 so there was plenty of time to act on this one. The hospital had suggested an intensive care unit but Mr. Brooks said that did n…
Bill Gates Speak About Challenges of Global Health - Healthcare Budgets in the US - Video
The Wall Street Journal caught up with Bill Gates on his way to Davos and talks about quite a few healthcare subject here, including budgets. He says through the foundation he learns a lot about healthcare and urges continuation of funding. The conversation goes back to the market fall and the i…
