Four Preview Videos in the Footer
Knome Introduces First Plug and Play Human Genome Supercomputer Interpretation System–knoSYS100, It Runs Behind Client Firewalls for Privacy and Security–No Cloud Needed
George Church has come a long way since the Polonator, which was introduced in 2008 and sold for $150,000. This one is $25,000 less and probably does a whole lot more. The knoSys100 is both a hardware and software system that transforms sequence data produced by various platforms into a standard r…
FDA Approves S-ICD Defibrillator for Patients At Risk of Cardiac Arrest - First Subcutaneous Device That Works With No Wire Leads Placed or Attached to the Heart With a Less Invasive Procedure
This sounds like very good news as you read in the news about wires needing to be replaced. Here’s a couple of articles from the last 2 years and it has not been limited to one manufacturer at all. I think be now we have all read the many news articles that have been out there and the risk involve…
Care Harbor LA–Free Healthcare Clinic At the Los Angeles Sports Arena September 27–30, 2012
One of the sponsors of the event is Healthy Way LA which is a free plan for certain individuals to get insurance that fall under the low income provisions and this is being promoted and discussed for those who may qualify. If you are in the Los Angeles area and need medical or dental care or know …
Money and Medicine–PBS Documentary Discussing Patient Care, Breast and Prostate Cancer Interventions at UCLA and Intermountain Medical Center in Utah
This is a PBS presentation and here’s the trailer. Below I have embedded the entire video which may or may not be available permanently. This is interesting as they are comparing Intermountain Healthcare with UCLA Medical Center here in Los Angeles. With a C-section Intermountain charges are around …
Sears and Darden Restaurants Will Begin Offering Employees Cash to Buy Their Own Health Plans Through Online “Private” Exchanges With Contracted Insurance Companies
So here’s the first step of employer insurance going away. Both of these companies are self insured so what a way to kick a lot of the administration out of human resources and save money. Companies have used similar plans for years to where a dollar amount is give and employees choose from a …
Maryland Insurance Contract Negotiations in Maryland At a Standstill as CareFirst BlueCross Blue Shield Objects to Private Insurers Paying a Higher Percentage on Hospital Bills Versus Medicare Discounted Rates
When you think of Maryland and hospitals one that stands out of course is Johns Hopkins and would be included in the Maryland Hospital Association negotiations on rates. Maryland is the only state that sets hospital prices for all payers to include Medicare. Medicare rates though have to stay in …
Common Parasites Carried by Cats Reduces Inhibitions–In the Cat Host and Also With Humans If Exposed to Cat Feces by Increasing Dopamine..
This is an interesting journal publication and not sure if I’m in on this one as far as believing it but the video is kind of funny. Clean out the litter box for your cat and get exposed and go out and have a good time:) It has to do with increasing dopamine in the brain and hormones and it does t…
FDA Approves Bayer Colon Cancer Drug Stivarga to be Co-Marketed by Onyx Pharmaceuticals
Stivarga in clinical trials was shown to extend lives a little bit over 6 months. It is the second drug approved within the last couple of months for colorectal cancer. Patients in the trail also showed a delay in tumor growth. It does carry a black box warning that it can cause toxic liver prob…
Johns Hopkins Grows New Ear for Patient Who Had Cancer and Had Part of Her Ear and Face Removed–New Ear Grown in Her Arm & Transplanted to Face
This is very cool as the forearm of the patient was used as the area to “plant and grow” her new ear. If you have been reading about regenerative medicine for a while you might remember from about 3 years the mouse that had the human ear growing on it, so it looks as though this has progressed in a…
Nuance to Acquire Quantim, QuadaMed’s Health Information Management Division–Computer Assisted Coding Solutions To Support Transition to ICD-10
We all know that transitioning to the new coding system will come at some point in time and the date for compliance has been pushed back a year as there’s just so much on the plate of hospital CIOs today that priorities needed to be established to allow the processes to build and take place. Just y…
HHS and DOJ Send Letters to Hospital Trade Associations Warning of Gaming Billing System Via Use of Electronic Medical Records–Hospitals Just Learned How to Bill Better & Hired Consultants–Case of Being Algo Duped With Numbers?
I know this is a double edge sword but how many consultants are there out there who promise results and bigger profits? It’s all over the place and some of these consultants hired by hospitals, guess what, are owned by insurance companies. Is this the pot calling the kettle black? Certainly there…
The Blue Button Campaign–Get Your HL7 and XML Engines Up and Running–Lot of Code to be Written to Ultimately Make It Simple for the Consumer To Benefit
For the consumer who is not tech savvy on all of this terminology I have to say it must be confusing as it’s an effort for me to write and try to explain some of these things so everyone can get an idea of what’s happening here. Code, code and more code…keep that in mind and time, time and more tim…
U-Mass Medical Center Cuts Another 140 Jobs And Puts Hospital Labs Up for Sale
It was just back in February of this year UMass announced 700 to 900 jobs would be cut so now the number gets a little higher. We still seem to have this big focus on games and entertainment when it comes to money and the healthcare system loses. In addition the hospital labs are up for sale and w…
Hospital in China Introduces New Sperm Donation Machine–Automation Taken To a New Level….
Ok check this out and laugh like the folks do in the video:) It has a video screen built in there too. This is funny in reading the customizations too, temperature control, frequency, speed and height. The hospital says it needs the machine to attract more donors? It’s for those who can’t do it …
HealthTap App Offers “Doc in the Box” Service for Patients to Ask Question From Registered Doctors For Opinions And Then the Peer Groups of MDs Rate Each Other’s Answers? Enough Time For This?
Yet one more way to talk to a doctor. There’s a free version and then you can also enroll for a paid service. The one good thing the site has is access to the entire PubMed database indexed with relevant information searched. They are talking about their HIPAA complaint message service as well wi…
“The Waiting Room”–Documentary of Highland Hospital Emergency Room in Oakland, California–Where Insurance Rarely Exists–Movie Trailer
The film is coming our and will start showing this week. Highland Hospital is a public hospital and the last resort for care for many. Again this week I heard that Romney stated this is the answer for the uninsured but as you know there are fewer public hospitals than we used to have. They have a…
MD Anderson Cancer Center In Houston Launches Massive “Moonshot” Effort To Find Cures and Lower Deaths for 8 Types of Cancer Funded By Gifts, Grants And Revenues From the Center
The center currently spends over $700 million a year on research and the additional funds are on top of this. Myelodysplastic syndrome, breast and ovarian cancer, along with lung, prostate, melanoma and two types of leukemia are the targets. MD Anderson is the nation’s largest cancer center. In …
