Richard Cordray Yet One More “Algo Duped” Government Executive Sucked In To Virtual Values and Unable to Locate the “Real World” Now Creating Huge Data Base Of All US Consumer Credit Information…

<p>Mr. Corday is not alone and sure he has good intentions as do most government executives but he’s just one more out there sucked into “The Grays” of virtual values and can’t see the humans for the algorithms.  <strong>I named this ugly phenomena a while back and I call it the “Sebelius Syndrome”</strong> as there was nobody more visible in the public’s eyes and we kept seeing the sad show over and over and over.  She was whipped early on by the Killer Algorithms and when folks can’t determine what’s a real world value versus a virtual value, well I don’t need to say a lot more as it’s been on display now for quite a while.  Even here is a prime example on getting lost in virtual values when a while back Sebelius determined she needed more spy type of information on how HHS employees were talking within the agency, total nut case virtual value. <img align="right" height="172" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-iAYIxCUQzBg/UV2UCP7NHQI/AAAAAAABGWM/TQKKLzd0GCk/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="208" /> When you see such activities like this you know up front there’s insecurity as folks without some<strong> “data mechanics logic”</strong> in their background and the fear to learn a little bit ends up dumping out insanity monitoring like this at the “bees” link below.  </p> <p>In a letter from May 15, addressed to FHFA Director Mel Watt and CFPB Director Richard Cordray, Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) and Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) alleged that "this expansion represents an unwarranted intrusion into the private lives of ordinary Americans and I agree with it.  </p> <p><em><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/new-federal-database-will-track-americans-credit-ratings-other-financial-information/article/2549064">Washington Examiner has a full detailed story here.</a>  </em></p> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/10/jon-stewart-talks-to-kathleen-sebelius.html">Jon Stewart is great with his comedy</a> about pulling this out center stage and does give us an chance to laugh about it but again nothing gets done.  My favorite Sebelius public blunder was <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/02/speed-up-rate-of-change-in-health.html">“hurry up Health IT”…</a>which again shows lack of data mechanics knowledge as people doing software are working at about 150% all the time anyway, but she didn’t get that and yes this brought a roar out from the tech community as well.   It gave banks and insurers yet a little more confidence that <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/virtual-worlds-real-world-we-have.html">“The Grays”</a> were going to be running for quite a while, so they could continue creating more profit models with little disruption from the government.  At the time Sebelius was all wrapped up in Facebook with even having a contests, so see what I mean by lost in virtual values, social networks are all virtual and have their place, but hey they make money when they can dupe as well as provide a platform as Facebook has done.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/09/sebelius-has-bees-in-her-bonnetgiving.html">Sebelius Has Bees in Her Bonnet–Giving A Contract to Good Data to Mine HHS Employees Data So We Can See What They Think? Who Cares…Algo Duping Strikes Again…</a></h5> <p>Again it’s nothing personal but when you see these folks running around captured in a world of virtual values it begins to stick out like a sore thumb.  Both Sebelius and Corday share these weird values and its plays out in the news all the time.  <strong>Code runs hog ass wild</strong> while they focus on verbiage and are just completely lost on what to do.  Banks, insurers and so on just love this as they are lot smarter and see it as a great opportunity to work their models to increase their own profits with these folks running around with virtual values, in essence just lost.<img align="right" height="58" src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRJsy5_-1cPjzaPKJ1bNbOsyA0E5vLocojVTXPwC_UMW1X2avqTmg" style="float: right; display: inline" width="147" />  I saw it coming <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2009/02/kathleen-sebelius-kansas-governor-for.html">way back in 2009 with Sebelius</a> as I already had figured out the game with seeing what the other side was doing and why do you think we have the uneven money distribution we have today?  It’s all done with math models and code while executives,<strong> Congress and even the White House run around with their “virtual values” and again can’t see the humans for the algorithms.</strong>  <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/va-crisis-should-be-huge-wake-up-call.html">This is what occurred at the VA</a> and look where it got us…in a very toxic situation and again having executives being <strong>Algo Duped</strong> will allow this to continue with no hope of return and that scares me.  </p> <p><strong>Cordray even had problems within his own agency with “virtual” values as well with employee reviews</strong> and see how this syndrome rolls over into many other areas.  The guy’s just lost with virtual values stuck in his head and this has been a long time conditioning that’s been going on for quite a while and the problem is the virtual values come over into the real world and end up hurting us with bits of insanity and logic floating around everywhere.  Sure he got attacked in his own department as Cordray was off in “virtual land”.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/01/richard-cordray-on-daily-show-small.html">Richard Cordray on the Daily Show, Small Efforts, Still Doesn’t Understand Modeling and Data Mechanics As Heard In The Conversation, Low Tech Solutions For High Tech Problems Is About As Good As It Gets..</a></h5> <p><strong>Now we have this insane project from Mr. Cordray on building a <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/new-federal-database-will-track-americans-credit-ratings-other-financial-information/article/2549064">data base on all the credit information on US citizens</a> headed up by his department.  I said when that was announced how nuts he was as again there’s a big lack of “data mechanics logic” here and look what<img align="right" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-fpaB8yOE0io/USv18tNlXUI/AAAAAAABFxM/25MkrAmeTq8/AlgoFairy1%25255B11%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" /> he’s doing, just repeating what Sebelius did when she wanted to “spy” more on the HHS employees…just lost as hell again.</strong>  We don’t need this data base but again people that really don’t understand how values of data work, make this mistake over and over and over.  He’s going to end up with monster to manage but perhaps that’s job security in having a monster to manage?  <strong>Who knows, but he’s out there in “virtual” land.</strong>  </p> <p>I’m a big privacy advocate and want something done outside of virtual values to help consumers as I’m one of them too and I just don’t see anything happening as so many executives are lost in virtual land and as I mentioned above, <strong>banks and corporations love it as they can create some new models for profit while these folks wonder around not having a clue looking for the “Algorithm Fairies”.</strong>  I wrote a while back about the lack of data sleuths in government and asked why don’t they hire some who know what the “real” world is all about.  Quants get it as they are the real talent that know how to create models and code and there are both sides to that discussion as well as it made trillions for the banks with models and proprietary code that everyone’s afraid to talk about.  <strong>If you need some clues into their brilliant insight and talent, watch the 4 videos in the footer of this blog.  Nerds never get to be heard as Cathy O’Neill says in video number three and that is correct and we get folks like Cordray and Sebelius walking around numb in virtual land.</strong>  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/06/lack-of-modeling-and-algorithm-sleuths.html">Lack of Modeling and Algorithm Sleuths and Stalkers In Government, Part of Why We See Such “Silly” HHS and Congressional News About Financial Donations And/Or Solicitations…</a></h5> <p>I did see a little light in the recent <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/white-house-privacy-report-privacy-bill.html">White House Big Data/Privacy Report</a> to where one of the recommendations was for the consumer protection agency to “learn up” more about financial technologies so somebody at least had a glimpse of “The Grays” and lack of “data mechanics knowledge” there.  I didn’t expect a lot from that report as again when you see all of these folks and what they say in public, <strong>you can pin point they are just lost with virtual values while banks, insurers, etc. just walk all over them with math models and subsequent algorithms that perform on servers 24/7.</strong>  We did have the President address inequality but it seems that’s where it ended from what I have seen in the news.   We can always go for more recognition of this but we need action as well with coming out of “The Grays” and doing something.  Read the link below if you like for more of my thoughts there, it’s basically very much the same as what I am saying here, folks stuck in virtual worlds while consumers eat it.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/president-obama-defines-inequality-as.html">President Obama Defines Inequality As A Real Problem in the US That Needs to Be Addressed–Most of It Is Modeled By Banks and Companies With Power and Code to Move and Gain Money and Restrict Access–The System “Is” Rigged…</a></h5> <p>I like a good laugh but this year I chose not to watch the annual news correspondents show because it was too close to real life and making humor of virtual values hurting consumers was just not my cup of tea this year as if you have read this far I think I have pretty much spelled it out that we have most all our government executives floating around with “virtual” values and we’ve lost most of them as far as being in touch with “the real world”.  Virtual values and this lost sensation is alive and well over at Congress <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/09/jon-stewart-discusses-little-paper.html">(the folks that choose remain bliss and out of touch and just vie for media attention)</a>  too so it’s an epidemic that just won’t stop with the wrong people being in the wrong jobs I guess.  It even bothered me a bit to see the “Obama/Biden” selfie as it seemed to be just one more reminder of how out of touch they seem to be with the “real world”. <strong></strong>Google is having a Hay day with manipulating both parties in DC these days as they have pretty much figured out the psychology involved on how to approach the bliss on the hill and get pretty much what they want as their lobbying money is only second to GE these days.  </p> <p><strong>We want jobs to rebuild the economy and failing infrastructure and all we got as consumers were a bunch of algorithms that score us and deny access.  So this latest effort by Mr. Corday, there you go, he wants a data base on all our<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="167" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-_5jUKdqb0qY/U4oPz2lwnqI/AAAAAAABKdU/dnS27d9QvJo/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="276" /> credit information, sucked in like a true person confused with virtual values at a time when we are fighting to maintain some privacy and decency.</strong>  </p> <p>If you take a minute and read the <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">World Privacy Forum report</a>, they address this very situation and the rest of the world is watching “The Scoring of America” as they don’t have these extremes with virtual values like this in other countries.  Some of the other countries are starting to look at us like we’re nuts and maybe we are with so many current leaders running around in “virtual land”.  Even Elizabeth Warren, and I like her, is stuck out there a bit too as she’s trying but what did she do?  She wrote a book..big deal as there’s no shortage of those out there today and they don’t do thing except make some money for those writing it.  </p> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/07/glass-steagall-revival-presents-low.html">She proposed reenacting Glass Steagall,</a> and that’s better than nothing but it’s only a band aid as the folks who model and write code will work all around it.  Banks, insurers and other corporations are total experts at that as they have been doing it for years.  Here’s a post from a year ago (link below) on this topic as to me it’s crystal clear what’s happening here with folks not being able to separate and distinguish what’s a virtual value and where the real world kicks in.  I have learned a lot about this from reading about what Quants have to say and again they are considered nerds and never get to be heard, but there’s you real intelligence, the folks that don’t get to be heard and we end up with the nonsense of economists who as the #1 Quant in the world Paul Wilmott says, “economists don’t have laws, Isaac Newton has laws, they just have ideas that may or may not work<a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/it-will-never-be-100-bottles-of-beer.html">”…”It will never be 100 bottles of beer”</a> absolute wisdom here that those stuck in the virtual world just pass by.  Anyone want to waste anymore time talking virtual values of Piketty?  It’s makes for good click bait but nothing gets solved, he doesn’t have laws just idea and we can kill months and months debating his math and ideas.  Again the banks, insurers and corporations thrive on this and love seeing everyone distracted as they go about their business of creating more models for profit as the world is stuck over here discussing a bunch of virtual values.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/12/hiding-falsifying-and-accelerating-risk.html">Hiding, Falsifying, And Accelerating Risk Has Become the Achilles Heel of the US Economy As the “Real” World” Clashes With the Values Created From a World of “Fictional Values” Of Formulas and Math</a></h5> <p>Most are more of the same, just folks stuck in “virtual values” with no data mechanics knowledge running around the same tree over and over, and those types of books anymore are starting to say and show the same thing, so you read one, you’ve read them all.  There are some much more colorful that others out there though when some really trip over the real world.  <strong>I guess we shall see what Hillary Clinton comes up with on her book and again I like her and she’s done good things but writing a book doesn’t solve anything today.</strong>   Again I like her but I’m not going to waste my time right now with more “virtual” world stuff while the real world is screaming for help, and I’m part of the real world.  Doctors deal with the real world every day and we have a name for it: patients.  </p> <p>Doctors too are stuck in dealing with virtual values, with broken software, analytics, etc. that crash with what they are trying to do in healing.  They too have everything coming down on them with virtual values and it disrupts practicing medicine and sure we need software and <img align="right" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6HDDm04lOwA/Ts0zq-EuFHI/AAAAAAAA4d8/nMT-KL0JEDY/image_thumb%25255B12%25255D.png?imgmax=172" style="float: right; display: inline" />analytics, but it’s gone too virtual today as well.  <strong>Here’s a recent example to where an insurance company now, WellPoint is going to pay doctors to use their “prescribed” cancer treatments…what the hell is this now, kickbacks?</strong>  They are getting away with it as WellPoint quants modeled it and have used context in promoting this that gets everyone to buy in as their quants pulled in some real virtual values and made a case of it.  I keep telling everyone this is where the brains are and the very talented people, aka Quants that know how to toss virtual values into the real world for money.  </p> <p>Quants are paid to create a model and do a job and they do it for their pay, regardless of how it will affect the consumer.  <strong>We can just chuck all those studies about technology saving Healthcare “trillions” and evens some of the “billions” studies that were put out there over and over,  as you can see now as time has evolved, they were just bunk that duped you in and were repeated on Twitter like a bunch of magpies with everyone sucked in.</strong>  I watch every day with folks thinking stats are something they need to repeat and it’s nothing that touches them personally but we have become a nation of stat rats anymore.  Sure there are some studies and statistics worth reporting by all means and we like those but the smart marketing folks who know how to turn this bliss into money use this conditioning to rack you into <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">quantitated justifications for things not true as well.</a>  We sure seem to get a ton of what could be called <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/spurious-correlations-per-capita.html">Spurious Correlations</a> too with studies, so much so that it caught the attention of a Harvard student who made a website with a little satire showing how “ridiculously silly” we get at times with thinking some things correlate with others.  </p> <p>If you watch video #2, Quants of Wall Street you can see the Hippocratic Oath for Quants and Modelers discussed but it’s only an oath and doesn’t stop cheating and lying with models either.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/wellpoint-begins-new-oncology-program.html">WellPoint Begins New Oncology Program For Providers Offering Doctors $350 Monthly Payment For Each Patient Treated Using Insurers Recommendations - Is This A Kickback Offer? </a></h5> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/04/banks-are-actually-just-software.html">Banks and insurance companies have just morphed into being big software companies</a> any way I<img align="right" height="156" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-I5DHxK01ND4/UWWRTkIAlEI/AAAAAAABGbQ/MsscEcwywhE/image%25255B10%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="172" /> said a couple years ago and now we have the P2P lending companies too which are nothing but software facilitating another way to loan money.  They only fund about 10% of their applicants and the 90% of data probably gets sold.  In addition the basic concept of P2P loans is getting away from us as well and we are going right back into a subprime selling of loans as bonds again as hedge funds and banks are back in scooping them up, so the initial individual CDO concept there as designed is being consumed once again by big financial corporations.  It’s a different bunch of loans and smaller than mortgage loans but will end up in the same end result as we have regulators there to being duped all over the place.   The SEC is pretty well duped with another Sebelius Syndrome executive over there too<a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/markets-are-not-rigged-spoken-like-true.html">…”systems are not rigged”…</a>Algo Duping once again.  </p> <p>So here we go again with the wrong guy doing the wrong job.  I’m not normally a big supporter of the GOP but they are right in us not needing this data base with all the financial data on consumers in the US, we just have a lost soul with Richard Corday living in “virtual land” that can’t see the humans for the algorithms and sure he’s trying but he lacks data mechanics knowledge to really make anything happen and himself is kind of ending up as just one more “data serf” out there sucked in.  Cordray is a big one for being stuck with <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">quantitated justifications for things not true</a> and is just shuffling through his virtual perceptions creating little value other than some low hanging fruit where he has had some success.  </p> <p><strong>Cordray is doing little on the actual cause of consumers rip offs as well as the FTC as they don’t want to go there as it means math and models and really digging in other than just some additional verbiage in a law..</strong>and that too is getting more complex as how in the heck does the average consumer under half of what it out there.  I don’t expect and neither should anyone all consumers self included to understand big bulks of the law but the common things that touch us are now being blown out of proportion by banks, insurers, corporations and heck we don’t get a chance and we have these Algo Duped folks like Sebelius and Cordray that say “we need more consumer education” instead of attacking the root of where the complexities begin.  They also don’t have to deal with it online day to day as we do, so duped it is and blame those old dumb consumers for not being educated once again.  </p> <p>God forbid we have executives come out of their virtual worlds and come to face with this, much easier to remain Algo Duped and again, banks, insurers and corporations love it as they can create even more financial, insurance and other models that get more complex for us to deal with and they do it because that is profit, keep the consumers confused an we’ll make money is the way it goes.  So anyway, I’m taking my turn at the tables to talk about the real world here and not the virtual values our leaders are sucked into I guess.  Nothing personal but it just grinds me to see all us suffer while the virtual bliss folks just wonder around without a data mechanics clue. </p> <p>Visit the <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Killer Algorithm page</a> if you want to learn up and see what’s really going on.  I put it out there for awareness and learning so for those who want more than just another political side show and want to see how virtual values impact the real world and yourself, the videos are there.  </p> <p><strong>Like I said above, even Jon Stewart is having a difficult time making these digital illiterates out there look good:)</strong>  The cheers and rah rahs are just not there as folks in the know that understand this virtual world confusion, just see right to core.  God forbid we get a “Richard Cordray” book out there next.  Here’s a couple back links here on what I see through my eyes, a big fail here, living in virtual values.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/01/richard-cordray-on-daily-show-small.html">Richard Cordray on the Daily Show, Small Efforts, Still Doesn’t Understand Modeling and Data Mechanics As Heard In The Conversation, Low Tech Solutions For High Tech Problems Is About As Good As It Gets..</a></h5> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/04/richard-cordray-fail-with-understanding.html">Richard Cordray, Fail With Understanding Flawed Models and Algorithms -Big Case of“Algo Duping”With Big Data-Save Time, Hire Quants Who Know How Consumer Financial Models Are Built and Function…Geez</a></h5> <p>When his appointment was announced, I blogged this (link below) and is saying then what I’m saying today and sadly it came true with my suspicions, <u>one more for the Algo Duping files.  <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="134" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-02Ob9htM37g/U4oP0RsVSTI/AAAAAAABKdc/2nQCoEyZ1ck/image%25255B9%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="219" /></u></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/01/president-appoints-richard-cordray-as.html">President Appoints Richard Cordray as New Consumer Financial Protection Chief - Hope He Knows And Understands Correcting Flawed Math and Formulas To Battle the “Financial Attack of Killer Algorithms” On Consumers With Banks and Corporate USA</a></h5> <p>I probably managed with this post to attack a few folks but not done to hurt anyone but rather to try to raise the awareness of the fact that what’s happening out there is not cutting it as long as we have leaders living in virtual worlds and can’t the see the failures of the current day models failing and crashing at every turn.  </p> <p><strong>When are folks going to wake up, return to the real world and stop writing books?  BD</strong></p>

Richard Cordray Yet One More “Algo Duped” Government Executive Sucked In To Virtual Values and Unable to Locate the “Real World” Now Creating Huge Data Base Of All US Consumer Credit Information…

Mr. Corday is not alone and sure he has good intentions as do most government executives but he’s just one more out there sucked into “The Grays” of virtual values and can’t see the humans for the algorithms.  I named this ugly phenomena a while back and I call it the “Sebelius Syndrome” as there wa…

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Over Reaching With Algorithmic Healthcare Policies and Decision Making Puts Our System At Risk- Nurses Concerned And Make Some Very Good Points, Human Points

<p>One item addressed here is the cost and I don’t think one has been able to miss that over the last few years that for every efficiency we gain in healthcare with technology, it spurs yet another layer of technology or IT investments, it’s the beast we live with today.  Thus so all those studies and reports you saw about Billions and Millions and Trillions to be saved in healthcare with efficiencies were false.  You still see them out there today and anyone in technology knows that all these projections by economists, etc. won’t hold water as there’s always the unexpected or a Black Swan event that will dramatically make huge changes almost instantly.  When it comes to all these wearable devices you have to not only think about the cost, but what I said below, “do people work this way” as we are seeing model afte<a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/"><img align="right" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-0izDRTg1eiA/Uxp9aXgWCUI/AAAAAAABJig/-_UkQEa6MGE/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" /></a>r software model to begin to fail, some of them even before they get off the ground.</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World.. - Medical Quack</a></h5> <p>We are starting to see the wear and tear and there’s nothing more glaring and in our face than the VA right now as we have become over dependent on on stats and reports.  Sure we need them, but how many and where and not go into overload either.  We almost go into the dog it’s tail at times. </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/va-crisis-just-tip-of-iceberg-as-us.html">VA Crisis Just The Tip of the Iceberg As US Needs a Full On Healthcare Culture Change Everywhere To Get Back In Touch With the Real World of Patients… </a></h5> <p>Let’s face it when you need healthcare would you rather look a human or an algorithm in the face?  Sure that’s a bit extended but we’re not far from it.  Another good point made here is that it’s not so much the treatment avenues, it’s the billing and cost that’s up front here too.  We just had that this week with WellPoint and their new answer for Cancer Treatments.  Do you want your care based on what an oncologist gets paid from the insurer to use only their regimens?  That is exactly what we have here.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/wellpoint-begins-new-oncology-program.html">WellPoint Begins New Oncology Program For Providers Offering Doctors $350 Monthly Payment For Each Patient Treated Using Insurers Recommendations - Is This A Kickback Offer? </a></h5> <p>The nurses work with systems every day and live it so they deserve some attention for sure.  Humans will add ethics to their decisions as well and machines can’t do this with decision making.  Again as I mentioned above the data model may show you one thing but ethics added to the data may bring about a different decision so the human doctor still needs to be in the picture. <strong> In just doing this blog I have seen a huge deterioration of ethics all over the place and it’s getting worse.  One example was just the language used when two IPAs merged together with United, “inventory was transferred”..so doctors and patients are now just inventory?  See what I mean with ethics and those were just words and it gets worse.   </strong>Here’s a bit of a scientific write up where someone really tried to explore giving machines ethics, can’t be done.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/limitations-and-risks-of-machine-ethics.html">Limitations And Risks Of Machine Ethics (That Really Don’t Exist) - Abstract Basically Substantiating the Existence of What I Coined As “The Attacks of the Killer Algorithms”…</a></h5> <p>When it comes to models working or not working, look at this video below..do you want an end of life robot?  I’d rather have someone shoot me in the head that have to be put through this, but again we have folks living in virtual values today that get the real world and virtual values confused.  The person who created this is certainly out there in a virtual world.  This is the worst but people will create non ethical garbage like this if we leave the humans out.  Again, think of the VA and what occurred there, everyone initially interviewed were just stat rats as they were so brain washed.  That is also why I created “<a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">The Attack of the Killer Algorithms” page</a> with videos that help you see what’s going on around you so you are aware.  </p> <p><iframe style="height: 272px; width: 464px" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/T8PNzA2S6EY" frameborder="0" width="560" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <p>So again nurses make some good “human real world” points on not to lose our ethics by all means and what in the heck is all of this going to cost.  Sadly we have resorted to a bit of a sick way to rationalize who gets what and that is “scoring” and the World Privacy Forum is all over it with how this denies access and it’s proprietary and we don’t know the formulas, models, etc. and just have to believe that some of the junk science is true?  I hope not as it’s getting worse with “The Grays”.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">World Privacy Forum Report - The Scoring of America: How Secret Consumer Scores Threaten Your Privacy and Your Future - One Big Element that Fuels the Continued Attack of Killer Algorithms & Demise of the Middle Class Creating Profiteering And/Or Denial of Access </a></h5> <p>Again for all the efficiencies we gain, we lose any savings to some form of software or medtech and I’m not saying it’s all bad because it’s not but how we use it and how we balance is what’s important.  Is that the future of what kind of care we get…algorithms with no ethics?  Something to think about.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />“What this technology does is generate profits for healthcare corporations because they standardize based on this model of care that’s based on the factory floor. You treat everybody like a Model T Ford,” Deborah Burger, a registered nurse and co-president of NNU, told me over the phone.  <br />By speeding up the provision of care with algorithms, private hospitals can serve more patients in a day—and charge them accordingly. Apache III collects patients’ information and sends it right to the hospital’s billing department.<strong> “It’s actually a billing mechanism more than it is a treatment protocol,” Burger said.</strong></p> <p>Algorithms that can analyze symptoms and spit out a diagnosis favor efficiency over proper care, according to a<a href="http://www.nationalnursesunited.org/press/entry/nurses-launch-new-campaign-to-alert-public-to-dangers-of-medical-technology/"> recent campaign</a> by<a href="http://www.nationalnursesunited.org/"> National Nurses United</a> (NNU). The union claims that automated diagnosis systems lack the individualized care a nurse can provide and mainly allow private hospitals to boost their bottom line.</p> <p>Healthcare professionals have worked for years to develop diagnostic algorithms—including early methods like<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APACHE_III#APACHE_III"> Apache III</a> and<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAPS_III"> SAPS III</a>, as well are more more advanced <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinical_decision_support_system">clinical decision support systems</a>—which are used to help determine how patients are treated.</p> <p>They compare patient symptoms to a base dataset—Apache III's was culled from<a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1959406"> over seventeen thousand</a> ICU patients—to determine things like mortality probability and whether a patient should remain in intensive care or be moved. It may be a bit impersonal and morbid, but it’s efficient. Instead of improving the quality of healthcare, <strong>however, NNU sees these algorithms as eroding it.</strong></p> <p><a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/algorithmic-mds-will-ruin-healthcare-nurses-say">http://motherboard.vice.com/read/algorithmic-mds-will-ruin-healthcare-nurses-say</a></p>

Over Reaching With Algorithmic Healthcare Policies and Decision Making Puts Our System At Risk- Nurses Concerned And Make Some Very Good Points, Human Points

One item addressed here is the cost and I don’t think one has been able to miss that over the last few years that for every efficiency we gain in healthcare with technology, it spurs yet another layer of technology or IT investments, it’s the beast we live with today.  Thus so all those studies and …

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Sheridan Physician Outsourcing Service Bought by Amsurg Surgical Services for $2.35 Billion

<p>Both companies help place doctors in surgical centers and hospitals.  Amsurg operates in 34 states and is the largest operator of ambulatory surgery centers in the US.  The surgery center business is growing and merging as well as the urgent care business in the US.  Urgent care and surgeries sure seem to being moved out of hospitals over the last few years.  You also have health insurer United Health busy in this industry as well with buying up either entire entities or controlling interests in surgical centers as well their <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/01/united-healthcare-now-entering-urgent.html">urgent care</a> center expansion.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/07/unitedhealthcare-making-bigger-aco.html">Ownership or 51% Controlling Interest in 130 surgical center Physicians With Beach Surgical Holdings, Another Subsidiary</a></h5> <p>So we have more outsourcing of physicians on the agenda and Sheridan employs more than 2400 physicians in 25 states.  Amsurg is publicly traded company while Sheridan was not so here we go again with what appears to be attempts to not only merge business models but maybe raise stock values as well.  BD </p> <p> <hr /></p> <p>“<a href="http://sheridanhealthcare.com/about-us/sheridan-advantage"><em>Sheridan Healthcare</em></a><em> is the single source solution for providing comprehensive physician services in anesthesiology, emergency medicine, neonatology and radiology.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="61" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-r0dFmSCvlks/U4f5YopXcTI/AAAAAAABKc8/LG2U7SkOmUQ/image%25255B5%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /></em></p> <p><em>Our strength lies in the long-term relationships we have established with our hospital partners and our medical and professional staff. Our provider and client retention rates are among the industry's highest, providing stability for our clients' programs and strengthening our reputation for meeting and exceeding our clients' needs.”</em></p> <hr /> <p><em>Partnering with more than 1,800 physicians at more than 235 outpatient surgery centers across<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="67" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-sZVBI7e9W_0/U4f5ZH9xeBI/AAAAAAABKdE/-yXXKwxwrSU/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /> the United States, AmSurg is the nationally recognized leader in the development, management and operation of outpatient surgery centers.</em></p> <p><em><a href="http://www.amsurg.com/AboutUs/Pages/default.aspx">AmSurg surgery centers</a> provide high quality, low cost surgical services with superior patient satisfaction.</em></p> <p><em>We believe in empowering our physician partners to achieve their professional and personal goals by providing innovative operational, clinical and strategic services</em></p> <p> <hr />Health-care facility operator <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/AMSG">Amsurg</a> Corp. <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/AMSG">AMSG +6.87%</a> has reached a deal to buy physician-outsourcing service provider Sheridan Healthcare Inc. in a cash-and-stock transaction valued at about $2.35 billion, the companies said Thursday. </p> <p>The combined entity will have a total market of about $70 billion and will encompass more than 4,600 physician relationships in 38 states, they said. The deal is expected to close during the third quarter. </p> <p>Amsurg buys, develops and operates ambulatory surgery centers, recently owning and operating 242 such centers in the U.S. Sheridan, likewise, outsources physician services to hospitals and other health-care facilities in 25 states, employing more than 2,400 doctors and health-care professionals. </p> <p>"With the addition of Sheridan, we will be significantly diversified and differentiated—holding leadership positions in outsourced physician services for anesthesia, children's services, emergency medicine services and radiology while retaining our standing as a leading owner of free-standing ambulatory surgery centers," Amsurg Chief Executive Christopher A. Holden said in a news release. "This will be a combination unlike any other in the marketplace today." </p> <p><a href="http://online.wsj.com/articles/amsurg-to-buy-sheridan-healthcare-for-2-35-billion-1401361067">http://online.wsj.com/articles/amsurg-to-buy-sheridan-healthcare-for-2-35-billion-1401361067</a></p>

Sheridan Physician Outsourcing Service Bought by Amsurg Surgical Services for $2.35 Billion

Both companies help place doctors in surgical centers and hospitals.  Amsurg operates in 34 states and is the largest operator of ambulatory surgery centers in the US.  The surgery center business is growing and merging as well as the urgent care business in the US.  Urgent care and surgeries sure s…

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A Router That Uses Facebook to Authenticate and Track You for Free WiFi Offerings…

<p>It just doesn’t stop.  This is a router that small businesses can use to offer free WiFi service to clients but the catch is you have to use a Facebook account to long on so as long you don’t mind Facebook tracking you all over the web, and missing a bit of privacy then you can as a customer use the free Wi-Fi.  Maybe this tracking capability is right next to the NSA chip? (grin) <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="121" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-Hp8J1Q5zrbg/U4fyGw62rSI/AAAAAAABKcs/PrsbNwpwyXU/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="347" /></p> <p>You will also have to share your location as well as your shopping behavior.  So will these be popping up all over?  Well if you are a doctor and wanting to connect to your medical records system remotely, and you want to use this free Wi-Fi, you might want to think about it.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />D-Link <a href="http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20140529005384/en/D-Link-Works-Facebook-Bring-Advanced-Wi-Fi-Small">introduced a new wireless router on Thursday</a> aimed at small business providers that would like to treat customers to free Wi-Fi.</p> <p>Facebook is making that free connectivity possible with the condition that patrons log into the social network and check in at the respective company's Facebook page.</p> <p>Other than that, D-Link assured that users don't have to enter any additional codes or be pressed to sign up for more services.</p> <p>Specs-wise, the D-Link 11AC Router sports 1750Mbps Wi-Fi with 802.11ac along with an SPI firewall and WPA2 security measures.</p> <p><a href="http://www.zdnet.com/d-link-taps-facebook-on-wi-fi-routers-for-smbs-7000030016/">http://www.zdnet.com/d-link-taps-facebook-on-wi-fi-routers-for-smbs-7000030016/</a></p>

A Router That Uses Facebook to Authenticate and Track You for Free WiFi Offerings…

It just doesn’t stop.  This is a router that small businesses can use to offer free WiFi service to clients but the catch is you have to use a Facebook account to long on so as long you don’t mind Facebook tracking you all over the web, and missing a bit of privacy then you can as a customer use the…

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VA Crisis Just The Tip of the Iceberg As US Needs a Full On Healthcare Culture Change Everywhere To Get Back In Touch With the Real World of Patients…

<p>As I said before we have turned into a nation of “stat rats” with an over dependence on virtual values which stats are.  Sure we need them and it tells us where we need to focus and so on but again I call it “The Grays” to where people can’t tell the difference between the importance of real world values and the virtual stuff.  When I saw the interview with the Phoenix executives before they were put on leave, that’s all they could talk about and even Anderson Cooper didn’t seem to see any sort of concern on their faces either.  <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="204" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-bPvO_JZroc8/U4a88TLLclI/AAAAAAABKcc/bzDf8-ltDsI/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="310" /></p> <p>This goes all the way to the top as well with both the White House and Congress as they have been duped a bit as well.  We are running our health system on algorithms, yes some of those are needed for sure, but when it comes to some of the management ethics, it’s starting to look like dog eat dog on Wall Street so I guess that’s what we might be getting, Wall Street Healthcare by the risk algorithms.</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/virtual-worlds-real-world-we-have.html">Virtual Worlds, Real World We Have A Problem And It’s A Big One With A Lot of Gray Areas Finding Where The Defining Lines Exist, Confusing Many With A Lot of Weird Values And Strange Perceptions… </a></h5> <p>Government is kind of stuck too as we wanted jobs as well and all we got were a bunch of algorithms that “over sold” science and we ended up with too much junk science along the way.  The US Privacy Report on “The Scoring of America” spells that out pretty clearly and how scoring denies either money or care and the rest of the world is watching the US with all of this and scratching their heads as no other country does this to their citizens to this extent.</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">World Privacy Forum Report - The Scoring of America: How Secret Consumer Scores Threaten Your Privacy and Your Future - One Big Element that Fuels the Continued Attack of Killer Algorithms & Demise of the Middle Class Creating Profiteering And/Or Denial of Access </a></h5> <p>I wrote about this last week too, we are just a bunch of Stat Rats that can’t see the humans for the algorithms.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/va-crisis-should-be-huge-wake-up-call.html">VA Crisis Should Be A Huge Wake Up Call , We Have Turned Into a Nation of “Stat Rats”, Losing Touch With the “Real” World As Virtual Values Confuse, Collide and Wreak Havoc As Models & Formulas Fail </a></h5> <p>We also have HHS wanting even more data on us, I’ll tell you they focus on building data files on consumers and less on building good care systems as long as the stats say “it’s ok”. </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/hhs-biosurveillance-plan-would-allow.html">HHS Biosurveillance Plan Would Allow Government to Track Your Health Via Medical Records & More, Monitoring For Any Event It Considers A Government Defined Health Incident, United States of Secrets Part Two With Privacy Lost </a></h5> <p>Fire the head of the VA, well that won’t do much good other than choosing a figurehead to leave and he’s only one person and the problem is bigger than that.  Even Chuck Hagel today announced a review of the entire military system, maybe to CYA before anything comes up on the other side. </p> <p>Through the conditioning over the years and the push to sell more and more and more software that’s layered, and making a case for it, this what we got…</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">Quantitated Justification For Believing Things That Are Not True And Using Mathematical Processes To Fool Ourselves-The Journalistic Bot Functionality Debuts As Media Can’t Resist the Formulas…</a></h5> <p>As models being to fail it’s a cold hard awakening as I said below a couple weeks ago<img align="right" height="100" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6HDDm04lOwA/Ts0zq-EuFHI/AAAAAAAA4d8/nMT-KL0JEDY/image_thumb%25255B12%25255D.png?imgmax=172" style="float: right; display: inline" width="214" />, “people don’t work that way”.  BD  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World..</a></h5> <p>Visit the <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Killer Algorithm page</a> and watch some videos if you want to learn how this plays out on servers running 24/7 and see how governments of the past have been pretty royally duped.  Today’s it is even worse and gosh know who in hell with current technologies would even want to run for President as that’s the issues that need to be dealt with, again balancing the virtual and real world and we don’t have that now, too many are duped on virtual values and that’s a reason the economy can’t bounce back either as it rolls from the top with being duped and duped again.  BD</p> <p> <hr />An investigation of wait times for medical care at Veterans Affairs facilities has found "inappropriate scheduling practices are systemic" through the VA and "instances of manipulation of VA data that distort the legitimacy of reported waiting times," prompting new calls for VA Secretary Eric Shinseki to resign.</p> <p>The VA inspector general's interim report, released Wednesday, shows the investigation has expanded to 42 facilities, more than a dozen beyond the previously reported 26.</p> <p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-va-oig-wait-time-report-20140528-story.html">http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-va-oig-wait-time-report-20140528-story.html</a></p>

VA Crisis Just The Tip of the Iceberg As US Needs a Full On Healthcare Culture Change Everywhere To Get Back In Touch With the Real World of Patients…

As I said before we have turned into a nation of “stat rats” with an over dependence on virtual values which stats are.  Sure we need them and it tells us where we need to focus and so on but again I call it “The Grays” to where people can’t tell the difference between the importance of real world v…

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FDA Approves CardioMEMS For Patients Who Have Been Hospitalized For Heart Failure-First Implantable Wireless Device With Remote Monitoring

<p>No this does not talk to your cell phone, it has it’s own device that it talks to.  Once implanted the physician can review the pulmonary artery pressure and the heart rate.  Patients must have been hospitalized for heart failure before<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="142" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-h4glnbwLJP4/U4av4e1KRUI/AAAAAAABKcE/hR3d6LHr8jY/image%25255B6%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="262" /> the unit can be used.  BD  </p> <p><a href="http://www.cardiomems.com/content.asp?display=medical+mb&view=heart_sensor">From the website:</a></p> <p><em>“The sensor is a resonant circuit consisting of a capacitor and an inductor. The capacitance of the sensor is a function of the pressure in the sensor's environment and the resonant frequency of the sensor is a function of the capacitance and is measured by the electronics unit. Because of the presence of the inductor coil, the sensor can be electromagnetically coupled and<strong> </strong>the resonant frequency of the LC (inductor-capacitor) circuit can be measured remotely. This allows for wireless communication with the sensor and eliminates the need for a battery.</em> “</p> <p><em>The sensor is implanted in a branch of the left or right pulmonary artery and remains in the pulmonary artery as a permanent implant. The sensor is tethered to an over-the-wire delivery catheter.</em></p> <p> <hr />The <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/f/food_and_drug_administration/index.html?inline=nyt-org">Food and Drug Administration</a> on Wednesday approved a new implantable device to help doctors monitor<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="153" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-F1KUvHLYBds/U4av4-E83II/AAAAAAABKcM/acZwyr1Jo60/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /> patients with severe <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/heart-failure/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier">heart failure</a> as they go about their day. The agency cleared the CardioMEMS HF System for patients who hospitalized in the previous year because of heart failure. The device uses an implanted sensor in the peripheral artery to measure <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/test/blood-pressure/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier">blood pressure</a> and heart rate. The information is wirelessly transmitted to an electronic database that can be retrieved by patients’ physicians. The F.D.A. cleared the device based on a study of 550 patients in which those with the device had significantly fewer heart-failure-related hospitalizations than those without it</p> <p><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/business/fda-approves-heart-device-that-transmits-data-to-doctors.html?partner=socialflow&smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&_r=0">http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/business/fda-approves-heart-device-that-transmits-data-to-doctors.html?partner=socialflow&smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&_r=0</a></p>

FDA Approves CardioMEMS For Patients Who Have Been Hospitalized For Heart Failure-First Implantable Wireless Device With Remote Monitoring

No this does not talk to your cell phone, it has it’s own device that it talks to.  Once implanted the physician can review the pulmonary artery pressure and the heart rate.  Patients must have been hospitalized for heart failure before the unit can be used.  BD  From the website: “The sensor is …

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WellPoint Begins New Oncology Program For Providers Offering Doctors $350 Monthly Payment For Each Patient Treated Using Insurers Recommendations - Is This A Kickback Offer?

<p>The program does not begin until July and is somewhat of a pilot I guess you could say as it will only be available in 6 states but more states added later.  Breast cancer, lung and colorectal cancer will be the initial focuses and more types of cancer added later too.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="92" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-56q40DDELZo/U4XucBvE5GI/AAAAAAABKbs/hD-LUthRl6w/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />  Back in 2010 United sent out letters “grading” doctors on their treatments and you can review that at the link below.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2010/02/united-healthcare-sends-oncology.html">United HealthCare Sends Oncology Reports to Doctors – Assessing Cancer Treatment Rules Compiled by Ingenix </a></h5> <p>This is a tough decision as cancer treatments change frequently so will the “recommended” program change with it?  We already have narrow networks for doctors so will this be narrowed drugs for cancer patients too?  Some of the comments here seemed to reflect that it is workable from a few cancer treatment centers, but I guess it’s a wait and see overall.</p> <p>This almost looks like a “kickback” type of situation does it not?  At any rate oncologists have a high up front cost with buying and storing some of the drugs as well and insurers know this as well so the $350 would be an incentive to help in that cost.   We know insurers are hiring more quants to create new types of business models and this sounds like it could one of those created.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="161" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-4LhbuFv-KXU/U4Xucjng9oI/AAAAAAABKb0/dlrgHWlbbX8/image%25255B7%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="134" /></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/health-insurer-actuary-jobs-becoming.html">Health Insurer Actuary Jobs Becoming More Difficult In the Era of Killer Algorithms, Can’t Function Like They Used To As Information Changes Take Place Daily And Hourly, More Insurance Companies Are Seeking Quants to Create New Math Models, The Next Level Up From Actuary Calculations</a></h5> <p>We also know that WellPoint is a “reseller” of IBM Watson services so will this increase those sales as well to additional hospitals to use for their “recommended” regimentations too?  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2011/12/wellpoint-to-bankroll-use-of-ibm-watson.html">WellPoint to Bankroll Use of IBM Watson at Cedar Sinai Medical Center to Research Cancer Data/Information To Provide Guidance for Physicians</a></h5> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/12/ibm-with-machine-learning-at-blue-cross.html"><strong>BM With Machine Learning at Blue Cross Pilot Program With Machine Assessing Authorizations and Next Level Is Using Predictive Analytics To Find Best Care Providers And Lower Reimbursements Rates</strong></a></h5> <p> <hr />Insurers are changing how they pay for cancer care, aiming to blunt rapidly growing costs and push oncologists to adhere to standardized treatment guidelines.</p> <p>The largest effort yet is set to be unveiled by <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/WLP">WellPoint</a> Inc., <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/WLP">WLP -0.31%</a> which will begin offering oncologists a $350-per-month payment for each patient who is on one of the insurer's recommended regimens. WellPoint, the No. 2 insurer in the U.S., will roll out its new program July 1 in six states and through its entire network by the middle of next year. Initially, it will focus on breast, lung and colorectal cancer, but it will expand to other forms of the disease.</p> <p>Programs like WellPoint's and others around the country are part of an effort to smooth out wide variations in how doctors treat patients, which health experts say can be wasteful and don't always benefit patients. In cancer, insurers and health-care providers have been developing treatment protocols—sometimes known as "pathways"—that are supposed to represent the best and most efficient approaches, balancing cost, benefit and side effects. Insurers are then paying doctors according to how well they comply.</p> <p><a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304587704579588170876612100?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702304587704579588170876612100.html">http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304587704579588170876612100?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702304587704579588170876612100.html</a></p>

WellPoint Begins New Oncology Program For Providers Offering Doctors $350 Monthly Payment For Each Patient Treated Using Insurers Recommendations - Is This A Kickback Offer?

The program does not begin until July and is somewhat of a pilot I guess you could say as it will only be available in 6 states but more states added later.  Breast cancer, lung and colorectal cancer will be the initial focuses and more types of cancer added later too.  Back in 2010 United sent out …

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Aver Informatics Raises Over $8 Million To Work With Optum API For Coding And Cost Saving…

<p>Aver CEO Kurt Brenkus is a former United Healthcare employee who directed 14 global service centers.  The funding was from GE Ventures and Drive Capital.  The company was founded in 2101 and you can see the use described in the paragraph below <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="87" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-iVKPcfqiwU4/U4WK-U52yPI/AAAAAAABKbc/W9vIfllBWjk/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />of using Optum (United Healthcare) products to integrate.  We have seen things like this before where United employees go out and do their own thing, build up the business and later end up being acquired or partly acquired i.e. 51% controlling interest by United or one of their subsidiaries.  This increases the United/Optum foothold in the Health IT business.  </p> <p>It will compete with the likes of TriZetto (who also uses some Optum software products for claims editing and pricing).  Interesting is it not how United or the Optum business is integrated in so many places?  You can find United hiring data scientists that work with this technology through out their systems too, so there’s your modeling for risk assessments in here and probably some software licensing to be paid by Aver.  We see the same efforts with companies like Red Brick that use Optum software for their employer wellness programs.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />Health care organizations can use Aver Informatics to understand the true cost of care by connecting all the diagnosis and procedure codes associated with a member, including doctor visits, prescriptions, follow-up and emergency visits. <strong>The medical coding reference from Optum is integrated within the application so you don’t need to be a coding expert to find the data you need.</strong> <strong>This data is pulled directly into the Aver application from Optum's data utilizing an Application Programming Interface (API) -- a source-based specification used as an interface by software components to communicate with each other.</strong> Aver Informatics can provide faster access to the disparate data required for performing quality benchmarking, validating pre- and post-payments, stratifying risk, understanding utilization and much more. </p> <p>Kurt Brenkus, President and CEO of Aver Informatics, advises other vendors looking to integrate referential data in their systems to be very diligent. “Because coding information drives so much of clinical decision-making and analysis, it is important to work with proven and reliable data. We chose Optum because of the breadth of their information and the many clinical and coding experts that augment it. <strong>We also liked the simplicity of integration using industry-standard protocols.” </strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.optumcoding.com/standalones/industryviews/article_online.aspx?id=18">https://www.optumcoding.com/standalones/industryviews/article_online.aspx?id=18</a></p>

Aver Informatics Raises Over $8 Million To Work With Optum API For Coding And Cost Saving…

Aver CEO Kurt Brenkus is a former United Healthcare employee who directed 14 global service centers.  The funding was from GE Ventures and Drive Capital.  The company was founded in 2101 and you can see the use described in the paragraph below of using Optum (United Healthcare) products to integrate…

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FDA Approves New Once a Week IV Treatment for Acute Skin Infections Associated With Diabetes And Other Diseases From Durata Therapeutics

<p>This is an antibiotic obviously that can help fight off infections such as MRSA and Strep viruses<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="118" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-LVM-58nzDE8/U4V3zCPkBFI/AAAAAAABKbM/kn_4WLJ13Do/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="158" />.  It is given in two doses.  It is designated as an infectious disease product.</p> <p>It’s a 5 year old company with no revenue so far and this is the first company drug approved.  It acquired the rights to the drug from Pfizer in 2009.  The <a href="http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm398724.htm">full press release</a> can be read here.  BD</p> <p> <hr />Chicago-based Durata Therapeutics Inc. said Friday that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved its first drug, a once-weekly intravenous antibiotic aimed at acute bacterial skin infections and skin structure infections.</p> <p>The drug, dalbavancin, will be marketed as Dalvance and was approved to treat adults who have deep-tissue infections or skin problems associated with underlying diseases like diabetes. </p> <p>It is aimed at treating serious bacterial infections, including Streptococcus and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, and is administered in two doses. <br />Durata said the drug was is the first drug with the qualified infectious disease product designation to gain FDA approval.  </p> <p><a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-durata-first-drug--fda-approval-20140523,0,2012002.story">http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-durata-first-drug--fda-approval-20140523,0,2012002.story</a></p>

FDA Approves New Once a Week IV Treatment for Acute Skin Infections Associated With Diabetes And Other Diseases From Durata Therapeutics

This is an antibiotic obviously that can help fight off infections such as MRSA and Strep viruses.  It is given in two doses.  It is designated as an infectious disease product. It’s a 5 year old company with no revenue so far and this is the first company drug approved.  It acquired the rights to …

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FDA Gives Approval To Suspended Animation Human Trials at UPMC-Reducing Body Temperature To Save Lives

<p>This procedure reduces body temperature to 50 degrees by inserting a cannula into the aorta <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="148" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-EW000s1Y8ak/U4VuVvZ-KeI/AAAAAAABKa8/f3Fht1pDmF0/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />and flushing cold saline into the system. This will slow the blood flow, which will prevent the body from bleeding out.   The low temperatures will also slow other biological processes as well.</p> <p>This is a small trial but very interesting as it has been done on pigs and saved the lives.  Interesting to hear the doctor’s comments on this as he says it will save lives with the additional two hours allowed to perform surgical procedures.  Experimentation began with pigs back in 2000, so it’s been ongoing for a while.  </p> <p>The procedure even has <a href="http://acutecareresearch.org/studies/current/emergency-preservation-and-resuscitation-cardiac-arrest-trauma-epr-cat">a website</a> of it’s own with additional information and other projects in the works.  BD</p> <p><iframe style="height: 271px; width: 496px" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/I3jXktFMaSM?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" width="640" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <p> </p> <p> <hr /></p> <p>The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the first human trials for a science fiction-worthy medical treatment — suspended animation.</p> <p>Later this month surgeons at UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Pittsburgh will begin using a suspended animation technique to extend the time available to treat traumatic injuries, possibly making up the difference between life and death in emergency situations <a href="http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/suspended-animation-human-trials-about-begin#qH7kPrMc6QZjkjL7.16">according to iflscience.com</a>.</p> <p>While the typical sci-fi rendition of suspended animation usually involves freezing the entire body in a capsule of some sort, the real “emergency preservation and resuscitation” (EPR) procedure involves flushing a body with cold saline, reducing its temperature to 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit) and slowing cellular activity and biological processes — including blood flow — to prevent bleeding out.</p> <p>This temporary method of suspended animation will give doctors an additional two hours to perform life-saving surgeries for patients with otherwise fatal conditions like those that go into cardiac arrest, which under normal circumstances has a seven percent chance of survival.</p> <p>“After we did those experiments, the definition of ‘dead’ changed,” Rhee <a href="http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129623.000-gunshot-victims-to-be-suspended-between-life-and-death.html?full=true#.U4SL4K1dXgJ">told the New Scientist</a>. “Every day at work I declare people dead. They have no signs of life, no heartbeat, no brain activity. I sign a piece of paper knowing in my heart that they are not actually dead. I could, right then and there, suspend them. But I have to put them in a body bag. It’s frustrating to know there’s a solution.” </p> <p><a href="http://dailycaller.com/2014/05/27/fda-approves-suspended-animation-human-trials/#ixzz32z0PiWaK">http://dailycaller.com/2014/05/27/fda-approves-suspended-animation-human-trials/#ixzz32z0PiWaK</a></p>

FDA Gives Approval To Suspended Animation Human Trials at UPMC-Reducing Body Temperature To Save Lives

This procedure reduces body temperature to 50 degrees by inserting a cannula into the aorta and flushing cold saline into the system. This will slow the blood flow, which will prevent the body from bleeding out.   The low temperatures will also slow other biological processes as well. This is a sma…

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Gates Foundation Giving Begins to Slow..

<p>This is kind of an interesting article to where nobody really knows why the foundation gifts are slowing down but there’s a lot of guessing here and there.  We certainly are better off due to the Foundation by all means.  Perhaps I might guess tha<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="67" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-EXo8FN7KdYQ/U4Qs6fZXwZI/AAAAAAABKas/QkRWL3fo1k8/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />t the guidelines are changing a bit?  As mentioned below the big gifts are complex in nature.  We have also been reading too about some of the charity work from hospitals beginning to slow down.</p> <p>For whatever reason it’s slowing down I hope it doesn’t go away…BD  </p> <p> <hr />John Pinette, a spokesman for Mr. Gates, declined to address specific reasons for the change of pace in giving, but he did point to the challenges of distributing large amounts of money where it can be most effective. Giving away $3.9 billion, as the foundation did in 2012, “is a massive task and a big responsibility,” Mr. Pinette said.</p> <p>Because the vast majority of potential grant recipients are relatively small, “finding organizations that have the capacity to productively use large grants can be challenging,” said Melissa A. Berman, president of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, which advises donors including the Gates foundation on how to achieve their goals. She said 75 percent of nonprofits in the United States had annual budgets of less than $500,000.</p> <p>Paul Brest, a Stanford law professor and former president of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, said, “It’s very easy to give away money, but hard to give away money to have real and lasting impact.”</p> <p>Some other Gates investments combine his expertise in software with disease-fighting goals that echo those of his foundation. He has invested $30 million in a drug-discovery start-up, Schrodinger. He has also invested in Nimbus Discovery, which aims to use computers to discover drugs.</p> <p><a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/as-his-foundation-has-grown-gates-has-slowed-his-donations/?smid=tw-dealbook&seid=auto">http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/as-his-foundation-has-grown-gates-has-slowed-his-donations/?smid=tw-dealbook&seid=auto</a></p>

Gates Foundation Giving Begins to Slow..

This is kind of an interesting article to where nobody really knows why the foundation gifts are slowing down but there’s a lot of guessing here and there.  We certainly are better off due to the Foundation by all means.  Perhaps I might guess that the guidelines are changing a bit?  As mentioned be…

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McKesson Corporation Subsidiary Sued by Hedge Fund Relative to Acquisition of Celesio Drug Wholesales

<p>The hedge fund actually filed the case in Germany, the country to where the suit is alleging laws were violated.  With this<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="87" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-onzde0mNARg/U4NoFaprxDI/AAAAAAABKac/zboQCC47nhg/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /> acquisition  we now have one of the largest drug distributors in the world with over $150 billion in annual revenue with operations in 20 countries.  The hedge fund said McKesson should have offered to pay more in additional compensation of minority share holders and bond holders with Celesio.  </p> <p><em>“If McKesson’s transaction is allowed to stand without addressing the divergent prices paid to different shareholders, this precedent would upend safeguards designed to ensure fair treatment of all shareholders in corporate takeovers in Germany,” the hedge fund said.”</em></p> <p>In short one investor appears to have been favored over others, Elliott Management.  BD </p> <p> <hr />The hedge fund Magnetar Capital sued a subsidiary of the  <a href="http://dealbook.on.nytimes.com/public/overview?symbol=MCK&inline=nyt-org">McKesson Corporation</a> on Wednesday in connection with its acquisition of the German drug wholesaler Celesio, contending that McKesson violated German takeover law by paying more to some holders of Celesio’s convertible bonds than it did to shareholders.</p> <p>Magnetar filed the lawsuit in the district court of Frankfurt on behalf of four funds it manages. It contends that McKesson agreed to pay Elliott Management and its affiliates the equivalent of 30.95 euros a share, or about $42.35, for Celesio’s convertible bonds to get enough shares to push the deal through. Magnetar and other shareholders were paid €23.50 a share for their holdings and are entitled to an equal amount under German law, according to the suit.</p> <p>In October, McKesson announced that it had acquired a controlling stake in Celesio from Franz Haniel & Cie., the majority shareholder, and planned to start a tender offer for the remaining shares.</p> <p>But, McKesson <a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/01/13/mckesson-comes-up-short-on-celesio-tender-offer/">fell short</a> in January of the 75 percent of the company’s outstanding shares and convertible bonds for the deal to proceed.</p> <p>It increased its tender offer for Celesio at the last minute after weeks of <a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/12/23/hedge-fund-has-no-plans-to-participate-in-tender-offer-for-celesio/">vocal criticism</a> by Elliott Management, a hedge fund in New York founded by Paul E. Singer.</p> <p><a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/hedge-fund-sues-mckesson-unit-over-celesio-deal/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0">http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/hedge-fund-sues-mckesson-unit-over-celesio-deal/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0</a></p>

McKesson Corporation Subsidiary Sued by Hedge Fund Relative to Acquisition of Celesio Drug Wholesales

The hedge fund actually filed the case in Germany, the country to where the suit is alleging laws were violated.  With this acquisition  we now have one of the largest drug distributors in the world with over $150 billion in annual revenue with operations in 20 countries.  The hedge fund said McKess…

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Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation To Close in June, But The Kanzius Machine Will Have It’s Day With at the FDA With An Application To be Filed

<p>Here’s a couple back links if you are not familiar with the Kanzius machine.  It has been on<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="187" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-73daHdlzW4g/U4KxUhEKRwI/AAAAAAABKaM/u4ak24sMmec/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="126" /> 60 Minute and a few other places.  The Foundation is closing as it has met it’s goals.  There have been no human tests with the machine yet.  </p> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2008/12/fda-checking-kanzius-machine-as.html"><strong>FDA checking Kanzius Machine as a possible cancer cure</strong></a></p> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2008/08/kanzius-machine-cancer-cure.html"><strong>The Kanzius Machine: A Cancer Cure?</strong></a></p> <p><em><strong>The M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and the University of Pittsburgh both have the machine and are doing some additional testing.</strong>  Mr. Kanzius was not from the medical field and somewhat stumbled up on his creation, being a person suffering from cancer as well.</em> “</p> <p>Tests are currently working with pigs so stay tuned on this one.  They are honoring the John Kanzius’s wishes and performing the trials where he wished, again upon FDA approval.  BD  </p> <p> </p> <iframe height="220" src="http://eplayer.clipsyndicate.com/embed/iframe?aspect_ratio=16x9&auto_next=0&auto_start=0&page_count=5&pf_id=10236&pl_id=24326&rel=3&show_title=1&va_id=5120109&volume=8&windows=2" frameborder="0" width="420" scrolling="no"></iframe> <p>AkesoGenX  purchased John Kanzius' external radio-frequency generator and its patents earlier this year as John Kanzius passed away in 2009.  If the FDA does not approve the research could go over seas.  If the FDA approves clinical trials could begin in 2 locations in the US.  Here’s a vintage CBS news video.  </p> <p><embed src="http://i.i.cbsi.com/cnwk.1d/av/video/cbsnews/atlantis2/cbsnews_player_embed.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" background="#333333" width="425" height="279" allowFullScreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" FlashVars="si=254&contentValue=999999&shareUrl=http://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-kanzius-machine-a-cancer-cure/2/" /></embed></p> <p>The Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation announced it will dissolve itself as of June 30, but the cancer-fighting technology it helped to develop is poised for approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).</p> <p>Sanibel Island resident John Kanzius, who died in 2009 from complications related to the chemotherapy he received for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, developed the Kanzius Noninvasive Radiowave Cancer Treatment.</p> <p>The treatment coats cancer cells with nanoparticles using a unique antibody and then essentially burns them away with focused radio waves.</p> <p>Foundation Executive Director Mark A. Neidig met with the public and donors on May 23 to explain that it was closing because the foundation felt that it had accomplished its goal. Formed by a group of Kanzius' dedicated friends, it has been the project's primary source of funding for the last five years.</p> <p>Researchers are preparing an application to the FDA as early as August in order to show the evidence they have compiled and ask for approval to begin testing it on humans. The FDA is required by law to meet with any applicant within 90 days and to make a decision within an additional 75 days.</p> <p><strong>"They aren't going to stop things because there are so many great pieces of data," said Neidig. "Every indication shows that the research is strong."</strong></p> <p> <a href="http://www.island-reporter.com/page/content.detail/id/524006/Kanzius-cancer-treatment-to-go-before-the-FDA.html?nav=5051#sthash.6g0aHbWh.dpuf">http://www.island-reporter.com/page/content.detail/id/524006/Kanzius-cancer-treatment-to-go-before-the-FDA.html?nav=5051#sthash.6g0aHbWh.dpuf</a></p>

Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation To Close in June, But The Kanzius Machine Will Have It’s Day With at the FDA With An Application To be Filed

Here’s a couple back links if you are not familiar with the Kanzius machine.  It has been on 60 Minute and a few other places.  The Foundation is closing as it has met it’s goals.  There have been no human tests with the machine yet.  FDA checking Kanzius Machine as a possible cancer cure The Kan…

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89 Years Old US Vet Gets Bit By a “Killer Algorithm” Reducing His Benefits to $6 a Month As VA Over Paid Him By $3000 Over Time - These Machines Aren’t Learning Anything…

<p>This kind of news just pisses everybody off and it was the VA’s mistake.  You every is frigging data all over the place, why don’t they take a look and see how much income this 89 years man has.  From what I’m reading here it’s an automatic payment and could an 89 year old man not notice a tiny bit more in the deposit?  Sure he could miss it or believe it was perhaps a small cost of living increase too as none of us know what the hell comes down the tubes anymore with constant business analytics algorithms shifting right and left <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="115" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-afiTM8nOh6s/U4Ji8hajXQI/AAAAAAABKZ8/8HMRnhTJVgw/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="244" />all the time, as what’s here today is gone tomorrow.</p> <p>The VA is not the only one to make stupid mistakes like this it happened in New York a while back with this story with leaving another person like nothing to live on!  What’ the F**k!  Here’s where you need humans to come in and look at some of this stuff and see that ethics are being carried out before the chomping algorithms come out and do this.  If you are the recipient end of this, it hurts and causes you to lose access to money, food, you name it.  Then we have the little “dizzies” that come along to fix it but hell it might take them months.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/06/new-york-subway-worker-dubbed-as-hero.html">New York Subway Worker, Dubbed as a Hero Has Pension Reduced to $5.00 a Month–Retirement System Error–Attack of the Killer Algorithms Chapter 35</a></h5> <p>We also know that “the machines” will never have ethics, no matter how hard folks try to tell you they can program this, they do as programmed and yes can be trained to recognize certain patterns in us, but is that considered ethics, no, its programming.  Here’s a good essay written on that topic where a data scientist talked about his trying to do just that..so those are limitations of machine learning and what you get is kick in the teeth from some Killer Algorithms.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/limitations-and-risks-of-machine-ethics.html">Limitations And Risks Of Machine ethics (That Really Don’t Exist) - Abstract Basically Substantiating the Existence of What I Coined As “The Attacks of the Killer Algorithms”…</a></h5> <p>I have an entire page with a lot of videos that discuss <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Killer Algorithms</a> in many aspects, a lot of it financial so you have time check out some videos and see how all of this is done and how you have no say over proprietary computer algorithms that making life impacting decisions on servers 24/7 about all of us that reach out and bite you when you lease expect it sometimes.   BD  </p> <p> <hr />An 89-year-old Navy veteran who came under heavy enemy fire aboard a landing craft on D-Day is accusing bureaucrats at the Department of Veterans Affairs of slashing his veterans benefits to $6 a month from $300.</p> <p>Joseph Teson, of Watervliet, N.Y., told WNYT-TV he used to get $300 a month in benefits, about a third of which he would donate to veterans groups. He said the VA cut his benefits to recoup an overpayment of more than $3,000 that he never even noticed.</p> <p>The letter had a toll-free number, which Teson’s daughter Tami called. No one at the VA could tell her how and why the overpayment happened. She said her father never realized he was getting more than he should have, WNYT reported.</p> <p><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/05/25/va-cuts-d-day-veterans-benefits-to-6-month/">http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/05/25/va-cuts-d-day-veterans-benefits-to-6-month/</a></p>

89 Years Old US Vet Gets Bit By a “Killer Algorithm” Reducing His Benefits to $6 a Month As VA Over Paid Him By $3000 Over Time - These Machines Aren’t Learning Anything…

This kind of news just pisses everybody off and it was the VA’s mistake.  You every is frigging data all over the place, why don’t they take a look and see how much income this 89 years man has.  From what I’m reading here it’s an automatic payment and could an 89 year old man not notice a tiny bit …

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Medical Quack Chat With Dan “The Clinical Trials” Guy, Offering Some Common Sense Talk About Healthcare Technology

<p><strong>If you came here looking for yet another earth shattering video that promises to “change your life”, well this is not it:)</strong>  We have enough of those out there today and Dan asked me to have an informal chat just to talk about healthcare technologies and get my input.  I try do talk “realities” and not paint a picture of the next greatest thing here.  Actually I tend to think it gets a bit over<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="143" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-db0NB_w4lgY/U4IjJyQHtnI/AAAAAAABKZk/b6Wj63vyH8Q/image%25255B9%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="243" /> done on the web and I know I get a steady diet of it and yeah some of it really gets old. <strong>I think I pretty much try to land myself in the “real” world versus so much of “virtual” values we see out there</strong> today as all virtual values don’t work in the real world.  I like software and what it can do to help make me smarter relative to better decisions and efficiencies for sure, otherwise I would not have been a developer.  I made a choice to leave writing code a few years back as I figured out that I want a “little” life back as it is life consuming at times and that’s all you end up thinking about, as the pressure can be phenomenal.  </p> <p><strong>I think we live a little bit “too virtual” today</strong> and that seems to be the root of a lot of issues out there and a more “common sense” look at things can help.  We have a bit of sensationalism out there with media looking for new revenue stream to replaced lost revenue but there’s still good news out there too but some of the “click baits” gets mixed in there too and after a steady diet of some of this your view on reality gets distorted a bit.  Bottom line here is that “people don’t work that way” and we are starting to see a lot of “failed models” out there.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">“People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World..</a></h5> <p><strong>I wrote about that a while back and called it “The Grays”, this unwanted phenomena and so far haven’t had anyone disagree:)</strong>  We have become a nation of “<strong>Stat Rats”</strong> as I call it to where goals, numbers, etc. take over and while we need to measure and need some of this data, it does get over done.  Just because the government releases data for viewing, does that mean you need it?  How important is it?  Does it impact you directly?  I love the folks that pound into my head that <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/wearables-news-glut-give-us-break-and.html">I need to be doing “wearables” over and over on the web</a> and 90% of those folks that keep telling me that don’t use of the products themselves (grin).  If you counter and say you question privacy with the devices and apps, some come back with an argument that you are wrong and then you end up with<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="117" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-0yNxoLw2Lg4/U4IjKkVq0dI/AAAAAAABKZs/PI4s_jlNe5g/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="125" /> this <strong>“entirely virtual debate”</strong> that goes nowhere as neither party “really” uses some of those products:)  Sometimes you end up with <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">“Quantitated Justifications”</a> for things that are just not true and see video number one in my footer for more on that topic.  </p> <p>I don’t know about you but I try to give that focus and ask that question a lot anymore to keep the “fluff” out from distracting me too much.  At times we all behave like “magpies” just repeating statistics to each other over and over and it may not be something that has any direct impact on our lives at all but is’ been a “conditioning” process.  Here’s what I sad about “The Grays” a few weeks ago…</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/virtual-worlds-real-world-we-have.html">Virtual Worlds, Real World We Have A Problem And It’s A Big One With A Lot of Gray Areas Finding Where The Defining Lines Exist, Confusing Many With A Lot of Weird Values And Strange Perceptions… </a></h5> <p>So here’s Dan and myself having an “off the cuff” chat as he managed to pull me into the YouTube Video world for about 30 minutes…again I’m telling you upfront, this is not going to change your life as you know it (grin) but rather give you some idea of how others think as we are not all the same. </p> <p><iframe style="height: 284px; width: 501px" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/jJuw-ksOsq0" frameborder="0" width="560" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <p>One last thought here too if you have been following the news on the VA, and you almost can’t miss it, I see that as the big root of their culture issues there too as the goals and states have been pounded into their heads for years and this is not making an excuse for any of what occurred, but I feel they too got too wrapped up in the “virtual” world and lost track with the “real” world out there..very sad indeed.  We need to do a little better out there than being<strong> “Stat Rats” and “Magpies”</strong> and not lose our focus and realize how we all get duped from time to time, as the <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Killer Algorithms</a> do exist and can fool you.  BD  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/va-crisis-should-be-huge-wake-up-call.html">VA Crisis Should Be A Huge Wake Up Call , We Have Turned Into a Nation of “Stat Rats”, Losing Touch With the “Real” World As Virtual Values Confuse, Collide and Wreak Havoc As Models & Formulas Fail </a></h5>

Medical Quack Chat With Dan “The Clinical Trials” Guy, Offering Some Common Sense Talk About Healthcare Technology

If you came here looking for yet another earth shattering video that promises to “change your life”, well this is not it:)  We have enough of those out there today and Dan asked me to have an informal chat just to talk about healthcare technologies and get my input.  I try do talk “realities” and no…

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As If the VA Doesn’t Have Enough Trouble On It’s Plate-Car Crashes Through the Wall of VA Hospital in Massachusetts

<p>Luckily nobody was hurt here when an elderly man hit the gas instead of the brakes.   It was the mechanical room of the hospital so no hospital medical equipment was involved.  BD  </p> <p> </p> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://whdh.images.worldnow.com/interface/js/WNVideo.js?rnd=239338;hostDomain=www.whdh.com;playerWidth=430;playerHeight=255;isShowIcon=true;clipId=10195601;flvUri=;partnerclipid=;adTag=Station%25201;advertisingZone=;enableAds=true;landingPage=;islandingPageoverride=false;playerType=STANDARD_EMBEDDEDscript;controlsType=overlay"></script><a title="7News Boston WHDH-TV " href="http://www.whdh.com">7News Boston WHDH-TV </a> <hr />WEST ROXBURY, Mass. (WHDH) - No one was injured Friday when an Elderly man accidentally drove his car into the side <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="109" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-VZbcevwT0vI/U4FyPUaVi1I/AAAAAAABKZU/8pfGag3rtdI/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />of the VA Hospital Friday afternoon. <br />Early indications show that the driver accidentally hit the gas pedal instead of the break causing his car to crash into the mechanical room at the hospital. <br />Witnesses say there are often people standing right where the man crashed. <p><a href="http://www.whdh.com/story/25599117/car-crashes-into-west-roxbury-va-hospital">http://www.whdh.com/story/25599117/car-crashes-into-west-roxbury-va-hospital</a></p>

As If the VA Doesn’t Have Enough Trouble On It’s Plate-Car Crashes Through the Wall of VA Hospital in Massachusetts

Luckily nobody was hurt here when an elderly man hit the gas instead of the brakes.   It was the mechanical room of the hospital so no hospital medical equipment was involved.  BD    7News Boston WHDH-TV WEST ROXBURY, Mass. (WHDH) - No one was injured Friday when an Elderly man accidentally drov…

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License Plate Tracking Outside of Law Enforcement Use - One More Good Reason to License All Data Sellers

<p>I have no problem with police agencies using the tracking system for fighting crime and I can myself vouch for that system as it helped me once.  By finding a stolen car the police were able to get a hold of my stolen purse<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="199" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-LL78lR-jKkw/U4FnHqxjnUI/AAAAAAABKZE/UerEBQs9-0s/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="307" /> and notify me even before I had noticed it was gone.  So in that effort, it works.  The problem is with <strong>private use and the data bases they create</strong> so here we are again back to data selling once more.  Data selling is screwing up everything from license plate to healthcare to anything anyone wants to sell.  Have data in someone’s pocket is like having cash to burn anymore and it’s getting obnoxious, all for the sake of targeted advertising for a lot of it.  It’s gone from personalization to being a menace.  I could care less at this point on targeted ads and would much rather return to doing a search at this point compared to the hassles it gives me.   It’s not worth it.    Besides sometime I don’t’ know what I want until I see it or an image.  </p> <p>Private companies are screening to provide data for police agencies, and that’s ok but they also sell the data to anyone else with a buck, that’s not ok.  That data gets matched and resold.  I understand people need it to repossess cars and so on and those who buy that information should also have to register, again so we know who in the hell they are.  Public agencies should not be sharing the data with anyone who wants to buy it.  Your license plate could be matched with other data bases and who knows what kind of data base would be constructed and sold then?  We need to know who the parties are selling and buying this data.  </p> <p><embed src="http://www.cbsnews.com/common/video/cbsnews_player.swf" scale="noscale" salign="lt" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" background="#000000" width="425" height="279" allowFullScreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" FlashVars="pType=embed&si=254&pid=m1rvpQhU4zMF&url=http://www.cbsnews.com/video/are-license-plate-scanners-an-invasion-of-privacy" /></embed></p> <p>The lawmaker bill is ok but again like most laws today, it’s not enough.  Again it’s the secondary matching and selling of your data that is the danger here it is becoming more common place all the time.  Look at this link below with Verizon and their data tracking to sell data.  So you have the private company with your license plate and Verizon tracking on your cellphone…hmmmm</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/data-selling-grows-bit-more-today-with.html"><strong>Data Selling Grows A Bit More Today With Verizon Wanting to Monitor Both Your Mobile and Home Computer Tracks - We Knew This Was Coming As SAP Wanted Some of This Action to Further Define Targets and Broker It…</strong></a></h5> <p>If that’s not enough you have facial recognition and private companies can buy this software and use it now too.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/05/licensing-and-excise-taxing-data.html"><strong>Taxing Data Sellers, Facial Recognition Yet One More Tool Used To Secure & Match Data - The Epidemic, Billions in Profits for Banks and US Corporations Using Killer Algorithms to Further Erode Consumer Privacy</strong></a></h5> <p>So look, with just facial recognition data base connect to your license plate data, what big complete file of data can be created to sell when queried together…again..consumers need to know who the data sellers are and what kind of data they sell and to who.   For all we know the private license plate folks could have a subsidiary or sister company that does some kind of other data base mining, merely separated by a door in an office for example.  I swear with in data in hand anymore and lack of regulation it’s like corporate cash to burn.  BD</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/cell-phone-privacy-tracking-even-if.html">Cell Phone Privacy Tracking, Even If Your Location Tracking Is Turned Off Matching Data Can Still Occur With App Data Comparisons That Use Sensors Such As Accelerometers And More- Something Else To Be Aware Of With mHealth And Other Mobile Apps…</a></h5> <p> <hr />If you've been behind the wheel lately, odds are your trip has been tracked by small cameras called "automated license plate readers."</p> <p>They're often mounted on law enforcement vehicles and street poles, and used by police to catch criminals. But in California, lawmakers are debating whether this technology needs restrictions to protect privacy.</p> <p>More than 70 percent of the nation's police departments use this technology to find vehicles associated with crimes.</p> <p>"If a vehicle comes into the area, it's instantly recognized," said Captain Ed Palmer with the University of Southern California Department of Public Safety.</p> <p>But now, private companies have built their own databases, and are using these cameras, too -- cruising streets and parking lots and sharing billions of hits of data not just with law enforcement, but with anyone willing to pay, including private investigators, insurance companies, and lenders looking to repossess vehicles. </p> <p>"They can track you around the country through these databases," said California State Senator Jerry Hill.</p> <p><a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-license-plate-trackers-raise-privacy-concerns/">http://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-license-plate-trackers-raise-privacy-concerns/</a></p>

License Plate Tracking Outside of Law Enforcement Use - One More Good Reason to License All Data Sellers

I have no problem with police agencies using the tracking system for fighting crime and I can myself vouch for that system as it helped me once.  By finding a stolen car the police were able to get a hold of my stolen purse and notify me even before I had noticed it was gone.  So in that effort, it …

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CVS Working To Acquire Brazilian Drug Store Chain DPSP - $4.5 Billion Offered, Refused, Still Working

<p>Well we have Walgreens trying to figure out if it’s going to move to the UK so now we have CVS working to buy a large non US Drug Store chain in Brazil.  In 2012 we had United buy up the biggest HMO in Brazil and the CEO and founder of that Brazilian is the largest single shareholder now sitting on United's board.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/10/united-healthcare-negotiating-to-buy.html">United Healthcare Negotiated to Buy 90 Percent of the Largest Managed Care Provider in Brazil, Where Insurers Can Own Hospitals and Physician’s Practices</a></h5> <p>Well you know CVS has yet to get rid of those cigarettes and needs to replace some revenue streams and is this part of that plan?  I though too they would increase the amount of data they sell to make up the difference as they have to be right out there with Walgreens making $1-2 billion a year just selling data.  A couple years ago we had this activity with a PE firm who bought a Brazilian Health Insurance company.  <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="141" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-YaDfb3fM2kU/U3_0Z_m_9TI/AAAAAAABKY0/1LVR-I3BkYg/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2010/07/private-equity-group-carlyle-buys.html"><strong>Private Equity Group Carlyle Buys Australian Hospital Company and Brazilian Health Insurance Company</strong></a></h5> <p>They are going to probably hate us in time in Brazil as they see their middle class shrink like what’s happening here.  The economy there right now is not good either and the World Cup won’t be the answer there either and there have been protests there as well.  The country’s credit rating is one notch above junk.  </p> <p>So here comes CVS ready to move in and buy up some drug store real estate.  It will be interesting to watch as I don’t think the bidding is done yet from what I am reading.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />SÃO PAULO— <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/CVS">CVS Caremark</a> Corp. <a href="http://quotes.wsj.com/CVS">CVS -0.12%</a> is in talks to acquire Brazilian drugstore chain Drogarias Pacheco São Paulo, or DPSP, as part of the company's plan to expand in Latin America's largest nation.</p> <p>The U.S. drugstore chain offered 4.5 billion Brazilian reais ($2 billion) to acquire control of DPSP, but the company rejected the offer, local news magazine Exame reported.</p> <p>CVS is evaluating making another proposal for DPSP, which set a minimum price for the company at 5.9 billion reais, according to local newspaper Valor Economico. Neither report said where it got the information. CVS and DPSP representatives weren't immediately available for comment.</p> <p>DPSP is controlled by the Barata family and 12 other shareholders.</p> <p><a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303980004579579562787899906?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303980004579579562787899906.html">http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303980004579579562787899906?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303980004579579562787899906.html</a></p>

CVS Working To Acquire Brazilian Drug Store Chain DPSP - $4.5 Billion Offered, Refused, Still Working

Well we have Walgreens trying to figure out if it’s going to move to the UK so now we have CVS working to buy a large non US Drug Store chain in Brazil.  In 2012 we had United buy up the biggest HMO in Brazil and the CEO and founder of that Brazilian is the largest single shareholder now sitting on …

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Specialty Hospitals File Chapter 11 Bankruptcy & Sell Washington DC Hospitals to Investment Firm

<p>Well here’s 2 hospitals right under the nose of Congress that couldn’t make it and and good thing they have a buyer. These are the city's only two long-term acute-care hospitals too.  The hospital system is about 50 Million in debt, have unpaid taxes and so on.  BD</p> <p><a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/profiles/company/us/dc/washington/specialty_hospitals_of_america_llc/1264650"> <hr />Specialty Hospitals of America</a> LLC will voluntarily enter Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and sell both of its District hospitals to an investment firm after <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/2014/04/specialty-hospital-of-washington-declares-itself.html">a group of creditors filed an involuntary bankruptcy petition</a> against the hospital group last month.</p> <p><strong>Greenwich, Connecticut-based Silver Point Capital has agreed to buy Specialty's Capitol Hill and Hadley<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="124" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6JjN72wPbkc/U37lNRDb7AI/AAAAAAABKYk/Dzb23zI8D24/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="209" /> long-term acute-care hospitals for undisclosed terms.</strong> Silver Point will loan Specialty's D.C. subsidiary, Specialty Hospital of Washington, $15 million to continue operations at those hospitals during the court-supervised sale of its assets. Specialty Hospitals of America is based in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.</p> <p>Employee pay and benefits will continue without interruption, and Specialty said it does not anticipate layoffs but could not say for sure. “It’s all in the hands of the court,” Proctor said. </p> <p>In April, a group of businesses owed about $2.7 million filed an involuntary bankruptcy petition against the local subsidiary in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware. Those petitioning creditors include Amalgamated Capital Partners LLP, CroppMetcalfe, Capitol Hill Group, J-Don <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/profiles/company/us/mo/saint_louis/enterprise_financial_services_co/2763113">Enterprise</a> LLC and JFW Services.</p> <p>D.C. Director of Health Care Finance <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/search/results?q=Wayne%20Turnage">Wayne Turnage</a> said the city has prepared a backup plan for how it would transfer patients should the quality of care deteriorate at the financially troubled hospitals. But he hopes that's more a last resort.</p> <p><a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/2014/05/specialty-hospitals-of-america-to-declare.html?page=all">http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/2014/05/specialty-hospitals-of-america-to-declare.html?page=all</a></p>

Specialty Hospitals File Chapter 11 Bankruptcy & Sell Washington DC Hospitals to Investment Firm

Well here’s 2 hospitals right under the nose of Congress that couldn’t make it and and good thing they have a buyer. These are the city's only two long-term acute-care hospitals too.  The hospital system is about 50 Million in debt, have unpaid taxes and so on.  BD Specialty Hospitals of Ameri…

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One For The Dogs - FDA Approves Bravecto, First & Only Chewable Tablets To Prevent Fleas and Ticks For 12 Weeks With One Dose

<p>I wonder what the cost will be compared to using Advantage or Frontline.  Those both go for around 30 days before another dose is needed.  The drug is made by Merck and it says the dogs will like the taste.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />(RTTNews.com) - Merck Animal Health, the global animal health business unit of Merck & Co., Inc. ( <a href="http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/mrk">MRK</a> ), said that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved Bravecto or fluralaner chewable tablets for dogs (112.5 mg, 250 mg, 500 mg, 1000 mg, 1400 mg).<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="113" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-tktL-A88sds/U37g6skWkqI/AAAAAAABKYc/Na1af7boJPk/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /></p> <p>The company noted that Bravecto is the first and only treatment that has been shown to quickly and effectively kill fleas and multiple tick species for 12 weeks in a single dose. Bravecto also is effective for eight weeks against Amblyomma americanum ticks.</p> <p>The active substance of Bravecto, fluralaner, a new ectoparasiticide belonging to the isoxazoline group, is systemically active against fleas and ticks. Bravecto is presented as a flavored chew that dogs accept readily. The product can be used as part of a treatment strategy for the control of Flea Allergy Dermatitis or FAD as a direct result of eliminating flea infestations. The most common side effects are mild and transient gastrointestinal effects, the company noted.</p> <p><a href="http://www.nasdaq.com/article/merck--fda-approves-bravecto-chewable-tablet-for-dogs-to-kill-fleas-and-ticks-20140520-00468#ixzz32VwYuP7G">http://www.nasdaq.com/article/merck--fda-approves-bravecto-chewable-tablet-for-dogs-to-kill-fleas-and-ticks-20140520-00468#ixzz32VwYuP7G</a></p>

One For The Dogs - FDA Approves Bravecto, First & Only Chewable Tablets To Prevent Fleas and Ticks For 12 Weeks With One Dose

I wonder what the cost will be compared to using Advantage or Frontline.  Those both go for around 30 days before another dose is needed.  The drug is made by Merck and it says the dogs will like the taste.  BD  (RTTNews.com) - Merck Animal Health, the global animal health business unit of Merc…

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