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Section: Health

Looming Oligopoly?

If President Donald Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions care about affordable health care, they will stop the Department of Justice from approving proposed mergers in the pharmaceutical industry. The Wall Street Journal reports the Justice Department plans to approve mergers of CVS Health with Aetna, and Express Scripts with Cigna. It means two of […]

September 17, 2018

17 Health Care Systems Launch Project for Underserved

Seventeen health systems, encompassing 280 hospitals—5 percent of the hospitals in the country—have come together to figure out financially sustainable solutions to the problem of how to improve health care for underserved people and their families. Read More

September 17, 2018

HIV Research Yields Dividends Across Medical Fields

Since the first cases of AIDS were reported in the United States 37 years ago, the National Institutes of Health has invested more than $69 billion in the understanding, treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS. Beyond the development of life-saving medications and innovative prevention modalities, such research has led to numerous advances outside the HIV field, […]

September 17, 2018

Food Safety Scares Up in 2018

Matt Arteaga, 51, is one of about 500 people who got sick this summer in an outbreak linked to McDonald’s salads. The cause was a parasite, cyclospora. Arteaga fell ill on a Thursday afternoon in June. He was in his office in Danville, Ill., when he says the symptoms came on quickly. “The chills, and […]

September 17, 2018

The ‘Mona Lisa’ Allure: Could It Be the Result of Thyroid Disease?

Mona Lisa’s smile is often described as enigmatic, but could the mysterious allure of this iconic painting actually be due to an underlying illness in “Lisa” herself? At least one doctor thinks so. In a Letter to the Editor in the September issue of the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, a cardiologist and his colleague take […]

September 17, 2018

Disparities Among Preemies May Be Wider Than Thought

A new study suggests that black and Hispanic premature babies, compared with white premature babies, had a two- to four-fold increased risk of four severe neonatal health problems. Those health problems included necrotizing enterocolitis, which impacts tissue in the intestine, and intraventricular hemorrhage, which is bleeding in certain areas of the brain, both of which […]

September 17, 2018

Health Insurance Proposed for Undocumented

Since Gavin Newsom, the Democratic candidate for governor of California, proposed free health insurance for illegal immigrants, the state’s gubernatorial election has quickly become a referendum on its sanctuary policies. “I did universal health care when I was mayor [of San Francisco], fully implemented regardless of pre-existing conditions, ability to pay, and regardless of your […]

September 17, 2018

Study: Undocumented Immigrants Report Less Chronic Disease Than Americans

A new study challenges the political notion that undocumented immigrants are a burden on the U.S. health care system — in fact, they’re much less likely to seek medical care at all, the study found. The four-year study, from Drexel University in Philadelphia and published in the journal Medical Care, relies on a California health […]

September 17, 2018

Undocumented immigrant

Turning Clock Back

Last week, a federal court in Texas heard oral arguments in yet another lawsuit attacking the Affordable Care Act. The difference this time is that the Trump administration refused to defend the law — choosing instead to jeopardize the health care and financial well-being of tens of millions of Americans with pre-existing health conditions. Read […]

September 12, 2018

Campaign Launches LGBTQ Health Survey

The Campaign for Southern Equality has launched a Southern LGBTQ Health Survey in order to better understand the health care needs of LGBTQ Southerners. The survey data will be made publicly available and will serve as a valuable resource for the LGBTQ community, researchers, and public health advocates. In the three weeks since the survey […]

September 12, 2018

Audit: 2 V.A. Health Contractors Got $100M in Overpayments

Two major healthcare contractors who serve the federal government’s Veterans Choice Program received more than $100 million in overpayments during 2016-2017 due to double billing and other mistakes. This information was discovered during an audit by the VA Office of Inspector General and released on Thursday. The report on the audit said: “Because of ineffective […]

September 12, 2018

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California’s Large Minority Population Factor In Low Death Rate

High poverty rates, low education and lack of insurance are all social determinants that are expected to lead to high mortality rates and negative health outcomes. Despite a 62 percent minority population with these characteristics in California, the state’s health profile was significantly better than the nation’s as a whole, researchers report in a new […]

September 12, 2018

Timeline: Trump’s Efforts to Dismantle Obamacare

The Republican-led U.S. Congress has repeatedly tried and failed to repeal and replace Obamacare. Since taking office in 2017, they have had an ally in President Trump, whose administration has attempted to dismantle the health care law, one step at a time. Read More

September 12, 2018

2.1M People Could Lose Care If Medicaid Work Rules Expand

As the Trump administration barrels forward on Medicaid work requirements, new studies show the policy could remove millions from the program if implemented across the country. In two recent studies highlighted by JAMA Internal Medicine, researchers found that, if implemented nationally, work requirements as written would not save a significant amount of money. But if […]

September 12, 2018

A Year After Hurricane Irma, Nursing Homes Ill-Prepared for Disaster

Despite enhanced guidance from CMS, nursing homes hit by disaster often struggle to execute emergency plans and protect residents, according to testimony (PDF) from the HHS Office of Inspector General to lawmakers last week. Addressing the Energy and Commerce Committee’s oversight subcommittee, OIG’s Regional Inspector General Ruth Ann Dorrill said officials went in and looked […]

September 12, 2018

Immigrants Fear Using Nutrition, Health Programs

AUSTIN, Texas — Before President Donald Trump was elected, Marlene saw the food stamps her children received as a way to feed them healthy meals. After Trump’s election, the $300 a month from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for her 14-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son became a source of sickening worry. This spring, she stopped […]

September 12, 2018

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‘Religious Liberty’

Not that long ago, there was little difference between a physician and a preacher, a clinic and a chapel, a patient and a proselyte. Instead of prescribing medications, healers chanted hymns; instead of prescribing painkillers, they offered prayers. Faith remains an integral part of human society and the modern hospital is a place where patients […]

September 10, 2018

California Lawmakers: Stop Dumping Homeless Patients

Here’s an interesting problem. The California Legislature is trying to do something about what it calls “patient dumping.” By that it means the hospital practice of discharging non-paying homeless patients out into the world without any means to take care of themselves. As far as I know the bill hasn’t yet been signed by the […]

September 10, 2018