Archive Trendwatch
Archive of TrendWatch |
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Report: SARS is threat to U.S.
A lack of specialists who study diseases, along with cuts in state and local health department budgets, have left the United States ill-equipped to handle an outbreak of the SARS virus, says a report commissioned by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "The current shortage of epidemiologists, public health nurses and other personnel in the U.S. will reach a crisis stage in the event of an epidemic," according to University of Louisville researchers.
Click here for the full story.
- The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky., 12/03/03
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More women in medical school shows change in times, tradition.
This year, female medical school applicants outnumbered men for the first time in history, according to figures released last week by the Association of American Medical Colleges. Nationwide, the percentage of men and women who were admitted to medical school is roughly even now -- with men making up 50.3 percent of entrants and women making up 49.7 percent. Click here for more.
- The Tennessean, Nov. 9, 2003
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BSE expert says Japanese case implies larger outbreak.
The recent finding of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in a 23-month-old bull in Japan suggests that Japan may have more cases of the disease than previously suspected, according to a University of Minnesota expert on the disease.
"For me the Japanese case suggests that in fact they had a much larger epidemic than most people realize, because this animal had a massive exposure to develop the disease this early," said Will Hueston, director of the University's Center for Animal Health and Food Safety in St. Paul.
Click here for the full story.
CIDRAP News, 10/16/03
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Wisconsin tuition no longer affordable.
When the University of Wisconsin-Madison opened its doors a century and a half ago, one of its primary goals was to remain affordable for all -- not just the upper crust.
Few would argue today that UW-Madison is accessible to all -- not with a straight face anyway. And not after the recent 18.7 percent tuition hike that was stuffed down the throats of resident undergrads for the 2003-04 academic year.
Click here for the full story.
- Capital Times, 10/13/03
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National stockpile of SARS safety gear proposed
Preparations for the possible return of SARS should include establishment of a national stockpile of equipment to protect healthcare workers from the disease, a Minnesota official said at an Oct. 8 Senate field hearing.
"We recommend that the federal government create a national supply of the personal protective equipment and other supplies required for isolating large numbers of people?including items like masks, gowns, and gloves?separate from the Strategic National Stockpile of medical supplies," said Minnesota Health Commissioner Dianne Mandernach.
Click here for the full story.
- CIDRAP News, 10/08/03
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Group to study health-care rationing.
A group of doctors and medical ethicists, including physicians from Brown and Harvard universities, is working to develop national guidelines for the rationing of expensive intensive-care unit treatment. "Most physicians don't want to admit they engage in it, but the truth is bedside rationing happens all the time," said Dr. Mitchell Levy, chairman of the task force, a Brown Medical School professor, and director of the medical ICU at Rhode Island Hospital. "There's nothing wrong with it; it shouldn't be taboo. We should do it wisely." The group is gathering data for a series of journal articles, to be published within the next year. But the second step will be far more difficult: How does the group decide how much money saving a life is worth?
-The Boston Globe, 9/14/03
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Congress plans to trim fat from kids.
Alarmed by the nation's rising rate of childhood obesity, Congress is considering a number of bills designed to wean America's children from junk food and inspire them to get physically fit. The proposals range from better educating health professionals, to boosting federal research on eating disorders, to getting more vegetables into schools while getting the soda machines out.
Click here for the full story.
- Pittsburgh Post-Gasette, 9/16/03
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Tallahassee radiologists and instructors are joining forces to provide a solution
to a problem that is plaguing Tallahassee and the nation - a shortage of certified radiologists. Steve Katicish, Capital Regional Medical Center's imaging director, said he's had to look elsewhere to hire radiologists at the hospital. "What it amounts to is that we don't have anyone here locally to fill the jobs," he said. "So we have to go outside the state and hire temporary agents to fill the positions." Katicish added that age is the main problem of the continuing cycle of shortages in radiology. "The average age for technicians is 40, and they're looking to retire soon," he said. So Tallahassee Community College and Capital Regional Medical Center along with other radiology practices around the area worked together to enhance TCC's existing program. Click here for more.
- Tallahassee Democrat, 9/08/03
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The AAMC has joined nearly 600 patient groups, scientific societies and research institutions
in calling on the Senate to add $2.5 billion to the NIH budget for FY 2004. The AAMC signed an Aug. 29 letter asking senators to support an amendment to the FY 2004 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, sponsored by Sens. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), to increase NIH funding by an additional $1.5 billion, for a total increase of $2.5 billion (9.2 percent) over FY 2003. As reported by the Senate Appropriations Committee in June, the Labor-HHS-Education bill provides $27.982 billion for NIH, a $1 billion (3.7 percent) increase. The additional funds would be obtained by pushing back into FY 2003 $1.5 billion in funding advances that were appropriated in FY 2003, but advanced into FY 2004. By moving advances in this manner, it permits an additional $1.5 billion to be appropriated for the NIH without breaking the cap for FY 2004. However, because this amendment would violate the FY 2003 spending cap imposed in the FY 2004 budget resolution, it will require 60 votes to pass. The Senate is scheduled to begin consideration of the FY 2004 Labor-HHS-Education appropriation bill when it returns to Washington on Sept. 2.
-AAMC, August 29, 2003
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First responders worried about safety gear for chem, bio hazards.
Emergency workers in the United States believe they lack adequate gear to protect themselves when responding to chemical, biological, or radiological terrorist attacks, according to a RAND study released last week.
Emergency responders "felt they did not know what they needed to protect against, what protection was appropriate, and where to look for it," RAND stated in a news release. "Such uncertainty frustrates efforts to design a protection program and acquire the necessary technology."
Click here for the full story.
- CIDRAP News, 8/25/03
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Most UW nurses to get pay hikes of more than 10%.
Nurses at UW Hospital and Clinics in Madison will receive a minimum pay increase of 8 percent, and in most cases more than 10 percent under a new contract provision.
Gary Johnson, director of employee labor relations at the hospital, said the agreement provides "a very substantial wage increase to nurses, because we must remain competitive in the marketplace. Recruitment and retention of a skilled work force is a key priority for UW Hospital and Clinics," he said.
Click here for the full story.
- Wisconsin State Journal, 8/14/03
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West Nile rapidly invading the U.S.
Officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned on Aug. 7 that the number of West Nile cases (153) had tripled during the first week of August and that the disease appeared to be spreading rapidly across the United States. Just since that time, the number of cases has more than doubled again. Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 8/13/03
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Public policy targeting obesity.
With obesity the fastest-growing disease in America and related health costs soaring, state lawmakers have filed more than 140 bills targeting obesity, from restricting sales of candy and soda in schools to taxing sedentary entertainment such as movie tickets and video rentals.
Click here for the full story.
- Washington Post, 8/10/03
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Kentucky officials defend steep tuition hikes.
At an Aug. 4 hearing before Kentucky legislators, university presidents defended double-digit tuition increases for the coming academic year, saying it was their only practical option in the face of two years of state budget cuts.
Click here for the full story.
--The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Kentucky, 8/04/03
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SARS return could strain hospitals, GAO says
Congress's General Accounting Office (GAO) warned yesterday that a major resurgence of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) could cause overcrowding and shortages of personnel and equipment in hospitals.
Federal, state, and local health officials are working on guidelines and recommendations to prepare for a possible SARS resurgence, but implementing the recommendations could prove difficult if the disease returns in a big way.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 7/31/03
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Survey: Number of uninsured kids falls
Government health insurance programs have helped reduce the number of uninsured children, though at least 4 million eligible kids are not covered, a survey finds.
Overall, 7.8 million children were without health insurance at some point last year, a drop of 1.8 million in just three years. Researchers credit increased enrollment in Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program, or SCHIP, created in 1997 for children from working poor families.
At the same time, private coverage declined, as more companies dropped benefits for workers and their families.
Click here for the full story.
-- New York Times, 7/31/03 (free subscription required)
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For aspiring doctors, the first half of medical school is both hard and messy,
as they dissect human cadavers and practice giving physical exams to classmates. But soon medical students at Brown University in Providence could study medicine for two years without getting near a cadaver, a fellow student - or even Providence. In what may be the most extreme example of the trend toward Internet-based education, Brown and a worldwide group of medical schools are collaborating to build an "International Virtual Medical School," allowing students to begin work toward a medical degree thousands of miles from a classroom. Click here for more.
-Boston Globe, 7/30/03
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Higher education takes hit in California budget proposal.
The University of California would lose about $161 million in state funding--or a 1.6 percent cut--including $29 million for research, per a budget compromise in the California Senate. The California State University system would lose about $125 million, including money for outreach aimed at low-income students. The compromise is expected to be embraced by the California Assembly, which could vote Tuesday. Gov. Gray Davis has indicated he supports much of the plan. Click here for more from the Sacramento Bee.
--Associated Press, 7-28-03,
Sacramento Bee, 7-28-03
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Canada details rules to keep BSE agent out of food.
Following up on an announcement made last week, the Canadian government yesterday published new regulations designed to keep materials potentially contaminated with the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) agent out of the food supply.
Health Canada announced rules requiring the removal of all "specified risk materials" (SRM) from cattle carcasses at the time of slaughter. SRM are tissues that, in BSE-infected animals, are likely to carry the infective prion protein. The agency defined SRM as the skull, brain, trigeminal ganglia (nerves attached to the brain), eyes, tonsils, spinal cord, and dorsal root ganglia (nerves attached to the spinal cord) in cattle aged 30 months or older, plus the distal small intestine in cattle of all ages.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 7/27/03
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New health care model urges comparison shopping -
When was the last time you asked your doctor how much a procedure or treatment would cost - and whether there were cheaper alternatives - because you were on the hook to pay for it? Probably never, for most of us. But that could change soon with the dawning of "CDHC," or consumer-directed health care. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 7/7/03
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University of Kentucky employees who access health information online
will now pick up more than tips on how to stay healthy -- they'll also get a little extra padding for their pocketbooks. Under the new program, UK Healthtrac Rewards, employees and retirees who visit their personal Web page once a month and complete a questionnaire when it is available will earn $10 a month. Checks will be sent to participants' homes quarterly. "With all of us working together to improve our health, we also will help keep our health benefits affordable," said UK President Lee Todd. Click here for more.
- Lexington Herald Leader, 7/8/03
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Biodefense talent shortage said to threaten nation's preparedness.
The five federal agencies most involved in biodefense face a talent shortage that could keep them from responding effectively to a major bioterrorist attack, according to a new report by a nonprofit group that works on civil service issues.
Federal compensation systems and hiring processes badly handicap the agencies in competing with private companies and academia to hire and keep top biodefense specialists, the report states. To make matters worse, up to half of the federal workers in biodefense-related jobs will be eligible to retire within the next few years, and the flow of new talent entering the workforce is static or shrinking.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 7/08/03
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Many doctors withhold info from patients
A study published in the journal Health Affairs says nearly one in three doctors reports withholding information from patients about useful medical services that weren't covered by their health insurance companies. Click here for more.
-AP/ New York Times, 7/8/2003
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U.S. sues Cleveland Clinic over Medicare.
The Justice Department yesterday accused the Cleveland Clinic and University Hospitals of illegally billing Medicare for millions of dollars to cover the cost of experimental heart devices.
Both hospitals disputed the allegation, made in a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Connecticut, where the government has consolidated similar complaints against dozens of other hospitals nationwide.
Click here for the full story.
-- Cleveland Plain Dealer 07/02/03
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Report: U.S. cattle or feed might have brought BSE to Canada,
Canada's official report on its response to the mad cow disease case in Alberta suggests that the case might have resulted from the importation of American cattle or contaminated feed into Canada, among other possibilities.
The 12-page report examines the possible causes and implications of the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, case that was discovered in May. The case touched off a massive investigation that led to the slaughter of 2,700 cattle and testing of more than 2,000, without uncovering any other cases.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 7/03/03
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Monkeypox confirmed in imported African rodents
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said July 2 that it has confirmed monkeypox in six rodents from a shipment of African mammals that is believed to be the source of the current monkeypox outbreak in the United States.
Monkeypox was confirmed in one Gambian giant rat, three dormice, and two rope squirrels, the CDC announced. The animals were part of a shipment of African rodents, previously numbered at about 800, imported into the United States on Apr 9. The CDC did not say whether the six infected rodents were the only ones recovered from the shipment or if any other animals from the shipment were tested and found to be free of monkeypox.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 7/02/03
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First responders called unprepared for terrorist attacks.
Despite progress in the past 2 years, local emergency response agencies in the United States remain dangerously unprepared for major terrorist attacks, according to a new study by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonpartisan think tank. "If the nation does not take immediate steps to better identify and address the urgent needs of emergency responders, the next terrorist incident could be even more devastating than 9/11," the organization said. Its report is titled Emergency Responders: Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared..
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 6/30/03
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Hospital, drug firm relations probed.
Federal investigators are sending subpoenas to top academic medical centers in Boston and elsewhere in the country for records about their relationships with drug makers as part of a widespread crackdown on pharmaceutical company marketing practices, according to several attorneys who represent hospitals and drug companies.
Click here for the full story.
-- Boston Globe, 6/29/03
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Hospital, drug firm relations probed.
Federal investigators are sending subpoenas to top academic medical centers in Boston and elsewhere in the country for records about their relationships with drug makers as part of a widespread crackdown on pharmaceutical company marketing practices, according to several attorneys who represent hospitals and drug companies. Click here for the full story.
-- Boston Globe 6/29/03
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Medical Care Often Not Optimal, Study Finds
Americans have a slightly better than 50-50 chance their medical problems will be addressed in an optimal way when they visit a doctor's office or enter a hospital, according to a new survey. The failure to do the right thing -- or, more precisely, all the right things -- extends across the spectrum of activities physicians are expected to perform. Recommended "best practices" were followed about two-thirds of the time in diagnostic testing, prescribing drugs for acute and chronic illnesses, and monitoring patients' long-term health. In the area of counseling and health education, there was a 1-in-5 chance patients would get everything experts say they should. Click here for the full story.
-- Washington Post, June 26, 2003
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Employers cut benefits as health care costs rise
Rising health care costs and a weak economy are causing employers to nip away at employee benefits. The 2003 Benefits Survey by the Society for Human Resource Management found that more than nine out of 10 employers averaged an 18 percent cost increase over what they paid for health care benefits in 2002. Click here for more.-- Knight Ridder/Lexington Herald-Leader, June 25, 2003
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Maine Governor Signs Bill for Drug Plan.
Gov. John Baldacci signed a law Tuesday creating a program designed to force drug companies to lower prices on prescription drugs for the elderly, the working poor and others who have trouble paying for their medicine. The program is expected to provide discount prescriptions for people in Maine with incomes at or below 350 percent of the federal poverty level. Individuals' income cannot exceed $31,458; couples cannot earn more than $42,420.
Click here for the full story. (Free subscription required.)
-- New York Times 6/25/03
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FSU med school gets 'clean bill of health.'
Florida State University's fledgling medical school took another step toward full accreditation Wednesday.
The Liaison Committee on Medical Education - the accrediting body for medical schools - notified FSU by letter Wednesday that it voted to continue the school's provisional accreditation after a review of its plans for years three and four, which are the final two years of the medical degree.
"It's a clean bill of health," said Dr. J. Ocie Harris, dean of the school. "We're very satisfied with their report." Click here for the full story.
-- Tallahassee Democrat, 6/19/03
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Hospitals keep doctors afloat.
More than 600 doctors in Florida now buy malpractice insurance from companies based in the Cayman Islands and owned by two hospital networks in the Tampa Bay area. Baycare Health System Inc. and University Community Health Inc. reluctantly got into the business of selling malpractice insurance last year after doctors on their hospitals' staffs found themselves scrambling to get coverage. Many companies stopped selling insurance in Florida after what one hospital executive described as the insurance industry's version of the ``perfect storm.'' For many physicians, the cost of malpractice insurance has been less of a problem than finding it.
Click here for the full story.
-- Tampa Tribune, 6/18/03
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Squeezed by health insurance reimbursements that they say haven't kept pace
with medical office expenses, doctors in Pittsburgh and across the country are applying a more business-minded attitude toward copays and missed appointments. They also are imposing fees for services that used to be free, such as filling out physical forms for job, sports or camp activities and other paperwork. Some are even considering charges for taking after-hours calls. Click here for more.
- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 6/17/03
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FDA holds up hospital's work with transplanted stem cells -
A Michigan boy who received a pioneering stem-cell transplant in February after suffering a heart attack has made a strong recovery -- but federal regulators have warned his doctors not to do more experiments. Officials at Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, Mich., disclosed their attempt to repair the heart of 16-year-old Dimitri Bonnville at a news conference in March. Citing research done in animals and overseas, the hospital's cardiologists said they had collected bone-marrow stem cells from the boy's bloodstream and transfused them into his heart, hoping to regenerate the damaged muscle. The disclosure brought an immediate inquiry from the Food and Drug Administration. Last month, it turned down the hospital's request to try the transplant in 400 more patients, citing inadequate evidence that the treatment is safe and likely to help. An FDA representative said the agency doesn't comment on applications to test new treatments. However, the agency has asserted its regulatory authority in cases where cells are manipulated outside the body, as well as in cases where cells are being injected into a different organ from the one where they were drawn. The regulatory step comes amid increasing enthusiasm by heart experts that cell transplants could help patients recovering from heart attacks or suffering from chronic heart disease. The move is a sign of the agency's caution over politically charged stem-cell research, particularly in the wake of devastating side effects and deaths seen in gene-therapy treatments. Click here for more.
-Wall Street Journal, 6/12/03 (subscription required)
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Obstetrics practices thin as costs rise.
Jeremy Pyle has yet to even start his medical residency, yet he's pretty much ruled out one specialty. "I'm fairly confident my choice won't be obstetrics because of the harsh realities you face coming out of school as a medical student," said Pyle, 23, who is beginning his senior year at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine at Peoria. For Pyle and other aspiring medical students, hopes of a rewarding career in obstetrics are taking a backseat to the realities of medical economics: Soaring malpractice premiums are taking a bigger chunk out of physician incomes. Click here for more.
- Chicago Tribune, 6/15/03
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Postal Service to test anthrax detection systems at 14 sites
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is poised to test anthrax detection systems at 14 mail-processing centers around the country once first responders in the local communities feel ready to deal with an anthrax alarm, according to a Postal Service spokesman.
The USPS was originally scheduled to start a 30-day test of its biohazard detection system on Jun 2, but the test was postponed because local emergency responders wanted more guidance on what to do if anthrax turns up, said Bob Anderson, a USPS public relations spokesman in Washington, DC.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 6/17/03
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Skyrocketing Health Costs Pit Worker Against Worker -
David Jackson points toward a co-worker driving a bright yellow forklift. "Just look at that guy, his belly's almost touching the steering wheel," says the 58-year-old machine operator. "It's gross." The forklift driver, Eugene Black, admits he's overweight. "I know my weight will get me in trouble," says Mr. Black, also 58, who is 6 feet tall and weighs about 340 pounds. He already has trouble walking because of pain in his ankles aggravated by his weight. He is a borderline diabetic and takes five prescription drugs, including one to control cholesterol. All of that means higher health-insurance costs for his employer, Rockford Products Corp., a maker of metal fasteners, and ultimately for the other 540 workers enrolled in the company's insurance plan. That's why Mr. Black's weight irritates some of them. The battle over rising health-care costs has long pitted employers against workers. Now, as more companies slash their health-insurance benefits, it is starting to set worker against worker. The clash goes beyond fat-versus-thin or smokers-versus-nonsmokers. Click here for more.
-Wall Street Journal, 6/17/03
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D. A. Henderson sees reasons for concern, hope in infectious disease realm
Donald A. Henderson, MD, MPH, the man who did more than anyone else to eradicate smallpox, sees powerful reasons for both concern and hope in humanity's ancient battle against infectious diseases.
On one hand, with globalization and the threat of bioterrorism, the world now confronts a more dangerous microbial landscape than ever before, Henderson said this week in a lecture at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. On the other hand, the record of immunization programs in developing countries, together with advances in disease prevention and treatment, suggests that the world has a chance to defeat some of the greatest disease threats, he said.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 6/13/03
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To contain monkeypox, HHS endorses smallpox shots, bans rodent trade.
To contain the emerging monkeypox outbreak, federal health authorities today recommended smallpox vaccination for people potentially exposed to the disease and acted to freeze the movement of pets that may carry it. The steps were announced as the number of monkeypox cases under investigation increased to 54, including 23 in Indiana, 20 in Wisconsin, 10 in Illinois, and 1 in New Jersey. Nine cases have been confirmed, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 6/11/03
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Medical researchers are being stymied by new federal regulations
intended to protect patient privacy. These researchers say that HIPAA regulations -- as the privacy regulations that went into effect April 14 are called -- are making clinical research more difficult to perform and costly to conduct. Before the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act went into effect, research nurses typically would review patient records to determine if an individual may be eligible for a particular clinical trial. Now, that's no longer allowable. "I don't think anyone gave a great deal of thought of what HIPAA will do to clinical research," said Dr. James Roberts, director of Magee-Womens Research Institute. Dr. Roberts said some problems created by HIPAA are solvable while others will be extremely tough nuts to crack. Magee currently has about 100 studies being affected by HIPAA. Click here for more.
- Pittsburgh Business Times, 6/9/03 (subscription required)
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When Lisa Farragut had to have an operation a few years ago, she specifically told her doctor
that she didn't want her medical chart leaving his office. "There's a lot of personal information in there," she said. "Your name, address, Social Security number, whether you have problems with drugs or alcohol. I didn't want that getting out." Farragut had reason for concern. She's been a professional medical transcriptionist for the past 28 years and currently works out of her Riverside County home in Corona. She handles people's confidential medical records every day as doctors and hospitals increasingly farm out the labor- and time-intensive task of transcribing recorded notes into electronic format.... The fact that doctors and hospitals are routinely outsourcing medical transcription will probably come as a surprise to most people. Click here for more.
- San Francisco Chronicle, 6/9/03
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The number of visits to the nation's emergency rooms climbed 20 percent
the past decade, even as the number of emergency departments was shrinking, a report out today says. The findings add to the evidence suggesting that more and more Americans face long waits in overcrowded and sometimes short-staffed emergency rooms. The report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta suggests the aging population fueled some of the increase. That will continue in the coming decades as baby boomers reach their senior years and develop chronic medical problems, says Linda McCaig, the report's author. Seniors were the heaviest users of emergency rooms. The report found that trips to the emergency room in 2001 rose to 107.5 million, up from 89.8 million in 1992. Meanwhile, numbers of emergency departments fell 15 percent. Some closed because they lost money and others because of mergers or hospital closures. Click here for more.
- USA Today, 6/5/03
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Midwest monkeypox cases are first in Western Hemisphere.
Nineteen human cases of probable monkeypox have appeared in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana, marking the first outbreak of the disease in the Americas, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced Saturday, Jun 7. The patients apparently contracted the disease from infected prairie dogs, which may have caught it from a Gambian giant rat that an Illinois animal distributor sold to a distributor in Milwaukee, the CDC said. The agency said the main route of transmission appears to be from prairie dogs to humans, but person-to-person transmission can't be excluded. The CDC recommended stringent infection control precautions.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 6/9/03
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FAO says BSE finding in Canada proves surveillance
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says the recent detection of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in a Canadian cow shows that active surveillance programs for BSE are working.
"It is good news that odd single cases of BSE are being picked up by inspection," said Andrew Speedy of the FAO's Animal Production and Health Division. "There has been no sign of an escalation of numbers in any of the countries that have identified isolated cases. Rather, it demonstrates that active surveillance is picking up the one-in-a-million case."
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News June 3, 2003
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IOM again calls for pause in smallpox shot program
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has again recommended a pause for evaluation of the federal smallpox vaccination program before it is expanded to more health workers and to emergency responders. A break is needed to allow time to evaluate safety issues, to assess which additional personnel should be vaccinated, and to revise educational materials for new groups of potential vaccinees, the IOM Committee on Smallpox Vaccination Program Implementation says in the report, published this week.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 5/29/03
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Elderly Medicare patients in Colorado are having an increasingly difficult time
getting in to see a doctor. The number of primary care physicians accepting new Medicare patients dropped substantially for the third year, according to the Colorado Association of Family Medicine Residencies. About 34 percent of Colorado family physicians are accepting new members of Medicare, the federal government's health program for people 65 and older. That's down from 52 percent in 2001, when physicians statewide were first surveyed. "It's alarming it's gone down this much," said Kathy Lindquist-Kliessler, executive director of the Denver Medical Society. Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 5/21/03
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Don't cancel events drawing people from SARS-affected areas.
Federal health officials say businesses and universities should go ahead with meetings and events, such as graduation ceremonies, that include travelers from areas affected by SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome).
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) made the recommendation today in new guidelines designed to help organizations that have employees from affected countries or that expect to host visitors from affected countries.
In addition to the advisory not to cancel meetings, the CDC does not recommend quarantining people arriving from SARS-affected areas if they have no fever or respiratory symptoms, officials said in a news release. But such people should receive yellow health alert notices about the importance of monitoring their health for 10 days following travel, the agency said. Those who experience fever, cough, or breathing difficulty should seek medical attention immediately.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 5/14/03
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The University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center broke ground for a new building
on Friday, May 9, that will be used for short-term public health research projects. The two-story, 29,000-square-foot building is expected to be complete by the end of October. The new center, officially known as the Research Incubator Building, will house offices for the College of Pharmacy, College of Nursing and the School of Medicine on the first floor, with lab space and research areas located on the second floor. "The majority of the research being done in this building will be for public health, which includes research for disease prevention, bio statistics, bio computing and environmental health," says Dr. Scott Burchiel, associate dean for research at the College of Pharmacy. He says the new space will also be used as a think tank for scientists to use in a variety of fields to discuss health related topics and to conduct research. The research building will have several labs and conference space for its occupants. Click here for more.
- New Mexico Business Weekly, 5/9/03 (subscription required)
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Researchers call for change of approach to prevent Listeria infections.
A pair of studies on Listeria monocytogenes in ready-to-eat (RTE) foods and associated illness rates suggest that only a small fraction of all Listeria-contaminated foods contain enough of the pathogen to cause illness. Therefore, the authors conclude that prevention efforts should focus on limiting the concentration of Listeria in selected foods rather than on the current policy of "zero tolerance," or eliminating the pathogen from all RTE foods.
--CIDRAP News, 5/9/03
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A new program at Ohio State University's School of Allied Medical Professions
is laying the groundwork to tackle employment shortages in the health-care industry. Launched in September, the school's Health Sciences program offers students a four-year bachelor's degree with an emphasis on management in nonclinical areas. "We've had strong professional programs here for years that prepare individuals for clinical areas like medical dietetics, radiologic technology and physical therapy, but more and more we were seeing students who were frustrated because they didn't think they were going to be competitive in other health professions," said Steve Wilson, director of the school. Wilson worked with other administrators and faculty members for seven months to develop the program. "We started out using other university programs across the country as a model, but realized we needed to use more of our existing resources," he said. Wilson projects the cost of the program will end up being about $75,000 for the first year. "It's an acceptable cost," he said. "But with the numbers of students we have, we will make more than enough to offset costs." Costs are expected to double next year, when the program adds at least one additional full-time faculty member, Wilson said. Click here for more.
- Business First of Columbus, 5/12/03 (subscription required)
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The epidemic shortages of nurses and other allied professionals are spreading,
with 75 percent of hospitals nationwide saying that, despite the weakened general economy, they remained in desperate need of personnel and were willing to pay salaries as high as nearly $80,000 last year to secure registered nurses. Salaries increased in all allied areas, except nurse managers whose salaries decreased 21 percent in the last year to an average of $58,420. Click here for more.
- Dallas Business Journal, 5/6/03 (subscription required)
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Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. could be ready to cut a half-billion dollars
from the state budget in a matter of weeks, accelerating a timetable for eliminating a projected $1 billion budget shortfall and inflicting another severe round of cuts on the University System of Maryland. The new timetable has stunned some officials who thought they had another year to prepare for the painful news. For the Maryland university system, which makes up about 10 percent of the state budget, the threatened cuts would deliver yet another large blow. The system has suffered a reduction of roughly $71 million, or about 9 percent, in its budget for the coming fiscal year, forcing dozens of layoffs and a tuition increase of 5 percent in the middle of the academic year. Even before yesterday's alert, system officials were considering raising tuition as much as 9 percent for the fall semester -- for a total year-over-year increase of nearly 15 percent.
--Baltimore Sun, 5/2/03
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SARS case count tops 6,000; deaths exceed 400.
The worldwide cumulative case count for SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) topped 6,000 today with the addition of 207 new cases, including 176 in China, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Twenty-six more SARS deaths were reported, bringing the global total to 417.
The cumulative case count stands at 6,054 in 27 countries, WHO officials said. The latest deaths included 11 in mainland China, 8 in Hong Kong, 5 in Taiwan, and 2 in Canada.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News 5/2/03
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Survey suggests half of states could give smallpox shots to all
Although few states have finished the first stage of their smallpox vaccination programs, half of the states that responded to a recent survey said they are prepared to vaccinate their entire population in 10 days if necessary.
The survey by the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) drew responses from 33 states and New York City. Of those 34 jurisdictions, 17 said they could vaccinate all their people within 10 days if a smallpox outbreak somewhere in the world indicated a need. Fifteen states, or 45 percent of the total, said they were not prepared to do that, and two states didn't answer the question. Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 5/1/03
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The Citizen-Scientist's Obligation to Stand Up for Standards -
...Presumably, in laboratory courses and in research projects with faculty, students can learn the values of honesty, creativity and full disclosure that are the hallmarks of good science. Also, in spite of the implicit hierarchy associated with education, students should get a sense of the "anti-authoritarianism" of science: that there are, or should be, no scientific authorities whose views are not subject to question. Indeed, proving one's colleagues (and oneself) wrong is one of the great pleasures of scientific progress. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 4/22/03 (subscription required)
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Patients who seek emergency care at University of Colorado Hospital will pay nearly $300,
even if they are not treated, as part of a policy hospital officials hope will keep some patients away from the ER. The charge is for a doctor or nurse to conduct a 5- to 7-minute screening exam to determine whether the patient is ill or injured enough to enter the emergency room. The hospital and its physicians say federal anti-fraud laws that prohibit giveaways by health providers require them to charge the fee. But critics say the hospital is misinterpreting the fraud law and cite Denver Health Medical Center's decision not to charge patients for the same brief exams. "University Hospital already has a reputation for not wanting to care for the uninsured," said Lorez Meinhold, executive director of the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative. "Really what they are saying is, 'We don't want people to walk in our front door.'" Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 4/25/03
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Doctors drawn to Wisconsin
Physicians across the country are pulling up stakes and heading for Wisconsin's greener pastures to avoid paying staggering medical malpractice insurance premiums, several doctors new to Wisconsin say. The early arrivals may be the harbinger of more physicians to follow. "My wife and I are both physicians and just arrived in Wausau in March. We fled the crisis in Ohio after spending our whole careers in that state," said Christopher J. Magiera, a gastroenterologist. Wisconsin is seen as one of six safe havens for physicians to practice in because medical malpractice insurance premiums are not exorbitant here, according to the American Medical Society. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 4/21/03
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Officials of the National Institutes of Health have advised researchers who study AIDS
and other politically sensitive health issues not to mention certain themes in their grant applications that might catch the attention of the Bush administration and members of Congress, according to news reports. The touchy terms include "sex workers," "men who sleep with men," "anal sex," and "needle exchange," The New York Times reported on Friday. Such projects are subject to heightened "scrutiny" by administration officials, The Times reported, citing unnamed agency officials and outside scientists. Some researchers feared that the warning would discourage vital research. The NIH has already fielded at least one question about such studies from a staff member of a government-oversight subcommittee of the U.S. House of Representatives, Science magazine reported in its latest edition. The staff member wrote to the NIH in March seeking detailed information about two federally financed studies of prostitutes. One study was conducted at the University of California at San Francisco, and the other in Miami. The memo sought the names of the peer-review committee members who had evaluated the grant applications, and the quality rankings they assigned them, Science reported. The Congressional staff member's letter stated that research on prostitutes could legitimize their trade and said that runs counter to a February directive from President Bush seeking to reduce international sex trafficking, the Science report said. Click here for more.
- Chronicle for Higher Education, 4/21/03 (subscription required)
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The University of Cincinnati plans to create several programs that marry the disciplines
of science and business. The effort could produce more leaders for the Tri-State's budding biotechnology economy, said Charles Sidman, a UC professor who is championing the idea of a joint double-master's degree program between the Colleges of Medicine and Business Administration. "People who know the business side don't understand what goes on in research, and people on the science side don't know how to translate that into a legitimate successful business," said Sidman. Click here for more.
- Cincinnati Business Courier, 4/18/03 (subscription required)
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Small businesses now say soaring worker health costs, not taxes,
are their biggest headache. Taxes had been No. 1 since 1986. The increase in health costs could cause more workers to lose company-sponsored insurance or shift more of the expense to employees. The impact could be wide: The nation's 5.8 million small companies employ about half of all workers. If they spend more on health care, they'll spend less on other goods. Health care costs are rising about 15 percent this year for employers with fewer than 200 workers versus 13.5 percent for those with 500 or more, says Mercer Human Resource Consulting. Many small employers cite increases of 20 percent or more. That's made insurance the No. 1 small business problem, according to four months of surveys by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). The higher costs come as small companies struggle to grow in a soft economy. The NFIB says 1 percent of firms surveyed last month plan to add workers, the lowest such figure since December 1991. Historically, small companies create most jobs, making them crucial to economic recovery. Click here for more.
- USA Today, 4/21/03
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Nursing shortage felt at Western Kentucky
The push to fill a shortage of nurses in the area is being felt at Western Kentucky University's nursing programs. Applications are on the rise, and it's becoming harder to recruit faculty because a nurse can make much more money in a hospital than in a classroom, according to Donna Blackburn, nursing department head. Click here for more.
- Bowling Green Daily News, 4/16/03
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New coronavirus confirmed as SARS pathogen.
A previously unrecognized coronavirus that has been regarded for 3 weeks as the likely cause of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) has been confirmed as the pathogen, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced today.... WHO officials credited close collaboration among 13 laboratories in 10 countries for the rapid identification of the pathogen. "Now we can move away from methods like isolation and quarantines and move aggressively towards modern intervention strategies including specific treatments and eventually vaccination," said Dr. David Heymann, executive director of WHO's communicable diseases program. "With the establishment of the causative agent, we are one crucial step closer."
--CIDRAP News, 4/16/04
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SARS virus genetic map will lead to better tests, speed vaccine:
Genetic sequencing of the virus believed to cause severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)--an achievement announced by Canadian and U.S. scientists in the past few days--has set the stage for improving diagnostic tests and developing treatments and vaccines for the disease, according to health officials.
--CIDRAP News, 4/15/03
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Congress passes smallpox vaccine compensation plan.
Congress, acting to remove a major barrier to the government's smallpox vaccination program, has passed a more generous compensation plan for those harmed by the vaccine than the one originally proposed by the Bush administration.
The plan approved Friday, Apr 11, provides the dependent families of people who die as a result of the vaccine with up to $50,000 a year to replace lost wages until the victim's youngest child reaches age 18. People who are permanently and totally disabled will get up to $50,000 a year for lost wages until they are 65.
--CIDRAP News, 4/15/04
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Biochemist Michael F. Summers is just the type of hidden jewel
the University of Maryland, Baltimore County wants to introduce to high-technology corporate America. Summers is doing important work determining the three-dimensional structure of the virus that causes AIDS. And Stephen Auvil, director of UMBC's Office of Technology Development, is constantly on the lookout for technology that can be "transferred," research that can be commercialized with the help of investors, strategic partners or both. Auvil helped find a pharmaceutical company interested in partnering with Summers to look for compounds that might be turned into drugs. It's early, but with a lot of hard work and some luck -- with patents secured, funding garnered, regulatory hurdles cleared -- UMBC could be the launching pad for a successful technology company, possibly reaping millions in licensing fees. These kinds of technology transfer wins are difficult to achieve. But a new influx of leaders in state government and at Maryland's research institutions is directing new energy toward the effort, determined to spin out these success stories and match the pace of other regions that are home to premier university and federal government research and development laboratories. The problem: They're doing it at a time when fiscal woes are crippling budgets, leaving precious little in the way of new resources to best do the job. And Maryland has a rich endowment of these R&D institutions to mine. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Business Journal, 4/11/03 (subscription required)
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States vying to get on biotech bandwagon -
In an earlier era, western Springfield, Mass., had a knack for the next big thing. Draftsman Milton Bradley made the first mass-produced parlor game here, and brothers Charles and Frank Duryea built the first automobile-manufacturing plant. Taxidermist Clarence Birdseye became the father of modern frozen food, and teacher James Naismith invented basketball. Now, Springfield hopes to recapture its place on the cutting edge. It's one of dozens of cities across the country, including Austin, pushing to become the next hotbed of biotechnology. So far, only one company has committed to a new, $15 million research institute along Main Street. But the institute's director, Larry Schwartz, says others would be crazy not to take advantage of its top-of-the-line equipment, talent from nearby colleges and cheap, clean living...Across the United States, more than 80 percent of the states and municipalities that responded to a 2001 survey prepared for a Department of Commerce conference listed biotech as one of their top two targets for development. Click here for more.
- Austin American-Statesman, 4/14/03
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Maryland state university system officials say students will face one of two barriers
in 10 years: far higher tuition or a limit on admission. The Maryland system is grappling with a $67 million cut -- or roughly 8 percent this year -- in its state funding for this year and next. Those reductions are being absorbed mainly through a midyear tuition increase, layoffs, and staff furloughs. The system projects enrollment growth that would require a 50 percent budget increase by 2013, which could be paid for with annual tuition increases of 4 percent and annual increases in state support of 8.5 percent.
--Baltimore Sun, 4/12/03
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Oregon's only medical school is in a bind.
Combine a growing demand for indigent care, decreasing funding from the state, and the inability to drop unprofitable services because of the teaching function they serve--and something has to give. Medical leaders are hoping it won't be the quality of education. "If you have a medical school, you can't just close down [obstetrics-gynecology] because it is losing money. You have to have that set of clinical experiences in order to train students," said Dr. Christine Cassel, dean of the Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine. Click here for more.
- The Business Journal of Portland, 4/14/03 (subscription required)
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UC Irvine has raised three-fourths of the $10 million it needs to show University of California
officials they should approve final plans for a new $365-million medical center when the UC Board of Regents meets next month. The $10 million is similar to good-faith money that must be raised before the official fund-raising campaign can begin. "I think that will go a long way to resolving anxiety at the level of the regents [and high-ranking UC administrators]," said Dr. Ralph Cygan, chief executive of UCI Medical Center in Orange, which the new facility would replace. "It's been clear we've got to demonstrate community support for this project."... The medical center, like hospitals statewide, must meet seismic safety standards by 2008, an expense so great that university officials decided it would be cheaper to build a new one. This also provided a chance to exchange what was once the county hospital in Orange County, built in the early 1960s, for an academic medical center designed for teaching and research. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 4/9/03
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Hospital stays continue to get shorter for U.S. patients,
and heart disease remains the main reason for hospitalization, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Wednesday. The country's 32.7 million hospital patients had average stays of 4.9 days in 2001, according to the most recent data studied by the CDC.... "They're much shorter because of a lot of advances in medical care," said Margaret Hall, CDC health statistician. Patients stayed in hospitals for an average of about 8 days in 1970. Drug treatment, surgical advances, better outpatient care and more efficient in-house analysis of which patients should stay and which should be sent to outpatient centers have contributed to the decline, Hall said. Click here for more.
-AP/ Detroit Free Press, 4/10/03
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Today's health-care workers are not being adequately trained or evaluated
to ensure that patients receive safe, high-quality care, according to a report released Wednesday by the Institute of Medicine. The report calls for a "major overhaul" of schools and programs that train health professionals. Doctors, nurses, and other health-care workers are ill prepared to work in teams, and are not subjected to rigorous review throughout their careers, the report says. The report by the institute, which is an arm of the National Academies, is part of a series examining ways to improve the quality and safety of the nation's health-care system. The series included a 2000 report that found that medical errors cause tens of thousands of deaths annually in the United States. The latest report recommends that academic programs in medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and allied health fields -- such as X-ray technology and physical therapy -- adopt five key skills that all students must master: to deliver patient-centered care, work in interdisciplinary teams, engage in evidence-based practice that includes the latest research, apply quality-improvement approaches to help reduce and report errors, and use information technology. Accreditation and licensing boards should closely monitor compliance with those goals, the report says. Click here for more.
- Chronicle for Higher Education, 4/10/03 (subscription required)
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How Mount Sinai Helped Undermine Its Own Health -
...Would Dr. [Kenneth] Berns agree to step aside? Behind Mr. [Peter] May's urgency was a hospital spiraling ever deeper into debt. The new financial documents showed that despite one executive shake-up, hundreds of layoffs and an array of program cuts, Mount Sinai's budget deficit had actually grown, to $72 million last year from $14 million in 2001. In January of this year alone, the hospital lost $12 million more, executives said. By the end of 2003, its losses since early 2000 are expected to reach $200 million. Its bonds are in danger of being rated as junk, the rating agencies say. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 4/7/03
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Claiming that electronic records and computerized physician order systems will save health care dollars
and improve patient safety, Rep. Sheldon Wasserman (D-Milwaukee) will introduce a bill later this month that rewards hospitals for getting wired. Wasserman's bill would give a 1 percent state increase in Medicaid reimbursements to hospitals that invest in the new systems. Wasserman, a member of the Assembly Health Committee and a physician, said he is seeking co-sponsors for the bill. Wasserman estimated the cost to the state would be about $2 million a year but said it would be well worth it in mistakes avoided, lives saved, and costs reduced. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 4/7/03
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As Baylor Medical Center at Grapevine prepares for the completion of the expansion
of its emergency department this fall, there is an effort under way to reduce wait times and shorten patient visits with a new registration process. "What we have now is a bedside registration procedure," said Laura Cheney, director of access services for Baylor Grapevine. "As long as a room is available, our goal is to send the patient directly to an exam room after triage, and we obtain their financial information there while they're waiting to be seen." Click here for more.
- Dallas Business Journal, 4/7/03 (subscription required)
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More than 300,000 Aetna members in Georgia could face higher out-of-pocket costs to use Emory
hospitals and doctors. Emory Healthcare said Wednesday that it will drop out of Aetna's hospital network Jan. 1, blaming low reimbursements from the insurer.... The Emory-Aetna dispute is the latest in a series of high-stakes contract negotiations between health insurers and medical providers. Insurers are trying to remain profitable while meeting employers' demands for affordable medical care. Doctors and hospitals are requesting significant rate increases, while squeezed by payment cuts from government programs Medicare and Medicaid and by escalating premiums for medical malpractice insurance. But many planned breakups between insurers and medical providers are headed off by last-minute agreements, and Emory and Aetna have nine months before their split takes effect. Click here for more.
- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 4/3/03
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Alternative Care Crops Up At "Traditional" Hospitals -
When Nancy Serber went into Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minnesota with heart problems this past October, her doctor advised her to get a chest scan and blood tests and undergo major valve-replacement surgery. His next suggestion: Try massage and music therapy, too. He wasn't kidding. The hospital's heart institute now includes a holistic-medicine program where patients can listen to Bach right after surgery or meditate to hilltop images. "I was leery," says Ms. Serber, a 53-year-old mother of four in New Hope, Minn. "But this made me believe everything would be OK." Now at a hospital near you: aromatherapy, meditation and milk-thistle tea. With a third of Americans trying alternative medicine, treatments that your doctor never learned in medical school are spilling into hospitals at a remarkable rate. In just the past two years, the number of medical centers with alternative clinics has jumped to almost 100, up from fewer than a dozen in 2000, according to integrative health experts and medical consultants. Duke is getting in on the action. So have Stanford, New York's Beth Israel and the University of Colorado. The latest at the University of California, San Francisco? A massage therapist to hold your feet during surgery. Click here for more.
- Wall Street Journal, 3/28/03 (subscription required)
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uncertainty@dr-mail.com: Some Doctors Use Patient E-mail in Their Practices, but Most Aren't Ready to Log On
Ellen Ranzman of Bethesda has tried a wide range of medications and procedures for her chronic heartburn condition. But ask her the most effective treatment for the problem, and she'll answer: e-mail. "It's amazing, I absolutely love it," says Ranzman, 56, about her ability to fire off questions on symptoms and medication issues to her Washington gastroenterologist, David Shocket. Early one recent morning, rather than leave her name and phone number with the doctor's answering service, she e-mailed Shocket to say she was gulping down antacid to no avail. A few hours later, Schocket's office contacted her by phone to schedule a procedure to dilate her esophagus. The procedure, she says, has brought her considerable relief. "[E-mail] gives me the opportunity to communicate with him when it's convenient for me, at night or first thing in the morning, and I get very quick responses," Ranzman says. It hasn't eliminated phone contact: If she sends an e-mail that concerns him, Shocket may still phone her. And she sometimes still dials in, too. But, she says, e-mailing with Shocket, and with her internist, Jody Robinson, "has made my ability to get things done medically much more efficient." The two doctors say responding to e-mail relieves them of the hassle of tracking a patient down by phone -- it may surprise some patients to learn their doctors complain about phone tag almost as much as they do. E-mail lets them leave a direct response to a patient's message instead. Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 4/1/03 (subscription required)
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The University of Wisconsin System needs to privatize UW-Madison,
according to one of the bolder ideas advanced at a meeting with members of the UW Board of Regents March 31.
The speaker, Madison business executive George Nelson, said a restructured UW-Madison could be run through the lucrative private and federal research grants and gifts that it receives. Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle has proposed cutting $250 million from the UW System's budget to reduce a $3.2 billion state budget deficit. The system could partially offset the cut with $150 million in tuition increases under Doyle's plan. Click here for the full story.
--Wisconsin State Journal, 4/1/03
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Should schools get a share of the riches if they make a fundamental discovery,
secure a patent but don't set down a clear path to developing a commercial product? In the unpredictable arena of patent litigation, the University of Rochester is willing to defend a faculty member's lab work with an eight-figure legal fund. Hiring a prestigious patent law firm, it has already piled up well over $10 million in costs. The colossal prize: billions in royalties. "What's at stake here is whether basic research is patentable," said the school's chief counsel, Gerald Dodson of the law firm Morrison & Foerster in Palo Alto, Calif.
Click here for more.
-AP/Kansas City Star, 3/28/03
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Hospitals get aggressive with scholarships -
Beth Caldwell's family in Toledo, Wash., called every day for two weeks to see whether she had any news. In early March it came. Caldwell, a 23-year-old nursing student at the University of Portland, learned she was one of the first Providence Scholars. She would join a program that will provide 75 of the university's juniors each year with full-tuition scholarships for their final five semesters of nursing school. In exchange, they must work for Providence Health System for three years after graduation, primarily at its three Portland-area hospitals, which employ about 3,000 nurses. Caldwell's parents, who pay her tuition, were thrilled. "They just finished putting my sister through nursing school," Caldwell said. "My brother's starting college next year." The partnership between Providence and the University of Portland aims at a nursing shortage that is expected to increase dramatically as aging baby boomers require more care. At the same time, an aging nurse population is beginning to retire in droves. Click here for more.
- The Oregonian, 3/27/03
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The University of California announced Thursday it will launch a new Internet-based system to track medical errors
at its five campus medical centers, joining other major health care providers in computerizing medical records to improve quality and efficiency. The Internet-based system, which has been developed by the university, will allow hospitals to track trends in medication errors, adverse drug reactions, blood transfusion errors, patient falls and bed sores. The University of California also will establish a "harm score system" for evaluating each error and comparing it with others. Nationally, major medical systems such as that of the Department of Veterans Affairs have been leaders in systematic efforts to reduce errors using technology. In February, Kaiser Permanente, the state's largest HMO, rolled out a $1.8-billion plan to give doctors and patients access to medical histories, test results, prescription information and other data, in part to reduce errors. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 3/28/03
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Emory University's Winship Cancer Institute has received a $10 million federal grant
to launch a prostate cancer research project with 11 other universities in seven other states. Funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, the program will work on identifying new therapeutic targets for advanced prostate cancer. It is led by Dr. Jonathan Simons, Winship director, and Dr. Leland Chung, an Emory urologist. Prostate cancer is one of the main focuses at Winship as it applies for prestigious National Cancer Institute status as part of the Georgia Cancer Coalition, a state effort using tobacco settlements funds to improve cancer care. The other institutions involved are Wayne State University in Detroit, Johns Hopkins Oncology Center in Baltimore, Harvard Medical School in Boston, the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, the University of California at Davis in Sacramento, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, UCLA Jonsson Cancer Center in Los Angeles, the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle, the University of Virginia in Charlottesville and Harvard/Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
-Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 3/27/03
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The University of Kentucky will cut 50 jobs at its Chandler Medical Center
as it transfers management of the center to the school's provost. UK President Lee Todd made the announcement Tuesday in a memo to faculty and staff. The memo also said Todd accepted most of the recommendations of a university committee to move services and functions from the chancellor's office of the medical center to UK Provost Mike Nietzel, steps expected to save the university $2 million annually. "Everyone in the university community should understand this is a substantial reorganization involving not only the Medical Center, but also the entire university," Todd said in the memo. "This effort is not being taken lightly, nor will it be completed without some challenges and pain." Established in 1957, the medical center includes five colleges -- pharmacy, medicine, nursing, dentistry and health sciences -- along with University of Kentucky Hospital and UK Children's Hospital. It has a budget of $652 million, including $319 million for UK Hospital, and has nearly 6,000 employees. Moving management of the medical center to UK's provost is designed to make all academic units at the university report to the same official. Click here for more.
- Louisville Journal-Courier, 3/27/03
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Fewer Oregon students will get a university education and those who do will pay more
for it under a preliminary budget approved by higher education officials March 21. The plan calls for tuition increases of up to 8 percent this fall. On top of that, budget cuts could shave statewide enrollment by as many as 12,000 students. Those moves would balance a budget cut that could be as much as $90 million for the 2003-05 biennium, on top of the $88 million OUS cut from its budget this year. Members of the State Board of Higher Education said closing the doors on some students is the only way to keep the quality of an Oregon university education from falling to an unacceptable level.
Click here for the full story.
-- The Register-Guard, Eugene, Oregon, 3/22/03
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Paramyxovirus implicated in SARS as cases reach 264
As cases in the global outbreak of "severe acute respiratory syndrome" (SARS) climbed to 264 today, the World Health Organization (WHO) said there is evidence that the illness may be caused by a previously unknown member of the Paramyxovirus family, which causes measles, mumps, and canine distemper.
Researchers at laboratories in Germany and Hong Kong detected particles of a virus from the Paramyxoviridae family in samples from SARS patients, WHO officials said in a news release. "This is the first major step forward in efforts to pinpoint the causative agent," the statement said. "The failure of all previous efforts to detect the presence of bacteria and viruses known to cause respiratory disease strongly suggests that the causative agent may be a novel pathogen." Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 03/19/03
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Providing health insurance coverage to everyone in the United States
who lacks it would cost only a fraction of what the nation is already spending on health care, a leading health-policy analyst told a conference on the uninsured Tuesday. "It's a single-digit percentage" of the estimated $1.6 trillion the U.S. will spend on health care this year, said Bruce Vladeck, former head of Medicare and Medicaid who now teaches health policy at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. "This problem is not nearly as big as we have made it out to be if we take it on frontally," he said at the forum sponsored by the American Public Health Association (news - web sites). Jack Hadley of the Urban Institute, a Washington-based think tank, told the group that the uninsured already receive about $35 billion worth of care each year, most of it coming through federal and state government coffers. Vladeck said that amount could be subtracted from the total cost of providing people with coverage instead. Click here for more.
-Reuters Health/Yahoo!, 3/19/03
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US should lead in battling global microbial threats, says IOM
With perfect timing in view of the current global outbreak of a mysterious respiratory disease, the Institute of Medicine today released a report calling on the United States to take the lead in addressing infectious disease threats around the world as well as at home.
The nation should work to build a global surveillance and response system for infectious diseases, especially in the developing world, says the report, titled "Microbial Threats to Health: Emergence, Detection, and Response." Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 3/18/03
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People without insurance are clogging emergency rooms in Washington
and across the country, a trend that ER doctors say is resulting in longer waits and untimely deaths. In a national survey of emergency care doctors, 81 percent said those without insurance were more likely to die prematurely than patients who had it, according to the American College of Emergency Physicians. "This survey demonstrates that many of the uninsured people who arrive in America's hospital emergency departments are in terrible shape," said Dr. Nancy Auer, vice president of medical affairs at Swedish Medical Center and an ER doctor herself.... According to the survey, about one-third of all patients who use emergency rooms are uninsured, and that percentage is expected to rise. The survey, which was sponsored in part by the non-profit Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, was released as part of national campaign to raise awareness about the issue of the uninsured. Click here for more.
- Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 3/13/03
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Problems caused by the lack of health insurance in America
have become so severe it will take a health care "revolution" to repair the damage. So says Dr. Marilyn Gaston, a former assistant U.S. surgeon general who rose to national rank after years serving the needy in Cincinnati - and who returned to town as part of a nationwide awareness campaign this week about the uninsured. About 41 million Americans, including more than 160,000 Tristate residents, lack health insurance. As a result, many people are skipping doctor appointments, delaying hospital visits, leaving medications at the pharmacy and cutting pills in half. "We need a revolution because we have to radically change the statistics you've heard. We're the only industrialized nation in the world that does not have some sort of national health insurance plan," Gaston said. Click here for more.
- Cincinatti Enquirer, 3/12/03
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A group of turnaround specialists told UCLA faculty Wednesday that the university's struggling
health-care system needs to substantially overhaul its unprofitable physician clinics and cut its workforce. The Hunter Group, a consulting firm paid $1.9 million by UCLA to suggest reforms, also said billing practices need revamping.... As of Dec. 31, it had only $20,000 cash in the bank and officials were forced to borrow $7 million from the UCLA chancellor's office to help pay bills. The consultants found fault with many financial practices at UCLA's three hospitals in Westwood and Santa Monica and its network of 18 primary-care clinics on the Westside. They did not evaluate the quality of care for patients.
-Los Angeles Times, 3/13/03
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As a first-year medical student, Deborah Newcomb is unusual
in a couple of ways: No. 1: She's 40. No. 2: She's already an accomplished professional, having directed the Northern Ohio Cello Choir before deciding on a rather massive career switch. But she is not unusual because she's a woman seeking to become a doctor. More than half of her classmates at the University of Miami School of Medicine -- 80 of 147 -- are female. In fact, across the nation, that's the trend: Growing numbers of women are entering medical school. Today, 25 percent of doctors are women, up from 7.6 percent in 1970. By 2010, women are expected to form 33 percent of the profession. Many patients and healthcare experts are happy to see the change, especially since scientific studies have repeatedly found that female physicians tend to spend more time with patients, listen more and show more empathy than their male colleagues -- particularly if the patients are members of minority groups. Click here for more.
- Miami Herald, 3/10/03
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For health care providers, privacy rule means big bucks --
At a time when health care providers are facing Medicare and Medicaid cuts, exponential rises in malpractice premiums and doctor walkouts, they'd like to avoid sinking billions of dollars into more bureaucracy. But they can't, because of a piece of federal legislation called the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, also known as HIPAA. The multi-part law has spawned a multi-billion dollar industry of its own, one that in some ways puts Y2K expenses to shame. The latest deadline, requiring compliance with the privacy rule, comes April 14. Click here for more.
- Macon Telegraph, 3/10/03
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Elderly Losing Doctors -
Lisa Skinner, a chief resident at UCLA School of Medicine, thought about specializing in the treatment of the elderly and even got a master's degree in geriatric social work. In the end, she opted to pursue general internal medicine. "I hated to give up the younger patients, even though I enjoy the older patients," she said. Across the country, thousands of new doctors such as Skinner have decided to pursue specialties other than geriatrics, a trend that has created a vast shortage of elder care doctors. Experts who worry about the depth of the problem say it's going to become extreme when baby boomers start hitting old age and start needing special care. "It's going to be enormous," said Dr. David Reuben, chief of geriatrics at the University of California at Los Angeles, School of Medicine. "You can't imagine how big this is going to be." Reuben is one of the 76 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964, known collectively as baby boomers. "In 2011, we're going to start hitting 65. One of out every five people in the country," he said. Click here for more.
- Myrtle Beach Sun News, 3/5/03
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Stanford University is freezing faculty and staff salaries
for next year. While such freezes have become common at public colleges and less-elite private institutions, the step may be the first of its kind for the nation's top private universities in the current economic downturn. John W. Etchemendy, Stanford's provost, made the announcement in a letter sent last Wednesday to all employees. He also said the university would cut operating funds to departments by 5 to 10 percent and make selected layoffs. According to a statement on its Web site, Stanford is facing a projected $25-million deficit for the 2003-4 fiscal year, which begins September 1. By freezing the salaries of its 8,700 employees at this year's levels, the university says it will save $7-million to $8-million. Those savings will "minimize the need" for layoffs, Mr. Etchemendy wrote in his letter, but "some units, in order to meet allocation decreases, may still have to lay off staff members." He did not offer additional details. Click here for more.
- Chronicle for Higher Education, 3/4/03 (subscription required)
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Patients are clamoring for it. Many doctors hate the idea.
But the smart money is on the patients to win this one, and it's a biggie: e-mail contact with doctors. A Harris Interactive survey last spring showed that nearly 90 percent of wired folks want to communicate with their physicians online to ask questions, set up appointments, refill prescriptions and get test results. Moreover, patients say they are willing to pay for e-visits. They figure that even paying for e-mail, they'll come out ahead: To see the doctor, a patient often misses half a day of work. So, why won't doctors just get with the program? While some do, most resist e-mail because they're scared. They're scared that e-mail will add work to their already rushed days. They are scared that patients will bombard them with dumb questions. They're scared that they might get sued for some e-mistake, a liability nightmare. And they're scared of the "culture" shift that direct access will create (which is precisely what patients want). "Doctors are used to controlling interactions with patients," says Dr. Tom Ferguson, a senior research fellow at the Pew Internet and American Life Project. "With e-mail, they are not in charge." Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 3/3/03
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Johns Hopkins Medicine will break ground today on an $80 million research tower
that will bring together scientists from many different disciplines who are working to fight cancer.
The 10-story building is a key element in a $1 billion construction campaign that is expected to transform Hopkins' 52-acre East Baltimore medical campus and create up to 1,000 jobs over the next decade. When complete in May 2005, it will provide laboratory and office space for several hundred scientists and their support staff. The second building at Hopkins devoted solely to cancer research, it is consistent with the institution's tradition of putting research space close to the patients who stand to benefit most. "We need this new facility to accommodate the steady growth in numbers of our faculty securing gifts or grants to support the fight against cancer," said Dr. Edward D. Miller, dean and chief executive officer of Johns Hopkins Medicine. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 3/3/03
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Nursing students offer help in crisis --
Stephanie Nitz cannot stand guard over national landmarks, join an invasion into hostile territory or track down suspected evildoers. But as a first-year nursing student in Waukesha County, Nitz does have another skill to offer in America's war on terrorism: She knows how to vaccinate people. And some health professionals from the Milwaukee area hope to convince the federal government that the nation's nursing schools are an ideal source of an emergency work force, should thousands of people need to be vaccinated in a crisis.... At a national conference next month in Chicago, two health industry activists from southeastern Wisconsin will urge colleagues to consider mobilizing the nation's 225,000 nursing students as a resource in terrorism response plans. Vicki Dallmann-Papke, director of occupational health for ProHealth Care Inc., and Bobbie Jurishica, a nursing instructor at Waukesha County Technical College, contend that nursing students are being overlooked as prospective volunteers to work with doctors, firefighters and other emergency workers. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2/26/03
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BioWatch program aims for nationwide detection of airborne pathogens
Feb 26, 2003--Typical predictions about what would happen in a bioterrorist attack with airborne germs say that no one would know about it until a number of people with similar symptoms starting showing up in clinics and emergency rooms. But the federal government is hoping to change that scenario with its new nationwide program to sniff the air for dangerous pathogens.
Click here for more.
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Californians are confronting a troubling new question as health-care costs rise,
a Mercury News/NBC11 poll has found: whether they can afford the care they want and need. The poll shows that 60 percent of state residents are paying more for care than they did two years ago, and half are worried about their ability to afford future increases.... "Consumers have been shielded from health-care costs, and health care is tremendously expensive," said Glenn Melnick, director of the Center for Health Policy and Management at the University of Southern California, who was asked to review the poll's major findings. "They're starting to see the costs, and they're afraid." Click here for more.
- San Jose Mercury News, 2/24/03
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Emergency room computer technology could track bioterrorism.
Computer technology developed at Vanderbilt University Medical Center to help the emergency room run smoothly could also help detect potential incidents of bioterrorism, officials say. The hospital's emergency department recently introduced a computer system that gives doctors and nurses instant access to every patient's medical record. The system, which displays the information on a 60-inch computer screen mounted in a central location, allows caregivers to spot similar symptoms or complaints in different patients, even if they are admitted at different times and seen by different staff members. The Metro Public Health Department wants to learn whether such a system could help it detect "a disease outbreak or a weapon of mass destruction incident," said Dr. Jon Warkentin, head of the department's Bureau of Communicable Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Robin Hemphill, a Vanderbilt emergency department staff member, is trying to solve the question of how to share information between the hospital and the health department. Speed, she said, is vital. Click here for more.
- The Tennessean, 2/24/03
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Two more private institutions are contemplating a merger.
Officials at Chapman University and Western University of Health Sciences, both located in Southern California, are in discussions about combining their operations. Chapman, a liberal arts institution with 4,700 students, is interested in broadening its graduate programs. In addition to undergraduate programs, it now offers graduate degrees in areas including business, economics, education, film and television, and law. Western, with 1,400 students, is a graduate health-sciences institution best-known for training osteopathic physicians. It also offers degree programs in nursing, osteopathic medicine, and, beginning in the fall, veterinary medicine. "Health care certainly will be one of the most rapidly growing industries of the 21st century," said James L. Doti, president of Chapman. "This merger would continue Chapman's evolution from a regional liberal arts college to a significant comprehensive national university."
-Chronicle for Higher Education, 2/19/03
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University of Louisville trustees OK plan for heart research center
Pacemakers that speed up when you walk up stairs. Artificial hearts and assist devices that pump more blood when they sense a drop in oxygen levels. Internal pumps that automatically release medication when a patient's blood pressure rises too high. Such "smart heart" technology, using miniature sensors and machines, will be developed and tested at a heart research center approved yesterday by the University of Louisville Board of Trustees. Click here for more.
-- Louisville Courier-Journal, 2/14/03
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President Bush's request for record spending on research and development in his 2004 budget
proposal could be a boon for Colorado's defense contractors, but may drain funds from the state's only academic medical research institution. So while scientists and engineers at Lockheed Martin celebrate $538 million in federal funding for the Atlas rocket program, faculty and administrators at the University of Colorado face heavy competition for dollars to fund research on cancer, diabetes, psychology, Native American health, infectious diseases and AIDS, said Jay Gershen, CU Health Sciences Center executive vice chancellor. "We're very concerned about the president's budget," Gershen said. "Every $1 million in NIH funding creates 38 jobs here." Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 2/13/02
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UPMC Health System and the University of Pittsburgh Medical School are preparing to overhaul the way they compensate
full-time faculty physicians. The pending changes, which won't include tenured faculty, have sparked rumors among doctors that some of them might be seeing pay cuts. The changes will take effect in June 2004 for some 1,150 full-time doctors already on payroll and upon hiring for new physicians. The overhaul is designed to align compensation with the nature of their work, whether it is teaching, clinical activity, research or some combination, said Dr. Marshall Webster, president and chief executive of the University of Pittsburgh Physicians, a business unit set up to compensate UPMC doctors. Webster said the plan would increase compensation for some doctors and reduce it for others. Click here for more.
- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 2/12/03
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A group of five Washington state community colleges has been awarded a total of $850,000
in federal grant money for expansion of programs that train health care workers. The Thurston County Board of Commissioners signed off Monday on contracts that channel part of those funds to nursing programs at South Puget Sound Community College and Centralia College. "It's a very necessary thing," said Steve Miller, dean of instruction, work force and professional technical education for Centralia College. "Our LPN waiting list gets as high as 100 people," he said. Click here for more.
- The Olympian, 2/11/03
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Physician satisfaction study reflects problems.
In a recent study of physician satisfaction, doctors said maintaining clinical autonomy--being able to treat their patients the way they felt was necessary--was more important than income in determining how happy they were on the job. But physicians are facing financial problems. Doctors in New Jersey walked off their jobs this week, refusing to see patients except those needing urgent care, because they say they can't afford to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on medical malpractice insurance. They are not alone. Doctors in other states report the same problem, and some of them have left their families to practice in other states where the insurance is just a fraction of what they were paying. Click here for more.
--National Public Radio, 2/7/03
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With unfriendly financial markets forcing many biotechnology companies to shelve
promising early stage projects, a program through the University of California is offering a means to help fund such work. UC Discovery Grants leverage funds from UC and the state of California with funds from private industry to conduct basic research. The program is accepting proposals for research from the biotechnology industry through Feb. 14. In the past year the program, which proponents say is unique among examples of university-industry cooperation because of the way it directly ties university researchers to industry, funded $60 million in research in areas including telecommunications, digital media, electronics, information technology and life sciences. "The university is absolutely key to the economy of the state. Historically, people have always thought in terms of the graduates of the university and how they feed into the economy, but the research the university has been involved in over the past 20 years has been the building blocks for hundreds of companies," said UC President Richard Atkinson, who created the Industry-University Cooperative Research Program that oversees the grant. "If you talk to most of these high-tech companies, they are not going to do most of the fundamental research that leads to new products and discoveries. But they can rely on the university for being the backbone for ensuring these ideas get out there and then can be developed," Atkinson said. Click here for more.
- San Francisco Business Times, 2/10/03 (subscription required)
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Technology to cut medical mistakes and improve patient safety is the top spending priority
for the health-care industry's chief information officers, but money remains an issue, a new survey indicates. Of 300 technology officers responding to the annual Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society survey released Monday at the group's conference in San Diego, close to 60 percent said technology to cut errors will be their top priority over the next two years.... How much gets accomplished, though, may depend on funds. While close to 70 percent of the health-care executives project an increase in their IT budgets in the next 12 months, nearly a quarter said a lack of adequate financial support is the most significant barrier to getting new technology. Hospitals have been under mounting pressure ever since a 2000 Institute of Medicine report said 44,000 to 98,000 people die annually from preventable medical mistakes such as getting the wrong drug or dosage of medication, misdiagnosis, or failure to provide the right treatment. Though many medical experts say those numbers are exaggerated, there is growing evidence that many mistakes can be prevented with new technology such as computerized order entry systems and bar coding devices for drugs. Click here for more.
- Wall Street Journal, 2/11/03 (subscription required)
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The Bush administration plans to double licensing fees on doctors,
pharmacies and drug makers to expand the government's fight against prescription drug abuse, which is growing rapidly across the nation. Officials said the fee increase will be disclosed in the next few days by the Drug Enforcement Administration, which polices the distribution of prescription drugs. The illegal use of these drugs is growing by at least 27 percent each year, and represents as big an abuse problem as cocaine, at least in terms of the number of abusers.... An estimated 11 million Americans abused prescription drugs in 2000, principally opium-based painkillers, according to federal surveys and interviews with federal regulators. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 2/11/03
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A high proportion of the doctors who do delicate medical procedures have relatively little experience
at them, according to figures being released this week. Some consumer advocates say the situation may endanger patients. Dozens of studies have shown that a patient has a much higher risk of serious injury or death at the hands of a surgeon or hospital that handles a particular procedure infrequently. Patient advocates, including the group that is releasing the new information, the Center for Medical Consumers, say the numbers point to a need for the New York State Department of Health and the hospitals themselves to limit which hospitals and doctors provide certain services. But the agency, hospital officials and some experts in the field say the picture is far from clear, and that volume is not a reliable measure of performance. The numbers being released cover the year 2001, and include 44 mostly common procedures. Most are surgeries, but the list also includes things like coronary artery angioplasty and colonoscopy. The figures, taken from raw data collected by the Health Department, were compiled by the Center for Medical Consumers, a nonprofit group in New York City, and are available on its Web site, www.medicalconsumers.org. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 2/10/03
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National health groups today said the United States has the science and ability to address
some of the top health and health system problems, but has failed to act. Excessive costs, widening disparities in health status, high prevalence of chronic disease, high numbers of uninsured and inadequate investment in the continuum of health services contribute to a poor state of national health. Health care costs consume more than 14.1 percent of the U.S. budget representing $1.4 trillion and financing some of the most scientifically advanced health services in the world. Yet despite spending more money on health care than other nations, in 2000 the United States ranked 25th among all nations in life expectancy. The groups welcomed news of President Bush's proposed increase of $100 million to curb chronic diseases and called it "a good first step," but said overall funding across the public health continuum to improve health outcomes has been insufficient. Only 1 percent of health dollars are spent on public health efforts to improve overall health. Click here for more.
-American Public Health Association, 1/27/03
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President Bush proposed on Monday spending $27 billion on basic research
in the 2004 fiscal year, an increase of 14 percent over 2002, the last federal budget passed by Congress. The 2004 proposal provided mixed news for various fields of academic science supported by federal funds: the National Science Foundation and research on bioterrorism, information technology, and nanotechnology would get significant raises, but most other agencies that finance science would get smaller ones. Complicating the unveiling of Mr. Bush's budget was the mess that remains from last year's budget process.... The $27.070-billion figure for basic research in 2004 represents a 5-percent increase over Mr. Bush's request for 2003; over all, he suggested an increase of 4 percent for all "discretionary" programs -- the portion of federal spending not automatically set by law -- in the 2004 fiscal year, compared with his request for 2003. The 2004 fiscal year begins October 1. Click here for more.
- Chronicle of Higher Education, 2/4/03 (subscription required)
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With the need for nurses expected to jump sharply in the coming decade,
Margaret Skulnik needs only to look at her colleagues to know there is a problem. Skulnik, director of the nursing program at Durham Technical Community College, works with nine full-time faculty members. Most are in their mid- to late 50s. Most are likely to retire in the coming years. Given the scarcity of qualified nurses willing to join teaching faculties, Skulnik and other health officials have no idea where community colleges are going to find enough replacements to train tomorrow's nursing corps. "A nurse who is qualified to teach can also find other jobs in health care that pay far more," Skulnik said. "So it's often difficult to convince nurses they are needed in the classroom, especially young ones." Click here for more.
- Raleigh News & Observer, 2/3/2003
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As the economy suffers through layoffs and wage freezes, hospitals and doctors are hiring
thousands of new employees and offering unprecedented referral bonuses and raises to key staff.... Over the past two years, Massachusetts hospitals, physicians, clinics, nursing homes, and health insurance companies have added 10,000 jobs - the only part of the state's economy aside from higher education that is growing - while the overall Massachusetts economy lost 84,000 jobs. Nationally, "health care is the key engine to current job growth," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Economy.com. "It is the only part of the economy that is adding large amounts of jobs, particularly in hard-pressed regions like Boston." Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 1/29/03
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West Virginia higher education officials told state legislators
that it's critical for lawmakers to restore $5 million due to be cut out of the budgets of the state's three medical schools. "These cuts would damage seriously our ability to provide the kind of health services education that are badly needed in this state," said Dr. Robert D'Alessandri, dean of the West Virginia University School of Medicine. The state's three medical schools would lose more than 14 percent of their overall funding from the combined effects of Gov. Bob Wise's 10 percent budget cuts and reductions in funding for personnel, and increased costs for public employees health insurance and liability insurance, he said. Higher Education Chancellor Michael Mullen said the combined effects of the cuts and the cost increases would give the medical schools $ 11.9 million less revenue next year. "They don't have the student volume to offset that with tuition increases," he said.
--Charleston Daily Mail, 1/23/03
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Under fire for failing to safeguard patients' health, the nation's most influential
hospital regulator said Wednesday that it will step up its oversight of facilities to cut down on fatal infections contracted in them. If the hospitals do not comply with the new standards, they could lose accreditation, which could jeopardize their federal funding, the regulator said. The actions by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, based in Oakbrook Terrace, comes in the wake of a Tribune investigation last year that found about 75,000 deaths from preventable hospital-borne infections in just one year. The investigation found the Joint Commission failing in its role as a public guardian by, among other things, vastly underestimating the number of avoidable patient deaths in its database, documenting just 12 cases of preventable hospital-borne infections since 1995. Click here for more.
-Chicago Tribune, 1/23/03
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Minnesota to test irradiation education program in school districts
As the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) prepares to offer irradiated ground beef to schools for their lunch programs, Minnesota state officials are planning a USDA-financed pilot project in three school districts to assess attitudes and test educational materials about irradiated beef.
The aim of the project is "to get the latest science-based information to school districts so they could make the best decisions about their food safety programs," according to an advisory from the Minnesota Department of Children, Families and Learning (MDCFL). The MDCFL received a $151,000 USDA grant for the project, department spokesman Doug Gray told CIDRAP News.
Click here for the full story.
--CIDRAP News, 1/16/03
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President Bush said Thursday his proposed nationwide ceilings on medical malpractice awards would drive down
health care costs, but critics said he was siding with mismanaged insurance companies that pass inflated costs to patients. Bush dusted off a proposal he made in July to cap the pain and suffering portions of malpractice awards at $250,000. Without the limit, Bush said, "excessive jury awards will continue to drive up insurance costs, will put good doctors out of business or run them out of your community and will hurt communities like Scranton, Pa. That's a fact." Legislation he backed last year was approved in the House but was never brought for a vote in the Democratic-led Senate. Now the Republican Party controls both houses of Congress, and for the second time this week Bush revived a proposal that died last year. The other was welfare reform. Click here for more.
-AP/NY Times, 1/16/03
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Students and faculty doctors will ask University of Colorado administrators today to sink more
energy and money into bringing people of color to the Schools of Medicine. This comes after a letter from a federal accreditation committee scolded administrators for not working hard enough on the issue. In a visit last year, a team noted that no written policy exists to recruit minorities, and that few have leadership roles at the school. "You have to fight apathy," said Ozzie Grendardo, a 29-year-old African-American who is a second-year student. Click here for more.
-Denver Post, 1/14/02
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States Organizing a Nonprofit Group to Cut Drug Costs -
In the strongest challenge yet in the battle between the states and the manufacturers and distributors of prescription drugs, nine states and the District of Columbia are organizing a joint nonprofit operation to manage their prescription plans, officials in charge of the effort said yesterday. The states intend to hold down spending on medicines for millions of state employees and Medicaid beneficiaries by creating an organization designed to be immune to drug makers' promotions of many of their more expensive products. The new organization is being formed at a time when two-thirds of the states are reducing Medicaid coverage, restricting eligibility or ending benefits altogether for at least one million people. A study by the Kaiser Family Foundation issued yesterday said state Medicaid directors expected further cuts in benefits and eligibility. Dozens of states are facing their largest deficits in years. Their combined shortfall for the current fiscal year is estimated at $45 billion, and the deficit for next year is projected to increase sharply, reaching 20 percent or more in some states. Click here for more.
-NY Times, 1/14/02
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New Jersey legislators are poised to give official approval for research on embryonic stem cells,
a measure that, while largely symbolic, would be a powerful statement against federal funding restrictions on such research. The debate over experimentation on stem cells from human embryos has pitted patient groups and scientists who say the research could lead to new treatments for diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's against opponents of abortion and others who object to destroying the embryo. The New Jersey legislation was introduced in September, less than a week after California had enacted a law explicitly authorizing research on stem cells. Like California's law, the New Jersey measure would provide that couples undergoing in-vitro fertilization be told that they could donate unused embryos to research. It also would explicitly approve a process known as therapeutic cloning, in which DNA from an adult cell is transferred to an unfertilized egg, which then generates stem cells matching the donor DNA. Many scientists believe that such cells will eventually prove more effective than other stem cells in treating disease because they would replicate the donor's own cells. Click here for more.
-NY Times, 1/12/03
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CU Opens New Wing on Vet Teaching Hospital -
Colorado State University has opened a new wing on its James L. Voss Veterinary Teaching Hospital. The new $10 million 35,000 sq. ft. facility will house the Animal Cancer Center, 12 research laboratories, clinical services and administrative offices. The Animal Cancer Center...addresses the needs of the veterinary cancer patient and is also deeply involved in veterinary cancer research. Many of the Center's research findings are applied to human cancer research, and vice versa.
-Veterinary e-Journal, 1/13/02
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Ricin awareness heightens after London arrests.
The London arrests Sunday (Jan. 5) of six men and yesterday of a seventh in connection with discovery of the highly toxic material ricin have British physicians on the alert for signs of poisoning and citizens being reminded by officials to be "alert but not alarmed." The situation has heightened interest elsewhere, as ricin is among the agents considered as likely agents of bioterrorism. Click here for more.
--CIDRAP News, 1/8/03
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Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at El Paso today will launch
its year-long 30th anniversary celebration by unveiling plans for a $38.5 million research center, which officials hope will lead to a four-year medical school. Dr. Jose Manuel de la Rosa, the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center's regional dean in El Paso, said the unveiling would serve as a "pep rally" for El Paso's state delegation making Texas Tech's local campus a full medical school a top legislative priority.... Topics of research to be conducted at the center include environmental health, diabetes and infectious diseases. The construction of the center is expected to begin in late July and be completed by May 2005, de la Rosa said. Click here for more.
- El Paso Times, 1/8/03
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Doctors in six other West Virginia cities are close to joining their Northern Panhandle peers
by staging a walkout, a Wheeling surgeon said Tuesday. Dr. Bob Zaleski, one of about two dozen surgeons at four Wheeling-area hospitals who submitted 30-day leaves of absence, said he is visiting the local medical associations in Elkins, Clarksburg and Parkersburg today to answer members' questions.... On Jan. 1, Northern Panhandle doctors staged a walkout to spotlight their calls for medical malpractice insurance relief and to support legislation that limits malpractice lawsuits and damage awards. Click here for more.
-Charlotte Gazette, 1/8/02
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Higher ed funding critical to state.
Like the student who keeps letting assignments pile up, the state of Washington has let itself slip dangerously behind in its support of higher education. The neglect of the state's colleges and universities bodes poorly for the future. Studies repeatedly have shown that people with higher education are more likely to be involved in supporting their communities and do better as individuals on a range of measures from income to health. Economically, higher education is increasingly tied to work-force productivity, the development of leading-edge companies and, more broadly, a region's ability to sustain economic development.Without a change of direction, the state stands to lose some of the social and economic benefits that higher education brings both society and individuals. Click here for the full story.
-- Seattle Post Intelligencer, Jan. 5, 2003
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Education remains a top priority for Iowa legislative leaders and its governor,
even though they acknowledge that no programs will be immune from cuts as the state faces another serious budget shortfall. Gov. Tom Vilsack and legislative leaders discussed the key role colleges play in economic development, both in terms of research and in creating an educated work force. "We cannot ignore the role that higher education plays in our economy," Vilsack said. Senate Democratic Leader Michael Gronstal, of Council Bluffs, draws a direct connection between developing business in the state and a strong higher education program. "If Iowa is going to succeed, economic development can't be just about creating any jobs they must be highly skilled jobs and high paying jobs," Gronstal said. He said state legislators should look at the state's high tuition rates especially at community colleges where high costs could keep college out of reach for some students.
--Associated Press, Des Moines, Iowa, 01/06/03
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Thousands of General Electric Co. employees vow to soon strike to protest rising health insurance
payments. It would be the conglomerate's first national strike in more than 30 years. GE said the strike would involve about 17,500 employees at the company's manufacturing plants.... Employees are protesting GE's decision to increase co-payments for health insurance Jan. 1. GE says the increases would cost the average employee about $200 a year and follow sharply rising health care costs. The last national strike by GE employees was in 1969 when workers were off the job for about 14 weeks. This time, the strike is expected to be much shorter. Click here for more.
-AP/NY Times, 1/5/03
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Good information or bad, the Internet is changing the way patients deal with their doctors.
Six million Americans are going online daily to search for information about health and diseases, according to the Pew Research Center--and they're taking that information with them when they go to doctors' offices. The trouble may be the information they're getting. "There are now over 100,000 health-information sites," said Yank D. Coble Jr., a physician-professor at the University of Florida and president of the American Medical Association. "It's really not possible for anyone to determine what's reliable and what's not reliable." Click here for more.
-Miami Herald, 1/5/03
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Patients face losing access to medical care as a malpractice insurance crisis spreads
across the nation, the president-elect of the American Medical Association warned Thursday. The crisis was underscored this week, when almost all surgeries at four West Virginia hospitals were canceled as a protest against high rates. While Dr. Donald Palmisano said he doubts that similar actions will become widespread across the country, the AMA chief said soaring insurance costs are reducing physician availability to patients. Click here for more. Free subscription required.
-Chicago Tribune, 1/3/02
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Local companies and workers are coping with bigger headaches as they struggle
with ever-increasing health insurance costs. A recent survey by Mercer Human Resource Consulting showed 8 percent of U.S. employers had lowered their 2003 budgeted salary increases to offset the additional expense associated with their health-care benefits; another 9 percent were considering the move. Most employees' salary increases will be dwarfed by the expected 10 percent to 20 percent health insurance increases anyway. Click here for more.
-Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1/2/03
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The National Institutes of Health would get only a small funding boost
under the Bush administration budget being prepared for next year, according to people familiar with the preliminary figures. President Bush is scheduled to unveil his budget for the 2004 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, on Feb. 3. The White House currently is planning to propose an NIH increase of less than 1 percent, and perhaps as little as 0.3 percent, say people familiar with the numbers. That would mark a sharp turnaround; Congress, which agreed to double the NIH budget between 1998 and 2003, has in recent years approved several annual increases of about 15 percent. The reduction being discussed by the administration partly reflects the deteriorating federal budget outlook and the keen competition for limited funds, as well as the recent big NIH increases. Still, the fact that the White House is suggesting growth of less than 1 percent for NIH comes as a surprise to many research advocates, who believe that much bigger increases are necessary to make the past years' investments pay off in biomedical advances. Click here for more.
-Wall Street Journal, 1/2/03 (subscription required)
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Almost all surgeries were canceled at four West Virginia hospitals beginning today
as more than two dozen surgeons began a protest of the high cost of malpractice insurance. In one hospital, 18 of the 19 orthopedic, cardiac and general surgeons are taking leave this week in protest. Today, at least one patient was transferred 90 miles to another hospital for surgery. A similar walkout was averted in Pennsylvania with a promise of a plan to trim rising insurance costs. Click here for more.
-AP/Washington Post, 1/2/03 (subscription required)
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Idaho business group lobbies for higher education.
Business groups in Idaho plan to do more than lobby against tax increases during the upcoming state legislative session. They will join many others in wondering how the state can steer clear of more program cuts in light of an estimated $160 million budget shortfall. The Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce's top priority is to "maintain essential education programs" and avoid further education budget cuts. Strong public school and higher-education programs are "a proven element in economic development," the Chamber Legislative Agenda says. "There are many similarities in the next legislative session to the Legislature in 1983, where education funding was a priority along with governmental efficiencies during that severe recession," Stark said. Maintaining education funding in 1983 factored into the economic recovery of the mid-1980s, he added. Click here for the full story.
--Idaho Business Review, 12/30/02
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A new national survey suggests that most Americans have serious misconceptions
about smallpox, including a belief that smallpox cases have occurred in the past 5 years and that smallpox is treatable.
Close to two-thirds of the respondents said they think smallpox vaccine should be made available to the public now. But 25 percent said vaccination would likely be fatal, and a large majority said they would not want to be vaccinated if they heard that their own doctor and many other doctors refused the shot.
Click here for the full story.
--CIDRAP News, 12/20/02
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The Bush administration won't appeal a court decision that threw out rules that required drug companies
to test in children adult medicines commonly given to kids. Instead, federal health officials announced Monday they will work to get Congress to write those child-testing rules into law this year. Congress could settle the long-simmering dispute much faster than a court fight, said Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Mark McClellan. The move does not mean the FDA is backing away from the so-called "pediatric rule," he stressed. "We want legislation that gives us the authority to require pediatric testing," McClellan said. "This is an important public health issue." Adult medications commonly are prescribed for children despite a lack of studies proving if the drugs work in youngsters, are safe for them -- and if so, what dose to use. Researching medications in children can be difficult because of ethical issues and because it's difficult to find enough sick children to test. Drug companies often have little incentive to do the work if they expect desperate doctors will use the medications anyway because they have no other option. In 1998, the FDA issued a regulation, known as the "pediatric rule," allowing the agency to require tests for those adult drugs used most often in children. Click here for more.
-AP, NY Times, 12/17/02
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Hospitals across the country are desperate for nurses like Tracey Rasmussen,
a 34-year-old mom with a warm, down-to-earth bedside manner and a 3.9 grade point average. ... But the problem isn't finding people who want to be nurses, it's getting them into nursing schools. Rasmussen was rejected twice from nursing school--one of thousands of qualified people turned away from the profession each year because nursing colleges lack space, faculty and funding. Click here for more. (free subscription required.)
-AP/NY Times, 12/16/02
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Infectious disease experts oppose smallpox shots for public
The 7,000-member Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has urged President Bush not to make smallpox vaccine available to the public for now, on grounds that serious reactions to it could undermine public confidence in the shots and in other immunizations as well.
"Due to the known risks associated with smallpox vaccinations, at the present time we urge that the national plan not include vaccination of the general public," IDSA President W. Michael Scheld, MD, told Bush in a Dec 3 letter.
Click here for the full story.
-- CIDRAP News, 12/11/02
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When Daniel Lowenstein was studying medicine at Harvard in the early 1980s, medical students were so closely involved
with hospital care that it wasn't uncommon for a patient to point to him and say, "That's my doctor." But now, says Lowenstein, who served until this month as Harvard Medical School's dean for medical education, medical students too often spend their days trotting along after a parade of residents and specialists, observing hospital care that is too fast-moving and sophisticated for them to play much of a role. "The clinical aspect of medical training is in a state of disarray," said Lowenstein, one of a crowd of medical educators who warn that medicine's traditional training grounds - hospitals and, to a lesser extent, clinics and doctors' offices - no longer teach medical students what they need to know to care for future patients. Click here for more.
-Boston Globe, 12/8/02
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U.S. companies saw an average increase in their workers' health-benefit costs this year of almost 15 percent
--significantly higher than they expected and the largest rise since 1990, according to a survey by Mercer Human Resource Consulting that will be released Monday. The jump in health-care costs was seven times the rate of inflation, another illustration of how a powerful resurgence in medical costs is fueling a cost crisis for employers, most of whom pay the bulk of their employees' health-care costs. Click here for more.
- Wall Street Journal, 12/9/02 (subscription required)
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The portion of doctors providing charity care is falling,
a sign of tight times that make it harder for the uninsured to get health care. Most doctors do some charity care but in most cases it represents a small fraction of their work. The portion spending more than 5 percent of their time with these patients is falling, however. "Physicians are under a lot of growing financial pressures," said Peter Cunningham, who wrote the report for the Center for Studying Health System Change, a health policy think tank that conducts the ongoing survey of doctors. "This may be making it more difficult to serve uninsured patients." Its survey found that in 2001, 71.5 percent of doctors provided free care. That's down from 76.3 percent in 1997. The results are similar to those found by the American Medical Association, which also saw a drop in charity care between 1994 and 1999 in a survey it conducted of doctors. The result is less care for people who can't afford it. Click here for more.
-AP/NY Times, 12/5/02
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Georgia does so little cancer research that more than 1,000 patients go out of state
every year for cutting-edge treatment. A major state-funded effort aims to reduce the exodus by acquiring a federal cancer center in Atlanta. But success is at least three years away and not guaranteed. Competition with other states and in-state rivalries could get in the way, and a previous attempt at obtaining a federal center failed. The goal is for Emory University's Winship Cancer Institute to become a "comprehensive cancer center" of the National Cancer Institute, an arm of the Health and Human Services Department. It is partly a symbolic designation, a government seal of approval that says studies of experimental cancer therapies are top-notch. But it also would bring nearly $1 million a year for research equipment, cancer nurses and computer databases, and those resources would act as a catalyst to generate much more federal and private foundation money, backers say. Most importantly for patients, NCI status would mean more clinical trials of promising cancer treatments. Click here for more.
- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 12/3/02
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Despite a nursing shortage that has health care providers desperate for workers,
Wisconsin's technical colleges are faltering in meeting the demand of thousands of students trying to enter the profession. Inadequate classroom space and insufficient numbers of teachers have forced several colleges to establish waiting lists that are idling students--in some cases for two to three years--before letting them into the classroom. The situation threatens to aggravate a statewide nursing shortage that already has some Wisconsin hospitals taking drastic action to recruit nurses--with some hospitals hiring nurses from India to fill shortages. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, 11/26/02
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Edwin Vides was a doctor in his native Colombia. Next year he will become a registered nurse,
helping to ease the nursing shortage in South Florida. Vides, 30, practiced in Yopal,a city of 90,000 in the shadow of the Andes, before political turmoil and guerrilla activity drove him to Miami in 2000. He is among 40 foreign physicians -- chosen out of 500 applicants from Cuba, Haiti, Romania, Central America, the Caribbean and Africa -- accepted into the first accelerated physician-to-nursing program in the nation at Florida International University School of Nursing. Click here for more.
- South Florida Sun-Sentinel
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When Chris Synodis of Olympia, Wash., was diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer, doctors
told him he had eight weeks to live. That was 2 1/2 years ago. What happened? Faced with the bleak diagnosis, Mr. Synodis, 55, contacted CanHelp, a medical search service. For a $400 fee, CanHelp produced a detailed report listing alternative treatments, including a German oncologist whom Mr. Synodis credits with extending his life. Medical-search services are a little-known but powerful tool to help patients find the latest information about their disease. For between $195 and $550, they will research any health problem and provide customers with a detailed report listing standard and cutting-edge treatments, medical experts, clinical trials and alternative therapies. It is the kind of information most patients would expect to get from their doctors. But at a time when medical research is moving at an unrelenting clip -- with thousands of clinical trials under way all over the world -- even the best doctors don't always have the time or resources to keep up with every promising new treatment. And while all of the information provided by the services is available on the Internet or in medical databases, finding the time to wade through it can be tough for someone battling a serious illness. A professional search service can weed out irrelevant information and offer a focused look at the latest research on a particular disease. Click here for more.
- Wall Street Journal, 11/26/02
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Important drugs, devices, procedures and operations to treat heart disease are widely available,
and American specialty groups have issued guidelines that generally agree on their best use. So, ideally, heart patients should receive the same optimal therapy wherever they are treated. In reality, they do not. Findings from a small number of studies reported at a meeting of the American Heart Association here last week highlighted a gap between what guidelines call for in preventing and treating particular heart conditions and what doctors actually prescribe for them. Differences in how often doctors apply guidelines for heart disease, which is the nation's leading cause of death, have exposed serious flaws in health care. The reasons cited for the gap are many and complex. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 11/26/02
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Some insurance companies are trying a new tactic to drive down health-care costs, using tiered medical coverage
to steer patients from high-priced hospitals and doctors to less expensive ones. The new plans establish price categories for hospitals and doctors in the same way that many plans now are "tiering" prescription drugs, requiring patients to pay more themselves for the costlier alternatives. The rationale is the same: If some of the money comes from their own pockets, patients will opt for cheaper services. Consumer advocates and hospital executives fear the plans will force people to make medical decisions based on cost rather than quality. The insurers say the wide differences in prices for similar services aren't always justified. Hospital prices, in particular, can vary by thousands of dollars in the same city. Click here for more.
-AP/Boston Globe, 11/24/02
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The nation is facing a shortage of doctors, nurses, and other health professionals trained to care for aging Americans,
a problem that is likely to worsen as the baby boomers reach old age, according to a report being released tomorrow. Already, many health problems of older Americans are misdiagnosed, overlooked, or dismissed as normal aspects of aging, exacerbating illness and driving up the nation's medical bills, according to the report by the Gerontological Society of America, which is meeting in Boston. While there is one pediatrician for every 1,000 American children, there is only one doctor trained in geriatrics for every 4,000 Americans over age 65. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 11/24/02
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Nancy Czarnecki was one of six women in Jefferson Medical College in 1961, when women were first admitted.
There were 151 men, and not all of them were happy with Jefferson's new policy. "You don't belong here," one male student told her. "You are taking the place of a man who needs to support his family." Czarnecki, now 62, recalls she responded that she, too, intended to work and support her family, but he wasn't convinced. Today, 45 percent of Jefferson's students are women. At many medical schools, they are in the majority. And, after many decades of being under-represented, African American and Hispanic students are more numerous than ever. Together, women and minorities are changing the face of American medicine. The new doctors now entering the nation's hospitals and clinics are bringing with them an appreciation of different kinds of patients and different kinds of treatments. Click here for more.
- Philadelphia Inquirer, 11/25/02
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Today's doctors-in-training have so much to learn about the sophisticated machines and equipment they use
to diagnose a patient that it can be easy to forget the more basic human skills also required for the job. To ensure its students don't overlook those simple visual cues, the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston partnered with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, to create a course in developing observation skills by studying works of art. Click here for more.
- Houston Chronicle, 11/21/02
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Attempting to influence rules on nurse staffing levels, representatives from two unions and hospital officials
Tuesday criticized proposed regulations of the California Department of Health Services... The department proposed initial staffing levels of one licensed nurse for every six patients on medical-surgical wards, where most patient care takes place. Within 12 to 18 months, that ratio would change to one nurse for every five patients. Staffing levels in pediatric wards would be 1:4, and 1:2 in labor and delivery wards. The regulations say that hospitals must comply with the ratios at all times or be subject to fines, or even closure. Click here for more.
- Contra Costa Times/San Jose Mercury News, 11/20/02
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After years of advances and retreats, Detroit's second-largest health system and lone medical school have agreed to form an alliance
for teaching and research. Henry Ford Health System and Wayne State University School of Medicine are expected to sign a contract today that will establish Henry Ford as a core academic affiliate of WSU.... The collaboration is expected to strengthen the region's reputation as a destination for medical training and research and help Henry Ford and the School of Medicine compete for crucial research dollars. Such distinctions are important to a region that depends on growing its own physicians, particularly at a time when health care services are under severe financial pressure, especially in urban areas. Click here for more.
- Detroit Free Press, 11/20/02
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USDA to deli meat producers: Test your plants for Listeria, or we will
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced yesterday that it will begin testing environmental surfaces for Listeria in processing plants that produce deli meats and hot dogs unless the plants do their own tests and share the results with the USDA. Elsa Murano, USDA's undersecretary for food safety, announced the testing plan at a "summit" meeting on Listeria monocytogenes yesterday in Washington, D.C. Until now, the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) has tested products at ready-to-eat meat and poultry plants but has not tested plants and equipment. In a Nov 6 speech, Murano said that approach had failed to prevent the listeriosis outbreak, which was linked with turkey deli meat. The outbreak led to a record-setting, 27 million?pound recall by Wampler Foods in Franconia, Pa., and a 200,000-pound recall by J. L. Foods Co. in Camden, N.J. Those two plants were reopened last week after the FSIS inspected and approved their operations.
--CIDRAP news, 11/19/02
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Decision on smallpox vaccinations expected soon, Osterholm says
Now that the federal government has some licensed smallpox vaccine in its stockpile, a presidential announcement on vaccination recommendations may be coming very soon, bioterrorism expert Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH, predicted last week.
"I believe that in the next days you'll be hearing from the president about this vaccine," Osterholm told healthcare workers at a meeting in Minneapolis. Click here for the full story.
--CIDRAP News, 11/18/02
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Even as escalating health care costs cut deeper into employer profits and worker paychecks, Oregon and the nation
appear increasingly unlikely to perform radical surgery to correct health care's ills.... In Oregon, voters overwhelmingly rejected a measure to create a single statewide health plan for all residents. The measure, which would have required at least $10 billion a year in taxes, failed by nearly a 4-1 ratio. And faced with a worsening budget shortfall, state lawmakers last week eliminated coverage of mental health and several other services for about 100,000 low-income residents covered by the Oregon Health Plan. Click here for more.
-The Oregonian, 11/17/02
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Malpractice insurance doubles for some.
Dr. John Kaelber, an obstetrician-gynecologist, has a clear medical license. No malpractice judgments or disciplinary actions appear on his record with the state of Florida. But his malpractice insurance doubled, from $20,000 in 2001 to $40,000 this year, he said. For January, judging by other doctors' experiences, he said the cost is likely to jump again, anywhere from 30 percent to 100 percent. Combined with low reimbursement from Medicaid and the normal difficulties of starting a solo practice, Kaelber and his wife have had enough. His patients recently got a letter that said Kaelber will stop seeing patients by early December. Click here for more.
-Lakeland (FL)Ledger, 11/18/02
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Health insurance is available for all full-time employees at Flightline Gainesville Inc., but signing up for the plan hasn't been too popular.
Single workers must pay $90 a month to obtain health coverage at Flightline, a management company that handles operations at Gainesville Regional Airport. Family plans for employees who want to include spouses and children are even pricier and can command a $350 monthly contribution. Flightline Gainesville bundles its health care bids with workers at the company's headquarters in Tallahassee in order to save money. But rates have still ballooned each year, said Bob Van Riper, vice president of flight services in Gainesville. "We only have a few people that take advantage of health insurance here," Van Riper said. "For the people making $8 an hour, $90 a month is lot of money to pay for health care. And if costs keep going up, you'll have a lot of people get to the point where they just can't afford it any more." Flightline's situation is typical for many small businesses today. As health care costs continue to rise - and as current economic conditions put a crimp on revenues and deplete earnings - small business owners are faced with some tough choices regarding workplace health plans. Click here for more.
-Gainesville Sun, 11/18/02
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HHS to study whether chronic wasting disease threatens humans.
Federal health officials have announced plans to expand research on whether chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk poses a threat to humans and other species.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is sponsoring two studies on the potential human health consequences of CWD and whether the disease can be transmitted to humans, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced last week. Click here for the full story.
--
CIDRAP News, 11/14/02
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The Utah Board of Regents raised student tuitions by 4.5 percent
Nov. 8 and set a proposed budget that is 12 percent above this year's, all in an atmosphere of pessimism about the prospects for improvement in Utah's sagging economy.
Funding for higher education has reached a crisis state, regents chairman Nolan Karras said. He crafted a message for the Utah Legislature and other top officials and was supported by the board: "If we don't pay attention now, we'll have a shambles of a system."
Possible alternatives are to re-prioritize state budgets to give more money to education or find other sources of revenue to keep higher education -- looked upon as the state's "economic engine" -- from going into a spiral, he said. Click here for full story.
-- The Deseret News11/09/02
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The state's (Texas) first examination of medical centers' performance shows smaller, rural hospitals in poorer health,
while bigger institutions in metropolitan areas may mean better care. Some of the highest mortality rates were found at smaller, community hospitals, according to the state-mandated Indicators of Inpatient Care report, released last month by the Texas Health Care Information Council. ... The state's strongest advocate for hospitals, the Texas Hospital Association, cautioned that the data, based on 2000 billing records, don't yet constitute a trend. At least one independent expert on health care in Texas called the report card "a very rudimentary measure but a step in the right direction." Click here for more.
-AP/Houston Chronicle, 11/6/02
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A tuition increase at Arizona's three public universities is unavoidable
for the 2003-2004 school year, education officials say. The Arizona Board of Regents and the presidents of Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University and the University of Arizona have been working on a plan to define each school's mission and the tuition increase is an integral part of it, officials say. NAU President John Haeger said universities must work closely with the state to make sure the Legislature understands the importance of finding ways to continue and improve funding.
"We know the state is in economic trouble right now, but the cost of not funding higher education would be much higher because of lost wage earning power by state citizens in the future," Haeger said.
--Associated Press, 11-02-02
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Universal health care, a largely quiescent notion since Hillary Clinton's failed efforts on its behalf nearly a decade ago, has re-emerged
in Oregon as the hottest measure on next week's ballot. To understand why, one need only ask Jane Moodie. The homemaker can't afford $160 a month to piggyback on her husband's health-insurance policy, and she thinks insurers' profits are "obscene." So three nights a week, she works at a phone bank here, calling on voters to back a ballot initiative that would make Oregon the first state to scrap the current system that mixes private insurance and government spending for health care. Under the initiative, called Measure 23, the state would become the sole payer of medical bills, which are expected to total about $20 billion a year by 2005, when the program would begin. The Oregon plan is audacious, covering everything from mastectomy and massage to prescription drugs and long-term care for all of the state's six million residents. Patients would be treated without charge by doctors and hospitals. A new bureaucracy funded largely by hefty taxes -- a new 3% to 11.5% payroll tax on employers, plus additional personal-income taxes of as much as 8% of income -- would pay the medical claims.
-Wall Street Journal, 10/29/02
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USDA approves irradiation of imported fruits and vegetables.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has finished writing rules that open the door to the irradiation of fruits and vegetables imported into the United States. Under the rules, published Oct 23 in the Federal Register, irradiation can be used to keep various fruit fly species and the mango seed weevil out of imported produce, the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) announced. Other methods are currently used to control those pests in imported produce. "This is not food safety irradiation, it's for plant pests," said APHIS spokesman Ed Curlett. Click here for full story.
--CIDRAP News, 10-28-02
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Pharmaceutical companies that pay for major testing of most new medicines give the participating university researchers little say
in how the studies and findings are handled, according to a survey of 108 medical schools to be published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine. "What the institutions have told us is they feel almost powerless in these contracts," said Dr. Kevin Schulman, a Duke University Medical Center professor who led the survey.... Among the study's findings:
- Researchers rarely were allowed a say in the design of the clinical trials, with only 10 percent of contracts covering how data is collected and monitored and only 5 percent covering how data is analyzed.
- Less than 1 percent of contracts guaranteed that results would be published and that an independent committee would have control over that.
- Only 1 percent of contracts required an independent board to monitor patient safety. Such boards can stop a study if the treatment is found to be harming participants.
Click here for more.
-AP/Chicago Tribune, 10/24/02
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Some doctors becoming more political
Cardiologist Richard Schott has turned his suburban office into a virtual campaign headquarters. In the waiting room, heart patients can read a brochure touting Democrat Sara Petrosky for the state House of Representatives, then watch a videotape of her giving a speech. A receptionist discusses how skyrocketing malpractice insurance premiums have damaged the region's health care system. And in the exam room, Dr. Schott talks up Petrosky's candidacy. The doctor-patient relationship has taken on a decidedly political tone this election season, as some physicians fed up with rising malpractice premiums and low reimbursement rates are breaking with tradition and telling patients how to vote Nov. 5. Click here for more.
-AP/NY Times 10/23/02
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Health costs are spiraling into another year of double-digit increases.
Patients, employers and government health programs are feeling the financial pain. But where is the money going? And why do health costs continue to rise when in so many other parts of the economy--from cars to clothes to computers--prices are falling and profit margins are being squeezed?... The pattern, in other words, is a classic one: the less competition, the higher the prices. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 10/23/02
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Young doctors had come and gone
like the rotation of crops in the fields surrounding this Eastern North Carolina community, so Dr. Art Apolinario had some suspicion to overcome when he arrived three years ago.... After putting in 12- and 14-hour days hustling between the hospital in Clinton, his brick clinic behind the Hardees in Newton Grove, and sickbeds up and down the highways of Sampson County, all that mattered was that Dr. Art, as everyone calls him, was as fine and dedicated a physician as anyone had ever seen. "He's just so caring and compassionate," said Patia McCullen, a patient and a member of Newton Grove's rural medical board, which helped recruit Apolinario, 32. McCullen wants him to stay forever. He says he's inclined to do just that. Apolinario's assimilation in Newton Grove is the kind of success that state health officials have increasingly achieved. They have tapped a combination of public and private funds to pay young doctors a portion of their medical school costs, in exchange for two to four years of service in rural areas. Click here for more.
- Raleigh News & Observer, 10/21/02
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For $4,000 a year, people can hire a Louisville (KY) primary care doctor
to provide an annual, five-hour physical, as many office visits as needed and 24-hour availability. The hardwood floors, spacious exam rooms and comfy robes are added perks. In Lexington, $40 a month gets you as many office visits as you need, a thorough physical and easy access to the doctor, though the office is smaller and there aren't any robes. The doctors running these practices have targeted different demographic groups, but their motivations are, at least in part, the same: They grew weary of managed care and decided to reduce their dependence on it. Click here for more.
- Lexington Herald-Leader, 10/21/02
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New Jersey universities to merge.
Gov. James E. McGreevey yesterday released details of his plan to merge Rutgers University with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and the New Jersey Institute of Technology, creating a statewide university system that would emphasize science and medical research.
Rutgers, after more than 175 years bearing the name of a Revolutionary war hero, would be combined with the other two colleges into one 65,000-student state university system, according to the plan. The University of New Jersey would be a single research university system that would encompass three universities: UNJ-North, based in Newark; UNJ-Central, based in New Brunswick; and Piscataway and UNJ-South, based in Camden and Stratford. The proposed system is similar to the University of California system. Each university would have its own president, but a chancellor overseeing the three schools would be responsible for hiring the presidents, writing budget requests, and approving new schools. McGreevey's proposal stems from a panel he convened in March to make UMDNJ stronger. P. Roy Vagelos, a member of Rutgers' Board of Governors and head of the panel, briefed Newark-area lawmakers about the plan Saturday. The plan must be approved by legislators. It is sure to meet resistance from those who fear giving up local control and from alumni who question what impact the change would have on the identity of their schools. Of the three schools, only UMDNJ officials have publicly raised concerns about merging the medical school with another university. But yesterday, the school issued a statement commending the governor for his "commitment to improve the overall quality of health education offered in New Jersey" and said it would be reviewing the commission's report. No one from the school would comment further, spokeswoman Susan Preston said.
-AP/Newark Star Ledger, 10/16/02
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No more A students at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
But that has nothing to do with the caliber of future doctors who are training there. The medical school has dropped its traditional letter grades and replaced them with a pass-fail system - a step that most other elite medical schools have taken. "This sort of ties in to a national trend and wave of trying to figure out how to assess very bright people and do so in a way that encourages them rather than discourages them," said Dr. David Nichols, vice dean for education at Hopkins. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 10/11/02
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One doctor-in-training missed signs of a possible heart attack on a patient's cardiogram.
...[one of the] problems on a recent overnight shift at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center were fixed quickly under a new policy that is unique in Boston. The hospital has put senior doctors back on the night shift, giving the residents who run the intensive-care units expert advice on the scene rather than a pager number to call for help. The move is expensive and some doctors are skeptical, but Beth Israel Deaconess is betting that it will improve care and even save lives. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 10/9/02
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University of Colorado Hospital, already under fire for cutting its services for the uninsured, this week began restricting access to its emergency room
and is poised to limit a common heart procedure for nonpaying patients referred from Denver Health Medical Center. University, which like Denver Health gets federal money to treat the uninsured, says it has come dangerously close to shutting down because of its number of nonpaying patients. Many of the uninsured come in through the emergency room because federal law prohibits the hospital from turning people away without a proper screening. So on Wednesday, administrators decided to satisfy that requirement by having a nurse practitioner perform screenings at the door. Patients, whether or not they are insured, are turned away if the nurse practitioner decides they do not have a real emergency. Click here for more.
- Denver Post, >/i>10/4/02
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Patients come and go, and there isn't much time to reflect on them later. But children with long-term illnesses need more
than a pill or bandage. So, local moms Marie Soza and Debbie Taliaferro set out to help doctors understand the daily challenges of raising chronically ill children. The two created Project Delivery of Chronic Care, a program in which residents make home visits and view the behind-the-scenes challenges and rewards of taking care of a child with a chronic illness such as cancer or muscular dystrophy. "So many times taking care of a sick child is such a traumatic experience," Taliaferro said. "This gets it turned to good because you're teaching doctors what they need." In four years, the program, also known as Project DOCC has expanded to the resident program at Christus Spohn Hospital Memorial and Bay Area Medical Center. Click here for more.
- Corpus Christi Caller-Times, 10/2/02
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Rural doctors squeezed ever tighter.
As West Virginia struggles to address medical malpractice insurance costs, Medicaid deficits and a lack of specialists, doctors in rural areas find themselves squeezed even tighter than their urban counterparts. Dr. Mary Marcuzzi, a Mabscott native who works at the Lincoln Primary Care Center in Hamlin, said several medical school classmates who planned to go into rural medicine have either left the state or are working in cities.... "Some people would rather default on their loans than open shop in rural areas," said Dr. Bob Walker, a professor at the Joan C. Edwards College of Medicine at Marshall University. Click here for more.
-AP/ Charleston Daily Mail, 9/30/02
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More money for nursing education.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson said Monday that he is asking Congress for additional money for nursing education, and he pledged to put his energy behind funding that the American Nurses Assn. says it needs to inject the profession with new blood. Thompson also announced the creation of the National Nurses Response Team, a nationwide mobilization similar in concept to the National Guard, to respond to bioterrorism or disease outbreaks. "In the coming years, projections are that there simply won't be enough [nurses] to meet the vital health needs of our citizens," he said at a news conference. "If those numbers continue, we're going to be faced with a potentially dangerous shortage of nurses within the next two decades." Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 10/1/02
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When (Rita) Lahey found out she was pregnant, at three months along, she spent a month calling obstetricians with no luck.
Nobody was taking anybody, she says. She only found prenatal care after she began to bleed and checked in at an emergency room. It's a story women and health care experts say is becoming more common in the Las Vegas Valley. Because of rising insurance premiums, doctors have quit delivering babies or taking new patients as a way to cut their costs.... The increased numbers of women coming to the public hospital for care is the first clear sign that financial aspect of the OB/GYN medical malpractice crisis, as yet unsolved, has morphed into a health crisis as well, doctors say. Click here for more.
- Las Vegas Sun, 9/27/02
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The rosy job outlook for nurses...underscores a severe shortage that has plagued the nation's hospitals in recent years
--and won't seem to go away.... Yet, at a time when patient needs are growing, enrollment at nursing schools has been gradually declining and young nurses are leaving the profession at far faster rates than their predecessors, reports Julie Sochalski, associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. "If new RNs are leaving the professions after only a few years, the shortage is likely to reach crisis proportions sooner rather than later," said Sochalski, who recently authored a far-reaching study on the current state of nursing. Click here for more.
- Chicago Tribune, 9/29/02
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When Samir Patel was doing his hospital residency as a new physician, he heard a chorus of complaints from primary care doctors
who felt visiting their hospitalized patients was costing them too much time -- and money. "I just got the sense that, if there was a way out of seeing those patients, they would take it," Patel said. So when he opened his practice two months ago, it was as a hospitalist, a relatively new breed of doctor who provides in-patient care in place of primary care physicians. Hospitalists don't substitute for specialists such as surgeons or obstetricians, but tend to the same kind of overall patient needs as a primary care doctor. The practice is one of the fastest growing trends in physician care. Click here for more.
-AP/ New York Times, 9/24/02
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In the morning, Florida Atlantic University heard how vitally important biomedical research is,
and Tuesday afternoon a new, $30 million building was dedicated to its pursuit. "This is a renaissance moment for the university," interim President Dr. Richard L. Osburn told about 150 people gathered in front of the new Charles E. Schmidt Biomedical Science Center. And Dr. Dwight Warren, chair of the school's biomedical science program, said the center would "help provide physicians for the future." The center was established with a $15 million gift from The Schmidt Family Foundation, established by the late Charles E. Schmidt, a longtime FAU benefactor, and matching grants from the state.... Students accepted by UM will study for two years at the Schmidt Center, pursue clinical studies another two years at a hospital and receive a medical degree from the University of Miami. Click here for more.
- Palm Beach Post, 9/18/02
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The University of Nevada Medical Center was forced to shut down the state's top trauma care facility
for 10 days when its staff of surgeons suddenly quit, citing soaring malpractice insurance premiums. It reopened only after the surgeons agreed to become temporary employees of Clark County, significantly lowering their exposure to medical liability awards. The Las Vegas episode is a dramatic example from a growing medical malpractice insurance crisis that is affecting many states, threatening to shrink the supply of doctors and make it harder on sick people needing treatment. Click here for more.
- Florida Times-Union, 9/16/02
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UCSF Medical Center has seen significant improvements in its financial picture, according to administrators,
who report a second year of steadily improved performance. For the fiscal year ending June 30, 2002, the medical center posted a $25 million gain, compared with a $17 million loss in 2001 that itself was an improvement from the previous year. The results, say UCSF Medical Center CEO Mark Laret, are heartening. But they also are tenuous, he says, as the medical center continues to face substantial financial challenges and navigate a precarious economic climate. "We're extremely pleased by the financial strides we've made during the last two years," says Laret. "The results have exceeded our expectations. They also are a reflection of the efforts by the staff, physicians and administrators to address weaknesses in our practices, while working extremely hard not only to maintain the quality of care, but to improve the experience that patients and their families have at the medical center." But the medical center still needs to improve financially, he says. "We must continue efforts to increase revenue and control costs to pay for new equipment, facilities and, ultimately, a new medical center. This is essential to enable our faculty and staff to provide the highest quality of patient care."
-AAMC Clinicalmail, 9/13/02
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Put off by its long hours, 10-year residency and drain on family time, fewer physicians are choosing a career in surgery.
A shortage of surgeons could result. In the first two months of his surgical training, Dr. Jason Williams has helped remove a gallbladder, excise tumors, repair hernias, save damaged limbs and patch up gunshot victims. With eight years of college and medical school behind him, Williams will spend about a decade under the tutelage of senior surgeons before he can practice on his own. Then, when he is pushing 40, he will launch a demanding career that could cost him some family dinners, Thanksgivings and birthday parties. What drives Williams, a resident in general surgery at the Johns Hopkins and Bayview hospitals, is the exhilaration of using his hands to heal sick patients. But his numbers are dwindling. Fewer medical students are choosing to become surgeons, opting instead for specialties that require less training, leave more time for family and pay just as well. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 9/13/02
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It could have been worse. That was how one Virginia Commonwealth University Health System board member felt
yesterday about the laundry list of recommendations from a consulting firm hired to help the health system, which operates MCV Hospitals, improve its financial performance. The 1,200-page report from The Hunter Group identifies financial adjustments of $130 million to be made by cutting expenses or improving revenue.... "It's some hard news to take, but we knew it was coming," said Dr. W. Baxter Perkinson Jr., a health-system board member, after the meeting yesterday. "I'm almost relieved it wasn't worse." Click here for more.
- Richmond Times-Dispatch, 9/13/02
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Officials at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center say they are growing impatient with the federal government's refusal
to commit money to treat military veterans at a new combined hospital in Aurora. Dennis C. Brimhall, president of the health sciences center, said the university must have a funding commitment by the time a new 12-story hospital tower is finished at the former Fitzsimons Army Medical Center in Aurora in December 2003. If the Department of Veterans Affairs can't commit to its six floors, CU simply will move more of its Denver facilities into the space, Brimhall said. The project would be unique for the VA, which operates its network of more than 150 hospitals in buildings that are solely for veterans. Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 9/10/02
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Nurses protest locator devices.
About two dozen nurses at Castro Valley's Eden Medical Center--who were required to wear personal locator devices as part of a program to provide more efficient care to patients--turned in their electronic badges Thursday afternoon to protest the new system. The system, which allows clerks and administrators to locate a nurse or supervisor anywhere at any time, has raised concerns over invasion of privacy and the potential for managers to use the system for disciplinary action. Nurses also charge that supervisors can use the devices--which resemble a miniature computer mouse--to listen in on conversations. Click here for more.
- San Jose Mercury News, 9/6/02
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Denver hospitals invest in medical-records technology.
Many area hospitals are implementing new technologies that can minimize mistakes, lower costs and give patients easier access to their medical records. From a program that will put all patient records online to one that could eventually eliminate the need for X-ray film, the move is a break from the norm for hospitals, which have been slow to adopt new technologies. "Most of their revenue traditionally has been focused on providing care and hiring more physicians," explained health-care expert Craig Dahl. "As a hospital, am I going to spend more money on adding a physician or putting in a new IT system? In the past, it's pretty much been a slam-dunk for physicians." Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 9/8/02
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Rio Grande Valley hospitals that spend thousands of dollars recruiting nurses across the globe are turning to a homegrown solution
to the crippling nursing shortage. The eight largest Valley hospitals have teamed up with two colleges and a state technical school, agreeing to hire local nursing and health-related students for $7 an hour for part-time jobs as they continue their studies. "Last year, our hospital sent a recruiting team to the Philippines twice, to Canada twice, to South Africa and England to try and recruit nurses," said Charles Sexton, chief executive officer of Valley Regional Medical Center in Brownsville. After returning from one of the recruiting trips, Sexton read about the Valley's high unemployment rate in the local newspaper. "It didn't make any sense to me that we spent all this money to recruit worldwide when we had people in our back yard who could be trained and go fill these jobs," he said. Click here for more.
- Houston Chronicle, 9/3/02
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The number of foreign medical school graduates seeking training in the United States has plummeted
since the start of an expensive new test that requires them to demonstrate skills in English, a study has found. The number of foreign graduates taking the examination, required of applicants for residencies and fellowships, fell by more than half from 1997 to last year, to 16,828 from 36,231, the study said. The decline coincided with a requirement instituted in 1998 that the foreign applicants pass a clinical skills assessment, in which they have to communicate with fake patients in English and are scored on the encounters. The authors of the study suggested that foreign students might be dissuaded by the prospect of having their English evaluated. The authors also cited the $1,200 cost of the test and the expense of traveling to Philadelphia, the sole examination site. The president of the American College of International Physicians, Dr. Alex Yadao, said the examination and other required tests, as well as the travel expenses, could total thousands of dollars. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 9/4/02
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Almost one-quarter of US physicians say they have limited or will restrict the number of Medicare patients they treat
because of reduced reimbursement cuts, according to an American Medical Association survey. Medicare, the US government health insurance program for the elderly and disabled, cut physician payments 5.4 percent this year. The 280,000-member AMA is lobbying Congress to overhaul Medicare's payment formula and avoid more reductions.... "If Congress fails to act soon, physicians face an additional 12 percent cut over three years," Richard F. Corlin, the AMA's former president, said in a statement.
-Boston Globe, 9/4/02
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Hospital volunteers more valuable then ever.
Last month, Eddie Davis worked 213 hours at Howard County General Hospital -- that's about seven hours a day, every day -- and he didn't get paid a dime. He filed documents, consoled emergency room patients and punched away at a computer keyboard, but his only compensation came in the form of a big "thank you," which Davis says is payment enough. Davis is a hospital volunteer, one of 458 at Howard County General who, in fiscal year 2002, donated nearly 33,000 hours of work and saved the hospital $492,956 -- what it would have cost to pay them for their labor. Volunteers have always been a big part of hospital operations, but with a third of the nation's hospitals running in the red and with increasing worker shortages at medical centers across the country, unpaid helpers are becoming more integral. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 8/28/02
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Tufts-New England Medical Center to withdraw from network.
Tufts-New England Medical Center, one of hundreds of U.S. teaching hospitals that merged during the 1990s to gain market power, will withdraw from the Rhode Island-based Lifespan hospital and physicians network. The health care industry, Tufts-NEMC executives said yesterday, turned out far differently than they predicted. The Boston medical center joined Lifespan in 1997, when executives believed New England health care would evolve rapidly from a local business into a regional one, with large multistate hospital networks controlling hundreds of thousands of patients, wielding considerable market clout, and negotiating better rates with health insurance companies. But that evolution never happened, said Tufts-NEMC chief executive Dr. Thomas O'Donnell Jr. Click here for more.
-Boston Globe, 8/29/02
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Terrorism fears inhibit hiring of Middle East doctors.
Fear of terrorism is making it harder for some rural communities in the United States to recruit physicians from the Middle East. Small towns throughout the country are dependent on foreign doctors to staff their hospitals and clinics. Those physicians work in the United States under temporary work permits or become permanent residents. After the events of Sept. 11, however, the federal government delayed or stopped issuing such visas to applicants from 26 countries. Click here for more.
- The Tennessean, 8/29/02
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Senator makes push for universal health insurance.
Concerned that millions of workers are losing their health insurance coverage at a time when health costs are surging, employers and Congressional leaders say the next great health care debate will be over how to help the uninsured. Senator John B. Breaux of Louisiana, an influential moderate Democrat, and leaders of the nation's largest pension plans are trying to drum up support for universal health insurance, a proposal that has received little attention, except from labor unions and liberals, since the collapse of the Clintons' health plan. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 8/27/02
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As Baby Boomers age, nursing shortage will climb.
There are about 125,000 vacant nursing positions in the United States. As Baby Boomers age, that number is expected to climb to 400,000, according to a report released by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. Inadequate nurse staffing has been a factor in 24 percent of the 1,609 cases involving death, injury or permanent loss of function reported to the commission since 1997. The nation's acute nursing shortage is becoming a greater problem, but David Owens has a simple solution: More men need to become nurses, as he did. Click here for more.
- Palm Beach Post, 8/26/02
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Poll: 'Radical reform' of healthcare system wanted.
Sentiment for "radical reform" of the U.S. health care system is growing, a new poll suggests. A new Harris poll finds that doctors soured on health care beginning in 1999 and have remained less satisfied than they have been in the past. Harris believes doctors' negative views reflect lingering anger about managed care. Doctors' sentiments are more negative now than at any time between 1984 and 1997, Harris noted. Click here for more.
- Rueters Health/Yahoo!, 8/23/02
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Drs. John Varga and Mark Wheeler want to return to the days when physicians had plenty of time to spend with patients,
made house calls and didn't have to do battle with HMOs over what care they could provide. So they're setting up a practice that will treat only one tenth of the several thousand patients that each has been treating. Patients will get exhaustive physicals, 24-hour access, same-day appointments and, in general, tender loving care. If they can afford it, that is. Their new St. Matthews practice, OneMD, charges patients an annual fee of $4,000, or $6,000 a couple. The fee covers treatment from the doctors in the practice, but outside tests or specialist treatment would cost more. It is the first example in the Louisville area of "concierge medicine," a relatively new phenomenon that has sprung up in reaction to the hassles of the managed-care era. The practice, also called "boutique medicine," is fairly rare. But it has popped up in enough places to raise legal and ethical concerns, especially involving Medicare patients. Click here for more.
- Louisville Courier-Journal, 8/22/02
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Our fear is fueled by the fact that the virus is new here and not well understood.
But experts say the risk of dying from West Nile is small compared to death by lightning strike, cancer or even drowning in a bathtub.... Public health officials and risk analysts have a message for the paranoid: Chill out. "You're more likely to get sick and die from contracting the flu than from the West Nile virus," said Bernadette Burden, a spokeswoman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
Click here for more.
- St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 8/22/02
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Radiologic tech shortages unprecedented.
Technology advancements, long hours, and an undeserved bad image are among the reasons for the shortage of technologists in the radiology field, says Mark Wilcox of Thomas Memorial Hospital. The unprecedented shortage of radiologic technologists throughout the nation and the state is bringing about unprecedented change in the field of X-rays and medical imaging services, said Wilcox, radiologic technologist and director of imaging services at Thomas. By 2010, studies from the U.S. Bureau of Labor predict the country will need 75,000 more radiologic technologists than it did in 2000. Click here for more.
- Charleston Gazette, 8/20/02
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The business of higher education is on a decided upswing in one metropolitan area:
The four universities with the most research-related funding pumped $76.9 million into the Triad economy last year, recently released figures show. The numbers, based on the fiscal year that ended June 30, represent a 55.3 percent increase from the $49.5 million that UNC-Greensboro, N.C., A&T State University, Wake Forest University and Winston-Salem State University brought in five years ago. Separately, Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center brought in an additional $132 million in research dollars for the year that ended June 30, 2001, the most recent period for which figures were available. That is an 88 percent increase over the $70.2 million it raised five years earlier. And those figures do not take into account things like Wake Forest's role in expanding the Piedmont Triad Research Park in Winston-Salem, a multiyear, multimillion-project that was announced this week. Universities say the increase in research-related dollars over the past five years represents an effort to reinvent themselves, because communities have increasingly come to rely on them as drivers for the local economy. Click here for more.
- Greensboro/Winston-Salem Business Journal, 8/16/02
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North Carolina foundation invests in biotechnology.
The N.C. foundation created by the national tobacco settlement announced Wednesday it will invest $85 million into an economic stimulus package devoted to bringing as many as 25,000 new biotechnology jobs to the state. State leaders hope the Golden LEAF Foundation investment, which could approach $200 million by 2008, will help with the group's goal of replacing tobacco as one of the primary economic drivers in Eastern North Carolina and prevent the state from suffering economic slumps like the current one. Click here for more.
- Charlotte Observer, 8/15/02
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At 49, Debra Munro isn't a typical medical student.
She has a doctorate in international relations and has run a successful research firm. In another way, though, she's quite typical of the 100 first-year students who started Monday at the University of South Florida College of Medicine. She's one of 57 women in USF's first female-majority medical class. "Having more women in med school is one more barrier that has been breached," said Munro, who began thinking about changing careers after aneurysms claimed the lives of her mother in 1988 and her father in 1996. "I'm also the oldest student USF has accepted into med school," she added.... By 2010, women are expected to make up 30 percent of physicians and 50 percent or more of medical students, according to the American Medical Women's Association, an advocacy group. Click here for more.
-- Tampa Tribune, 8/14/02
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For years, medical researchers were largely immune from lawsuits.
While other doctors faced a wave of malpractice suits, researchers seeking cures for diseases such as cancer found patients eager to participate in experiments and unlikely to hire a lawyer if something went wrong. But the death of Jesse Gelsinger in 1999 changed all that. The healthy teenager died of massive organ failure in a gene therapy experiment gone awry. His family won a multimillion-dollar settlement in 2000, opening the door to other suits by focusing national attention on the flawed protections for study participants. While the total number of suits remains small, involving only a few dozen of the hundreds of thousands of people who participate in medical experiments in the United States each year, their existence is sending shivers through the research community. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 8/12/02
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Nursing shortages contributes to deaths and injuries.
Inadequate nurse staffing contributes to nearly a quarter of hospital incidents that kill or injure patients, the national group that accredits hospitals says in a report being released today. The group called on the federal government and the health-care industry to act more aggressively on the growing shortage of registered nurses. The report suggests that the shortage of nurses is a factor in tens of thousands of deaths annually from causes ranging from medication errors to patient falls and hospital-acquired infections. Nationally, 98,000 deaths a year have been blamed on medical errors, and one in 10 nursing jobs is currently empty. "There's a problem out there," said Dr. Dennis O'Leary, president of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. "We knew other people were going to gulp and say, `That's really high.'" Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 8/7/02
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Minority medical school enrollments dropping.
When Bryan Fisher enrolled in the University of Wisconsin Medical School, he quickly noticed he was one of a small number of black students. And while the school has offered him a generally welcoming atmosphere, not to mention a hectic academic schedule, Fisher said it would be nice to see a few more minority faces in the crowd. "It was kind of a shock to go in and see there were so few," said Fisher, 24, now a second-year medical student. "I can't say what's happening." Since the mid-1990s, the number of African-American, Hispanic and American Indian students enrolled at the UW Medical School has been falling, and, in the case of black students, falling dramatically. Medical schools across the country, particularly public ones, are seeing similar declines. According to the registrar's office, in fall 1992, the UW Medical School had 23 African-American students. In the fall of 1995, it had 41. But by fall 2001, the number had dropped to 13. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/5/02
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Technology improves care but is costly.
There is little argument that advanced information technology can improve clinical care for patients and create efficiencies for health organizations. The cost of information technology, however, is a barrier. Installing and implementing information systems can cost millions of dollars. Eighty-five percent of 365 medical groups and 60 clinics in California say IT systems are too expensive, according to the California Health Care Foundation. And of those surveyed in 2001, 26 percent say there is a lack of reliable software products that meet their needs. The Oakland-based foundation funds research on trends in the state's health care system. But one Bay Area medical group is on the path to achieve its IT goals at a fraction of the cost. Its first step: making information systems a priority. Click here for more.
- East Bay Business Times, 8/6/02 (subscription required)
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Ten years ago the Portland region had an oversupply of hospital beds,
and the conventional wisdom was that the managed-care era would translate into a need for even fewer beds. But that conventional wisdom was wrong, said Rick Cagen, chief executive for Providence's Portland service area. "That decrease never really materialized," he said. And now that baby boomers are moving into the age group that uses more inpatient services, local health systems have gone into expansion mode. Click here for more.
- Business Journal of Portland, 8/5/02 (subscription required)
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This year, an estimated 20 million Americans will take part in more than 41,000 clinical
trials and uncounted more federally funded experiments. And even though few would argue the necessity of these life-and-death tests, the process of human experimentation is coming under a microscope. With billions of dollars swelling the coffers of medical research, a spate of tragic deaths has revealed cracks in regulatory safeguards and raised concerns that scientists in a rush to discover new treatments may not be doing enough to ensure safety. Click here for more.
- San Francisco Chronicle, 8/4/02
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A small but growing number of doctors are reviving the house call
to help pay the bills. Nobody knows exactly how many doctors are doing it, but the number of home visits that Medicare paid for shot up almost eight-fold to 1.5 million in 2001 from 195,700 in 1996, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. "Interest is picking up," says Peter Boling, professor of geriatrics at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, in Richmond. In pockets from San Diego to Detroit, he says, doctors are making thousands of home visits each month. The national caseload is potentially enormous: At least two million Americans are chronically ill and homebound, Dr. Boling estimates. Click here for more.
- Wall Street Journal, 8/2/02
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Acting Massachusetts Gov. Jane Swift urged the state's three largest drugstore chains to reconsider their decision to withdraw from its Medicaid program.
CVS, Walgreens and Brooks Pharmacy have announced plans to stop filling Medicaid prescriptions, meaning poor and disabled people could soon be shut out of more than half the state's pharmacies.... The chains said they will withdraw from the assistance program because of state budget cuts signed into law Monday that reduce reimbursement rates for Medicaid prescriptions by 11 percent. Click here for more.
-AP/ New York Times, 8/1/02
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UC Irvine Medical Center officials today will begin referring some poor patients to 24 other Orange County hospitals,
saying the center can no longer provide the bulk of medical care for the indigent. Under the new policy announced Wednesday by its chief executive officer, Dr. Ralph Cygen, the medical center in Orange will turn away poor patients who do not live within five miles of the hospital or two miles of its satellite clinics in Anaheim and Santa Ana. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 8/1/02
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Increasingly, employers are rolling out consumer-directed health plans,
hoping to rein in their workers' health-care spending. The new plans revolve around health-spending accounts offered by employers to their workers. There are variations on these plans but, in general, employers allocate workers an annual "allowance" -- for example, $2,500 for a family -- to spend on medical expenses. Employees can draw from this account to pay for the usual office visits, diagnostic tests and prescriptions. But they can also use this money to buy services not covered under traditional managed-care plans, such as laser eye surgery. Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 7/28/02
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Texas needs to graduate more physicians, but a report approved Thursday
by the Higher Education Coordinating Board doesn't tell lawmakers how to do it or choose between El Paso and South Texas as a location for a new medical school. El Paso community leaders are satisfied that the 18-member board declared a need for additional doctors. "It's a step forward. The coordinating board has never said that before - that there needs to be additional physicians, or that there needs to be additional medical schools. How you get there? The mechanism is up for debate," said Dr. Jose Manual de la Rosa, regional dean of the Texas Tech Medical Center in El Paso. Click here for more.
- El Paso Times, 7/19/02
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A growing body of research is leading many medical experts to ask whether more is really better when it comes to health care.
Some medical specialties and geographical areas are suffering from a glut of doctors and hospitals, these experts say. Supply seems to drive demand. More hospitals in an area mean many more days spent in hospitals with no discernible improvements in health. More medical specialists mean many more specialist visits and procedures. "If there are twice as many physicians, patients will come in for twice as many visits," said Dr. John E. Wennberg of Dartmouth Medical School, where much of the new work is being done. The Dartmouth researchers acknowledge that their findings are unexpected, and some experts say more work is needed to sort out cause from effect. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 7/21/02
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Severe financial problems make it unlikely that Texas lawmakers will approve a new medical school,
state budget writers said Wednesday, even though the Higher Education Coordinating Board is expected to make such a recommendation today. El Paso is considered one of two prime locations for the state's ninth medical school, according to a coordinating board staff report, which says Texas needs another school to keep pace with population growth. The state's latest medical school was founded 25 years ago. But a projected $5 billion state budget shortfall will make it difficult simply to preserve existing programs and services, some members of the Senate Finance and House Appropriations committees said. Adding new projects might be out of the question. Click here for more.
- El Paso Times, 7/18/02
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The Emma Eccles Jones Foundation has donated $1 million to the University of Utah to support a nursing research center.
...There is a growing demand in Utah for nursing faculty, nurse educators and advanced-practice nurses, said Maureen R. Keefe, dean of the college and Louis H. Peery Presidential Endowed Chair professor. Utah currently is third in the nation in the severity of its nurse shortage, said Keefe. "Each year, a large pool of well-qualified prospective students applies to nursing programs throughout the state, but inadequate numbers of nursing faculty limit our ability to prepare more nurses to respond to this critical shortage in health-care providers." Click here for more.
- Salt Lake Deseret News, 7/16/02
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Rather than navigate a telephone system, some patients of Dr. Vincent Wilson jump on the Internet and shoot an e-mail
to his Maitland office. Through a free online service known as MDhub, patients can request an appointment, seek a physician referral, or inquire about a lab result. "It cuts down on the volume of incoming calls, so it frees up my staff," said Wilson, whose office has fielded 1,800 electronic requests during the past year. "It's a whole lot easier and cost effective." An estimated 130 physicians in Central Florida -- and more than 11,000 doctors nationwide -- regularly use MDhub, one of the few online patient-to-doctor services to gain some semblance of acceptance from the medical community. Click here for more.
- Orlando Sentinel, 7/15/02
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When Joann Shea started her career as a nurse, a 400-pound patient might come into her hospital once a year.
Now, 20 years later, Shea is the director of employee health and wellness at Tampa General Hospital. She says people weighing that much and more are admitted to the hospital every day. Although TGH has one of the larger surgical weight-loss facilities in the area--which helps explain the startling increase in obese patients--a similar phenomenon is occurring at hospitals throughout the United States. The fattening of America is forcing hospitals to change their practices, in ways both large and small. TGH recently hired a six-man "lift team" to help transport and turn large patients safely. Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg is using bigger operating room tables and floor lifts. Community Hospital in New Port Richey has armless chairs in some waiting rooms so obese patients can sit more comfortably. Click here for more.
- St. Petersburg Times, 7/15/02
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Marc Libman, a medical student at the University of Rochester, is skeptical of natural medicine.
But he'll spend the next month studying it at Bastyr University in Kenmore because he feels he needs to understand it. "I want my patients to feel comfortable talking to me about it," he said. Libman is among 15 students from conventional medical schools who arrived at Bastyr last week for Complementary and Alternative Medicine camp. The program is the first major effort in the nation by a natural-health university to teach doctors about a kind of natural healing that is increasingly popular among patients but little accepted or understood in mainstream medicine. Doctors of natural medicine at Bastyr, a four-year university that has helped pioneer the study of natural healing for 20 years, say they hope, for the sake of patients, that it's a step toward opening communication between holistic and conventional medical providers. Click here for more.
- Seattle Times, 7/14/02
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By October, every patient admitted to St. Lucie Medical Center will have a bar code on his or her armband.
The Port St. Lucie (Florida) hospital started testing a technology last week that is expected to reduce medication errors by ensuring that every patient receives the right drug at the right time, said Ginger King, spokeswoman for St. Lucie Medical Center. With the Electronic Medication Administration Record technology, nurses use scanners and computers to pick up information from bar codes on the patient's armband and the drug bottle. If it's the wrong medication, the system beeps. "Medication is the biggest issue," King said. "Patients come first, and all hospitals have to work on medication error." The patient's EMAR also is displayed on the computer screen. The system contains the patient's pharmaceutical history and updates it automatically.
-Palm Beach Post, 7/15/02
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A new $4.55 million program by the University System of Georgia and hospitals throughout the state aims to curb the shortage of nurses and other medical workers
by promising jobs to people who enroll in education programs that are expanding. The Health Professionals Initiative, announced Wednesday, involves 13 colleges and more than 20 hospitals, which plan to train and hire 510 new workers over the next two years. Of those, 474 will be nurses, 22 will be pharmacists and 14 will be medical technologists. The state is committing $2.1 million to the colleges, and the hospitals are contributing an estimated $2.45 million. Some of the hospitals are offering scholarships, and loans of up to $10,000 a year are available, said University System spokeswoman Arlethia Perry-Johnson. Click here for more.
- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 7/11/02
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Residents in the Northeast spend more on personal health care than those in Western states
like Utah, Idaho and Arizona, the government says, due to higher incomes and greater costs in cities. Per capita health spending was 15 percent higher in Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island than in the rest of the country in 1998, according to the survey by the Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. "Urban areas in general tend to be higher-priced than rural areas," said Anne Martin, one of the report's authors. "There's also more concentration of population that can support teaching hospitals and other specialized facilities that can cost more." Click here for more.
- New York Times, 7/9/02
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The medical establishment has raised warning flags about the dangers of patients using the Internet for self-diagnosis
and self-medication. The sheer volume of information can be overwhelming and the advice on some Web sites incomplete or misleading. But the growing popularity of e-health has forced hospitals and doctors to join the trend with their own consumer Web sites. On a given day, 6 million people surf the Internet to get tips about nutrition, exercise or weight control, or the side-effects of a drug, or any of a thousand other health matters, according to a recent Pew Internet Project survey. That's more than twice as many people as visit their doctors on any day. And the "doc in the box" makes house calls day or night. Click here for more.
- Cleveland Plain Dealer, 7/8/02
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This little town is lucky.
When Dr. K. Krishnamoorthi arrived in a Central Valley farm town last year, he became the first full-time doctor in a decade at its worn brick clinic. Now, walk-ins are welcome. Krishnamoorthi gamely explains every ailment from toenail fungus to heart disease in his South Indian lilt, and even telephones patients at night to check on their progress. For many agricultural workers with no access to transportation, the proximity of a physician is a vital necessity. The baby-faced Krishnamoorthi is part of a federal program that has addressed a critical shortage of medical care across rural America. Thanks to visa waivers sponsored by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than 3,000 foreign doctors have been assigned since 1994 to small towns. But the program that brought Krishnamoorthi to this town has fallen victim to the war on terrorism. Citing post-Sept. 11 security jitters, the department announced earlier this year that it would no longer sponsor the visa waivers. The decision has caused panic among rural health advocates, who have come to depend on foreign medical graduates to hold together the country's fragile rural health system. In some areas, the foreigners make up more than 40% of all doctors. In California, the program has supplied towns with 232 doctors. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 7/7/02
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When his elderly father fell on a snowy driveway last winter and had trouble getting up, William L'Hommedieu started to think about nursing homes.
But he decided that his father could remain in his own home in Pleasant Valley, Mo., after a geriatric nurse made a detailed home evaluation and suggested a few modifications. He added a bathroom shower, for example, and an emergency call button. The home assessment--which helped give his father a new lease on living independently and provided some peace of mind for his family--was arranged and paid for by the United Automobile Workers union and the Ford Motor Company, Mr. L'Hommedieu's employer. It is part of a new class of corporate benefits being offered to some of the nation's 15 million or so workers who provide care for the elderly. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 7/7/02
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They arrive by the thousands from distant places each year, hoping that Boston's world-renowned hospitals will heal their livers,
mend their hearts, send their cancers into remission. Their surgeries - often paid for out-of-pocket and, unlike those of most domestic patients, at full price - boosted hospital budgets and the local economy as their relatives slept in hotel rooms, ate in restaurants, and shopped at boutiques. But following Sept. 11 and with new visa restrictions in place, the number of international patients at Boston hospitals has dropped dramatically. Sweeping new antiterrorism background checks have stretched the time it takes sick foreign patients to get a visa, from a day or two to weeks or even months. And now, Congress is hearing debate on a new Immigration and Naturalization Service rule that would shorten tourist visas from six months to as little as 30 days. Under the rule, expected to be finalized after the current public comment period, INS officials will have the discretion to grant more time if a visa holder can demonstrate the need.
Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 7/7/02
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Doctors are finding it's no longer enough to have an M.D. after their names.
After a decade of watching health care become ever more of a business and griping that bean counters were taking over, physicians are embracing the enemy: They're becoming MBAs. Some are in graduate school for practical reasons; others are idealistic, hoping to change what they say is a health system spiraling out of control. "The level of cynicism doctors have is enormous," says Paul Franke, 40, a student in an MBA program at Johns Hopkins that is geared specifically for physicians. "There's a negative feeling that legislators, trial lawyers, insurance carriers, they're all out to get us. I would like to take a leadership role and maybe make some changes." Click here for more.
-- USA Today, 7/5/02
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Four years ago, the new cancer research building at UC Davis Medical Center was nearly empty. Today, it is teeming with scientists and discovery
, all part of a new era for the university's cancer center and its patients. In a ceremony this morning, U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer and Gov. Gray Davis will announce that the UC Davis Cancer Center has achieved National Cancer Institute designation, an award that promises prestige and millions in additional federal funding. The announcement at the center caps a 12-year, $70 million investment by the university to build its cancer programs through the recruitment of top scientists, regional expansion of treatment services and, most recently, an unprecedented research partnership with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Click here for more.
- Sacramento Bee, 7/2/02
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As North Carolina's Hispanic population continues to grow, the ability of Tar Heel doctors to speak Spanish is becoming increasingly vital.
To that end, UNC medical school students will have the opportunity this fall, for the first time, to receive credit for Spanish language courses. This fall, the two existing intermediate courses will be offered for credit, as will a third, introductory course focusing on basics such as the alphabet, numbers, body parts and some key phrases. In a state as racially mixed as North Carolina, doctors often find themselves dealing with patients who speak only Spanish, said Marco Aleman, a UNC doctor and director of the language courses. Doctors who can speak in Spanish - at least at a basic level - can put patients at ease, he said. Click here for more.
- Chapel Hill Herald-Sun, 6/30/02
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Outstanding pre-medical students at the University of Central Florida will be assured
admission to the University of South Florida's medical school under a new arrangement starting this fall. The plan announced Tuesday calls for Burnett Honors College at the Orlando university to run a feeder program for USF's College of Medicine in Tampa. Students even could cut a year off their course of study, earning medical degrees in just seven years. "This is great for us because it will guarantee a place for our students, assuming they jump through all the hoops," said Allyn Stearman, dean of the UCF college. "This will take a lot of pressure off these kids because they can just study hard and not have to worry about getting into medical school." Click here for more.
- Orlando Sentinel, 6/26/02
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The California Nurses Association have ratified a new three-year contract
with the University of California. The vote, completed late Friday, finalizes a tentative agreement reached last month that provides average pay increases of 19 percent to 25 percent over three years and establishes joint committees to oversee future implementation of state minimum nurse-to-patient staffing ratios. CNA represents about 8,000 registered nurses employed by UC at five medical centers, nine student health centers and numerous outpatient clinics. Click here for more.
-University of California, Office of the President, 06/24/02
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Higher tuitions, fewer course offerings, faculty reductions
and the possibility that some students will be nudged out of the opportunity for higher education are on the woeful list of possibilities the Utah Board of Regents and commissioner for higher education have developed, based on the prospects of additional budget cuts. "What we are really talking about here is closing the door of opportunity on many students if significant additional cuts are required," said regents chairman Nolan Karras. Click here for more.
- Deseret News (Salt Lake City, UT), 6/20/02
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Cities and towns across the United States face a pharmacist shortage
-- severe in some locations, such as the Washington area -- as baby boomers take more medications and retail chains open more drugstores. While this is good news for new pharmacy school grads -- offers of leased BMWs and $100,000-plus salaries have been reported in some hard-to-staff regions -- it has meant poorer customer service and an increased risk of errors by overworked pharmacists, some experts warn. Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 6/20/02
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Fearful of lawsuits, some doctors in Corpus Christi are shunning certain cases.
Doctors are leaving town, screening their patients and restricting their practices to reduce their risk of lawsuits. Pregnant women and children are particularly vulnerable, as some doctors avoid them when they get seriously ill. More doctors are avoiding emergency call duty. There is much debate about whether the lawsuit crisis is real or a convenient excuse for insurance companies to raise rates. One thing is clear, though: Doctor fear of lawsuits is beginning to affect those most in need of care. Click here for more.
- Corpus Christi Caller-Times, 6/16/02
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Organ donors would have funeral and travel expenses partially paid for under a pilot study
that promises to be one of the main issues at the American Medical Association convention, which begins today in Chicago. Dr. Frank Riddick, chairman of the AMA's council of ethical and judicial affairs, said he's optimistic the study will be approved so doctors can learn whether those inducements would increase the number of organ donors. An average of 16 people a day nationwide die waiting for an organ. Colorado donor officials, however, say they won't participate because they want donor families to make altruistic decisions rather than be persuaded by incentives. Click here for more.
- Denver Post, 6/14/02
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Waukesha Memorial Hospital is offering online patient registration
that officials say is the first service of its kind in the Milwaukee area. The service is designed to save patients registration time at the hospital or time from being placed on hold as they try to register for hospital services by telephone. Some patients also are more comfortable giving personal medical information to a computer rather than a person, said Pat Kokta, manager of Waukesha Memorial Hospital's admitting department. "Especially when there's a question about a sensitive medical procedure, people want privacy," she said. Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6/13/02
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Many of the nation's teaching hospitals, already under financial pressure, are raising concerns about the effect of new rules
that will limit the number of hours worked by medical residents. "For academic medical centers, the impact is going to be profound," said Dr. Peter Herbert, the chief of staff for Yale-New Haven Hospital, a teaching affiliate of the Yale School of Medicine, who estimates that the cost for some hospitals could run into the millions of dollars. The rules, which are being imposed by the group that accredits teaching hospitals, will limit the average workweek to 80 hours and restrict a resident's duty to no more than 24 hours at a time. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 6/14/02
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New financing for U.S. biotechnology companies virtually collapsed in 2001,
compared with the previous year, falling 76 percent and imperiling the dreams of many young, small companies in the industry, a new study shows. Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 6/10/02
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Even though the US is in the middle of nursing crunch, with an estimated 126,000 unfilled nursing positions, many physicians do not realize that their own bad behavior may be driving some nurses from the field,
according to the results of a new survey. "One of the things we are concerned about is the nursing shortage," the report's author, Dr. Alan H. Rosenstein, the medical director of VHA West Coast in Pleasanton, California, told Reuters Health. As administrators struggle to deal with the ramifications of the nursing shortage, they must focus not only on recruiting new nurses to the field but also on retaining current nurses, he said in an interview. The relationship that physicians have with nurses can have a "profound" effect on whether nurses choose to stay in the field, he said. Click here for more.
-Reuters, 6/7/02
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Pharmacists are considered among the most trusted professionals in the country.
They work in clean, well-ordered environments, administer to the sick, counsel the confused and earn good money. Yet pharmacists are getting harder to find, even though there are more of them than ever. There are simply not enough to keep pace with demand, which is increasing as the population ages, chronic diseases and treatments increase and the development and use of prescription drugs multiply at head-spinning rates. Pharmacy grads are being wooed by the ubiquitous chain drugstores, which are proliferating almost as fast as the medications they dispense. But the demand for pharmacists far exceeds the traditional role of community druggist dispensing medications in a retail environment. Click here for more.
- Detroit Free Press, 6/5/02
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Dr. Joe Siemienczuk counts himself among hundreds of thousands of physicians who have partaken of drug company largesse:
gifts of office supplies, mountains of free samples, catered lunches for the entire office staff, even $100 payments in exchange for sitting through a sales pitch. No longer. Siemienczuk and colleagues with Providence Medical Group in Portland are taking drastic steps to curb drug company marketing. The 100-doctor practice will soon ban not just free lunches but all visits from pharmaceutical sales reps. The doctors are among a small but growing movement of health professionals nationwide who are snubbing drug industry gifts and other efforts to promote products. Click here for more.
- The Oregonian, 6/3/02
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At the University of Virginia, researchers are testing "black box recorders" in surgery,
videotaping and recording some operations then scrutinizing the data as they look for ways to improve communication among operating room staff and prevent and reduce medical mistakes. "It took $40,000 and four months to create," the technology, said Dr. J. Forrest Calland of the U.Va. Surgery Department, speaking yesterday at a meeting in Richmond on preventing medical errors. "Then another two years to clear legal hurdles to get permission to use." The delay in getting approval for the research project underscores one of the major concerns faced by health care providers when they talk about preventing medical mistakes. First, they have to admit mistakes are made, an act that in itself could open them up to legal problems. Click here for more.
- Richmond Times-Dispatch, 5/30/02
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University of Tennessee students could face another double-digit tuition hike this fall
if the austere budget proposal before the legislature passes. Although UT officials don't have specifics on increases at Knoxville, Martin and Chattanooga campuses, officials at the UT Health Science Center in Memphis have already mapped out possible tuition increases. And they're steep. Students in the colleges of allied health sciences, nursing and graduate health sciences, and the school of biomedical engineering could face a 15 percent tuition increase. Students in the colleges of medicine, dentistry and pharmacy could face a 22 percent to 27 percent tuition rise. Click here for more.
- Memphis Commercial Appeal, 5/22/02
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Americans without health insurance are more likely to die prematurely
and experience poor health than those with insurance coverage, according to new report from the Institute of Medicine released Tuesday.... Some 18,000 uninsured adults die prematurely each year because they do not get timely or adequate diagnoses or medical treatment, according to the institute, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences. An estimated 40 million Americans are uninsured, including 30 million adults aged 18 to 64, the focus of the institute's report. Previous research has established that lacking insurance makes it difficult for people to get medical care. This new report demonstrates that barriers to care for the uninsured have a significant, negative impact on people's health. Click here for more. Site requires registration.
- Chicago Tribune, 5/22/02
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Dr. David Lynch didn't want to stop accepting new Medicare patients in Whatcom County's Family Care Network.
But he and other doctors weighed the situation in 2000 and decided it was the only way to keep the doors open for their 80,000 patients. In some cases, Lynch said the health-care centers were spending $4 per Medicare patient before the physicians even got one penny.... Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., is planning this week to introduce the MediFair Act, a bill that would boost reimbursement rates for states that get less than the national average per patient from Medicare's payment system. Click here for more.
- The Seattle Times, 5/20/02
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A class-action lawsuit to be filed in Washington today challenges the National Residency Matching Program on antitrust grounds.
The suit says the defendants, including seven medical organizations and more than 1,000 private hospitals, have used the program to keep residents' wages low and hours long. Almost all first-year residents make less than $40,000 a year and often work 100-hour weeks. If the suit is successful, the nation's health care system faces an enormous financial liability and the prospect of being forced to change the way that generations of doctors have been trained. Click here for more. Registration necessary to view online.
- New York Times, 5/7/02
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As the waistlines of American kids are expanding,
so are the medical costs to treat diseases of childhood obesity such as diabetes, sleep apnea and gallstones. Although the percentage of children hospitalized for obesity-related health problems is small nationwide, researchers have noted a "disturbing increase" in the number of such children treated by doctors in the past two decades, according to a report released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Click here for more.
- San Francisco Chronicle, 5/2/02
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Faced with feverish health premiums that are poised to climb another 20 percent,
Michigan small-business owners are wondering if the patient is going to survive. Nearly a quarter of small-business employers surveyed for the Small Business Association of Michigan said the rising cost of health insurance threatens their ability to stay in business. Women and minority-owned businesses appear particularly vulnerable with 40 percent reporting concerns about their prospects for survival, according to the poll released Sunday. Click here for more.
- Detroit Free Press, 4/29/02
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Facing a severe and worsening shortage of organs for transplantation,
the ethics committee of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons has endorsed a pilot program under which the family of someone who dies could be offered a small sum of money to thank them for agreeing to donate their relative's organs. The committee "was unanimously opposed to the exchange of money for cadaver donor organs," said Francis Delmonico, a Massachusetts transplant surgeon and committee member who addressed the American Transplant Congress yesterday at its annual meeting here. However, Delmonico said, a majority of the panel members supported reimbursement "for funeral expenses or a charitable contribution as an ethical approach." Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 4/30/02
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A rising number of companies are using workplace wellness programs to improve employees' health and reduce medical claims.
These programs generally provide health information, and many also offer free or low-cost services such as medical checkups and weight management and smoking cessation classes. Some include fitness centers or subsidized memberships to local gyms. One factor in rising health costs is Americans' growing tendency toward obesity. Moreover, said David Hunnicutt, president of the Wellness Councils of America, "the vast majority of Americans spend the vast majority of time at work. And it's sedentary." Health experts say it is incumbent on employers to find ways for workers to get exercise and information about their health. Click here for more. (Registration required to view complete story.)
- AP/Chicago Tribune, 4/28/02
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Once known for their thrift, older Americans are piling on debt --
filing for bankruptcy in record numbers and jeopardizing retirement dreams. Many live on little more than Social Security. A sluggish stock market and painfully low interest rates pinch returns on their CDs, bank accounts and stock investments. Tapped out, many in this new generation of seniors turn to credit cards to finance medical bills, expensive prescription drugs and comfortable lifestyles. Click here for more.
- USA Today, 4/25/02
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Senators vowed yesterday to seek legislation that would strengthen federal protections for volunteers in medical experiments,
saying they are concerned about reports of flaws and loopholes in existing regulations. "If patients fear that their safety is not adequately protected in medical research, the cures of the future will be placed in jeopardy," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, chairman of the committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, said during a hearing on the issue yesterday. The Massachusetts Democrat is working with Sen. Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, to draft a bill that would strengthen federal oversight of experiments, compel disclosure of conflicts of interest and require full disclosure of risks to study subjects, according to aides. Click here for more.
- Baltimore Sun, 4/24/02
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Stung by a budget shortfall, Tennessee's Higher Education Commission
approved a plan Thursday to raise admission standards, limit enrollment and cut $25 million in state funding for athletics. University of Tennessee interim president Eli Fly said it would be premature to comment on each of the plan's provisions but added: "It's a sad day when steps like these are necessary." Click here for more.
- The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn., 4-19-02
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When Mary M. Baker hires a private nurse for her mother, she will be joining an emerging trend:
hospitalized patients employing nurses of their own rather than relying on the hospital nursing staff. Private nurses have been available for hire in hospitals for decades, markers of affluence much like household servants. Now, though, they are working in a different world. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 4/16/02
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Dr. Celedonio de la Cruz is part of a fast-growing corps of peripatetic doctors who bound around rural America
in airplanes and motor homes filling in for doctors who die, retire, or need a vacation. They are called locum tenens doctors, meaning they hold the place of others. "This is my way of feeling accomplishment," Dr. De la Cruz said. In the 1990s, medical schools in rural states like New Mexico, North Carolina, Kansas, and Utah sought residents to work as roving doctors. The University of New Mexico's program has sent 350 residents and staff doctors to assignments in 31 of the state's 33 counties. Like Dr. De la Cruz, some doctors find jobs on their own, but most work through companies that recruit and place them, pay their salaries, and cover their malpractice insurance, housing and travel costs. They then charge hospitals and clinics a fee. Click here for more.(Subscription required)
- NY Times, 4/16/02
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Casual dress shouldn't apply to doctors.
At least that's the conclusion of a study by two California dermatologists that appears in April's issue of the Archives of Dermatology. Patients said they want doctors to dress formally and leave the blue jeans and sandals for their days off. Name badges, white coats and dress shoes are preferable for both male and female doctors. Click here for more.
-Channel 4000.com, 4/15/02
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Hospitals and other health care providers are turning to traveling workers
to pitch in for several months until permanent workers can be hired. Danilio Davila, employment manager for Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas, said Parkland uses four to six traveling radiologists at any given time while job searches are conducted. "It doesn't resolve the long-term issue of trying to recruit a direct hire or someone who is going to be part of your staff, but it does fulfill a need to be able to serve our patients." Click here for more.
- Tallahassee Democrat, April 10, 2002
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Florida State University's new medical school lost a second attempt at accreditation
after a review committee said it was lacking in faculty staffing and curriculum development. The Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the national governing body for medical schools, on Monday denied an appeal of an earlier accreditation failure. The medical school enrolled its first 30 students last May and the second class arrives next month. The school was denied its first attempt at accreditation in February. The school, based at Florida State's main campus in Tallahassee, is one of three public medical schools in the state, along with the University of Florida and the University of South Florida. Click here for more.
-AP/Bradenton Herald, April 10, 2002
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The Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development is seeking to find out why the state is running short of pharmacists
and what can be done about it. The department will begin by taking a survey of licensed pharmacists in the state. The surveys are expected to begin arriving in the mail this week along with pharmacist license renewal notices. The survey asks about issues such as pharmacists' current employment and whether pharmacists have considered leaving the industry, and if so, why. "In Wisconsin, just like the rest of the nation, there aren't enough pharmacists to fill the current job openings," said Jennifer Reinert, Workforce Development secretary. "Pharmacists are in high demand, and we need to figure out why more people are not entering what can be a very lucrative field." Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 4/8/02
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Robots Make the Rounds To Ease Hospitals' Costs:
Whenever a new patient is admitted to the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Durham, N.C., a four-foot eight-inch talking robot rolls up to the nurses' station nearest to the patient's room, bringing doses of whatever drugs the doctor has ordered. TOBOR, the robot, is a delivery "droid" that glides along the corridors day and night, ferrying medicines from the hospital's central pharmacy to its wards. Bigger and boxier than R2D2, the rolling robot in the "Star Wars" movies, TOBOR shares the hospital's elevators many times a day with patients and visitors.... "Service robots," designed to perform mundane jobs such as delivering drugs, food trays and laboratory specimens, are increasingly being employed in hospitals, which must operate 24 hours a day and face severe labor shortages and high costs for personnel. Click here for more.
- Washington Post, 4/2/02
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...A quiet revolution is under way at University of California, San Francisco Medical School.
A new curriculum, developed over the past three years and highlighted by a dramatic first day of class last fall, has been implemented. Lectures have been cut down to 24 hours a week, and the character of those reduced hours of class have been dramatically altered. Faculty from different departments now collaborate to teach courses, integrating subjects such as cardiology, anatomy and pharmacology. Instead of learning about healthy organs in one year, diseases in the next year and treatment methods in the third year, this is combined in real-life learning situations. And to create that real-life, students work with real patients, actors trained to feign symptoms and mechanized mannequins. Click here for more.
- San Francisco Chronicle, 3/31/02
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Texas Southern University has become an official member of the Texas Medical Center
and will begin teaching and research activities there in the fall. TSU has educated almost a third of all black pharmacists practicing nationwide. "The immediate benefit for students is they (will) be trained in an environment that's recognized everywhere in the world, and obviously in the health care arena," Dr. Barbara Hayes, the dean of TSU's College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, said Thursday. "There's a need to have a university and a college that's committed to diversifying the number of practitioners. That's one of our strengths," she added. Click here for more.
- Houston Chronicle, 3/29/02
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The University of Connecticut plans to group its four health science-related schools under one umbrella
to save money and promote interdisciplinary programs. Starting in July, the schools of pharmacy, nursing, allied health and family studies will be bundled together as the Division of Health and Human Development. Each school will still retain its own dean, budget, curriculum, tenure and student-advising program, administrators said. Nor will there be job losses or pay cuts, Chancellor and Provost John D. Petersen said. The idea is to save money by combining administrative functions. Click here for more.
- Hartford Courant, 3/28/02
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If you want to understand where women are today, look at where they were 30 years ago.
Back then, higher education, key to any hope for a well-paid career and professional status, was an uneven, rocky playing field. Some colleges actually required women to have higher grades and test scores than men to get in.... Looking at medicine, only 7.6 percent of the nation's physicians were women in 1970, according to the American Medical Association. By 2000, they made up almost 28 percent. For the 2000-2001 academic year, almost half of medical-school entrants were women, says the American Medical Women's Association. Click here for more.
- San Antonio Express News, 3/24/02
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The future of the University of Nevada School of Medicine could be in jeopardy
if affordable malpractice rates cannot be found by July 1, when the current contract expires. The school's acting dean, Dr. Stephen McFarlane, has contacted Gov. Kenny Guinn in seeking ways to help keep the facility open if rates skyrocket. "If our rates even double, there's no way we can pay that," McFarlane said. "If that happened, our faculty and our student residents would not be insured. If they're not insured, they cannot practice, and if they cannot practice, we're out of business." Click here for more. - Las Vegas Review-Journal, 3/26/02
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As of July 1, psychologists in one state, New Mexico, will be authorized to pull out the prescription pad.
A new law will grant prescribing privileges to licensed, doctoral-level psychologists who have completed an additional training and certification program. And though the specifics of the plan remain to be worked out, the law is already the focus of a bitter national debate. Proponents argue that the law will provide greater access to quality care at lower cost. Opponents contend that psychology should remain distinct from its medical cousin and they worry that the legislation may place vulnerable patients in danger. (Online access is subscription-only.)
-New York Times, 3/26/02
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Training nurses on how to treat mass casualties took on a new urgency
after the Sept. 11 attacks as the government worried about whether the nation's emergency workers were prepared for another attack, especially one of bioterrorism. The International Nursing Coalition for Mass Casualty Education based at Vanderbilt University felt the pressure. Government officials, hospitals and university nursing programs from across the country turned to the coalition for help, but the group was still in its infancy at 6 months old. "The biggest complaint today is we're not moving fast enough," said founder Colleen Conway-Welch, dean of Vanderbilt University's School of Nursing. "We're moving as fast as we can. We started doing this out of our back pocket." Click here for more.
- The Tennessean, 3/24/02
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The Mayo Clinic and IBM are planning a database of every patient's history,
including genetic information. That database would be an unusually comprehensive resource for physicians and researchers hoping to understand how an individual's genetic makeup can influence the course of disease and the success of treatment.... Such "personalized medicine" is one of the major benefits expected from the sequencing of the human genome. "Projects like this are on the wish list of every dean of every medical school," says Ashok Amin, an immunologist at New York University, "but only a few elite places like Mayo can actually do it." (Full story available online only by subscription.)
-Wall Street Journal, 3/25/02
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More than half of the surgeons working at Southern Nevada's only trauma center are poised to quit
if Gov. Kenny Guinn doesn't soon commit to limiting malpractice liability in Nevada, their representative said Wednesday. The resignation of six of the 11 remaining surgeons at University Medical Center's Trauma Center would force the center to severely limit hours or close completely, said the center's medical director, Dr. John Fildes. The six surgeons, all in private practice at Desert West Surgery, say they can no longer afford to pay their skyrocketing rates of medical malpractice insurance. Click here for more.
- Las Vegas Review-Journal, 3/21/02
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Over the last four years, specialties such as anesthesiology and radiology have attracted increasing numbers of young physicians trained in the United States,
a trend some attribute to the fact that doctors in those fields have more control over their work schedules at a time of increasing stress on the profession. Meanwhile, demand has gradually declined for jobs in fields where the hours can be more unpredictable, such as general surgery, pediatrics, and some areas of internal medicine.... The trend has given physician leaders a new reason to take notice of the tough working conditions facing young doctors, said Dr. Jordan J. Cohen, president of the Association of American Medical Colleges, which advocates new limits on resident work hours. Click here for more.
- The Boston Globe, 3/22/02
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Recruiters trying to reverse an increasing shortage of registered nurses
are turning to a nearly untapped labor pool--men. An effort by Johnson & Johnson, begun a month ago, features men in nearly half its advertising. One 33-year-old male registered nurse in Utah said that at $23 an hour, he's able to support his wife and baby and still pursue his undergraduate degree. There are an estimated 126,000 vacant full-time nursing positions at hospitals across the country. That number is forecast to triple by 2020. Men make up only about 6 percent of the nursing force. Click here for more.
- Associated Press, 3/19/02
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A newspaper publisher has pledged $1 million a year in matching donations
to N.C. State's College of Veterinary Medicine to help raise money for a new medical center and hospital. Randall B. Terry has promised to donate $1 for every $2 the university raises in off campaign years and $1 for every $3 that is raised during fund-raising campaign years, up to an annual maximum of about $1 million, said Chandy Christian, director of development at the College of Veterinary Medicine. Terry's relationship with the university started almost 10 years ago, when one of his six golden retrievers developed a bronchial infection. It appeared at first that the dog would die, but doctors at the vet school cured it.
-Associated Press, 3/18/02
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Doctors say general surgeons could wind up on the critical list
if today's medical students continue to choose a comfortable lifestyle over grueling, unpredictable work hours. The number of applicants to residency programs in general surgery has dropped 30 percent in the past nine years, according to studies in the March issue of the journal Archives of Surgery. The trend began in the 1980s, but last year was the first since then that the number of general surgery positions offered to U.S. medical school graduates exceeded the number of students interested, the studies say. Click here for more. (Requires free membership to New York Times.)
- Associated Press3-15-02
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Marquette University's School of Dentistry will get $1.5 million to establish a mobile dental clinic program,
the school said Tuesday. Marquette will place two mobile units in northeast and northwest Wisconsin to serve children and families who don't have access to dental care. The school treats more than 15,000 of these patients each year in on- and off-campus clinics. The money comes from price-fixing settlements reached by Attorney General Jim Doyle with six vitamin companies in October 2000. He allocated an additional $250,000 to the Madre Angela Dental Clinic in Milwaukee and $210,000 to the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin in Milwaukee to increase access to dental care.
-Wisconsin State Journal, 3/13/02
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Harvard officials will announce a $40 million grant from the National Cancer Institute
that will dramatically expand five years of efforts to develop a new, mass-production approach to biology. The grant taps Harvard to build a powerful set of tools to speed the work of cancer researcher Joan Brugge and scientists around the world - and brings Harvard one step closer to university president Lawrence H. Summers's dream of making the Boston area the Silicon Valley of biomedical research. The federal dollars will fuel a new research center called the Molecular Target Laboratory. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 3/11/02
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Elias Zerhouni, executive vice dean of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine,
is likely to be nominated by President Bush as director of the National Institutes of Health, according to sources familiar with the decision. The choice of Zerhouni, which could be announced by the end of this week, would conclude a search for someone to preside over the nation's premier biomedical research agency, which has been without a permanent director for more than two years. Sources said Zerhouni met the administration's twin goals of a respected scientist who could live within Bush's ethical constraints on controversial research involving cloning and embryonic stem cells. Click here for more.
- The Washington Post, 3/6/02
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Oregon Health & Science University has named a new executive director for its hospitals and clinics: Peter Rapp,
currently a senior vice president with Fairview Hospital and Healthcare Services in Minneapolis. The new executive, who starts in April, will arrive at a challenging time for OHSU. The state's busiest medical center and employer of 11,000 workers is still assessing the costs of a 58-day strike by hundreds of registered nurses. The health system and medical school now face slashed state funding and increasing numbers of patients incapable of paying for care, and expects to lose about $3 million this year. Rapp has tackled tough assignments before. In 1997, after the University of Minnesota's teaching hospital suffered shrinking admissions and multimillion-dollar deficits, Rapp helped lead the university medical center through a precarious and contentious acquisition by the Fairview Healthcare System. Click here for more.
- The Oregonian, 2/26/02
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Getting dental care is among the toughest medical challenges for poor people,
especially those who live in rural areas. Fewer than one in four poor people sees a dentist, according to Wisconsin state figures for fiscal year 2000. Dentists have complained about reimbursement levels and paperwork, and say poor people tend to miss appointments more than other patients do. The bipartisan Legislative Council appointed a study committee, and last year it provided remedies that had the support of most of the players in oral care. But changes proposed will die when the Wisconsin Legislature adjourns next month. Click here for more.
- Madison Capitol Times, 2/25/02
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The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas used to automatically reject applicants with lousy grades
and low test scores. It's not that easy anymore. Because of a new state law, the admissions process is more complicated for the medical school and for all graduate schools in Texas. The measure, passed in June, says graduate programs may not use test scores as the sole or primary factor in admissions. Instead, the law throws in 11 other factors schools must consider, including applicants' hometowns and whether they grew up in poverty. Click here for more.
- Dallas Morning News, 2/25/02
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A tuition increase will hit students hard at Louisiana State University Medical Centers
in New Orleans and Shreveport, where an increase of $271 will push the annual tuition to more than $9,300. A legislative committee approved a tuition increase of about 3 percent at Louisiana colleges. Click here for more.
- New Orleans Times-Picayune, 2/23/02
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Experts say hospitals throughout the country need to look for more ex-nurses
willing to re-enter the field. The American Association of Colleges of Nursing recently reported, for example, that enrollments at nursing schools edged up slightly last fall after a six-year decline, but that the demand for new nurses still is outpacing the supply. Nurses have left the profession in significant numbers, for a variety of reasons that include family and finances. Click here for more.
- Indianapolis Star, 2/21/02
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When Danielle Ortiz was finishing up nursing classes at Victor Valley College last May,
she had one ambitious goal: to land a job as a labor and delivery nurse, a specialty slot not often handed to green college graduates. Luckily for her, she was entering a booming nursing job market in a state with one of the worst nursing shortages in the country. So with very little work experience, she easily landed a job in the field of her dreams--and collected a $2,000 sign-on bonus to boot. This is the flip side of the nursing shortage: a health care industry pulling out all the stops to recruit and educate nurses. California hospitals are now offering sign-on bonuses of as much as $15,000, as well as paying moving expenses, tuition for baccalaureates and master's degrees and contributions to 401(k) plans. Click here for more.
- LA Times, 2/17/02
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It may be the wartime mood, but lawmakers and law-enforcement agencies around the country are hot
on the trail of terrorists. Not the kind who attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon last September, but those who - in the name of animal rights and environmental protection - attack logging trucks, slaughterhouses, fur farms, and university research facilities. Click here for more.
- Christian Science Monitor, 2-15-02
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Ohio State University's proposed 34 percent tuition increase for incoming freshmen
has caused official gasps of shock and dismay. Good. Maybe this means that a long- festering problem in Ohio finally will get the official attention it deserves. For years now, the General Assembly slowly has been starving higher education. No one should be surprised that the ribs are starting to show. Click here for more.
- Columbus Dispatch, 2-10-02
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A health-care crisis was declared by an unlikely coalition Tuesday.
Business and labor leaders, the insurance industry, health-care providers and consumer advocates--at odds on almost every issue--sat on the same side of a table to proclaim their commitment to health coverage for all Americans. Their strange-bedfellows coalition highlighted the growing consensus in Washington that in a time of recession and spiraling health-care costs, something must be done to help Americans--more than 39 million and growing as of 2000--who have no health insurance. The partnership--Covering the Uninsured--announced its launch of a Web site and a $10-million advertising campaign. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 2/13/02
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Massachusetts colleges are closing health centers,
slashing class offerings, and canceling millions of dollars in new construction work required by the federal Americans With Disabilities Act, according to a report released yesterday. State and community college presidents from across Massachusetts, gathered for a meeting of the state Board of Higher Education, detailed the sharp cutbacks triggered by a recent $6.7 million cut in state higher education spending, and further cuts expected in the 2003 state budget. The 9,500-student Northern Essex Community College is closing its health center and mental-health counseling office, for example. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 2/13/02
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Pharmacists' long hours may endanger the public.
"It's like in anything, the more you work, the harder you work, the margin of error increases," said Georgia state Rep. David Graves, a pharmacist. "If you make a mistake on a prescription, you are messing with people's lives. There is not much margin for error in pharmacy." There are no statistics about how many prescriptions are filled incorrectly in Georgia and if they harmed patients. But there are national statistics showing a shortage of pharmacists. Click here for more.
- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 2/13/02
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Mount Sinai Medical Center decided it needed a few new superstar physicians
after it lost $26 million last year. So the New York teaching center turned to Boston, where it spent millions to lure away four top surgeons from Brigham and Women's Hospital and build a new surgery program. The hirings were the buzz of a heart surgery conference in Atlanta over the weekend, and surgeons say they highlight the growing competition between financially challenged academic medical centers. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 2/12/02
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Maya Angelou will lend her name to a new minority health research center
at Wake Forest University, where she is a professor. Officials at the Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center hope to raise a $20 million endowment for the Maya Angelou Research Center on Minority Health. "Our goal is full inclusion of all people in the scientific discussion of how we live, stay well and manage illness in this country," said Richard H. Dean, president of Wake Forest University Health Sciences. Click here for more.
- Piedmont News-Record, 2/11/02
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The Cleveland Clinic put up a Web site dedicated to selling second opinions.
Some other medical centers and several dot-com companies also are trying to carve out a slice of the online medical consultation business, mainly for cancer. The trend brings some of the best and brightest medical minds within easy reach but the advice comes at a price that health insurance might not cover. And whether it is good for doctors to advise patients they never meet is being debated by the medical establishment. Click here for more.
- The Cleveland Plain Dealer, 2/8/02
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One nursing school reports applications up 75 percent.
With applications still coming in, Northeastern University's Bouve College of Health Sciences School of Nursing in Boston is reporting a 75 percent increase in applicants this year. Dean Steve Zoloth attributes the jump to economic instability, saying students are increasingly drawn to a field that nearly guarantees a good-paying job upon graduation. The events of Sept. 11 also contribute. "People are being drawn to professions that make a socially just contribution to society," he says.
-AHA News, 2/8/02
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In an unexpected twist to the stem cell controversy,
the American Red Cross has decided to turn down what would have been the first federal grant devoted to research using stem cells from human embryos. The decision suggested that stem cell research, widely touted as the greatest hope for new cures for disease, has become so controversial that some major research institutions might be scared away, research advocates said. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 2/8/02
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A push to bring a federally funded biotechnology research center
to Wisconsin was launched by Gov. Scott McCallum, who asked top University of Wisconsin officials to lead the effort. McCallum's initiative is in its earliest stages: There is no formal proposal, and a location for the facility has not been identified. He has not asked for help from the Wisconsin congressional delegation. "It's something we are going to aggressively go after," McCallum said. "We're going to pursue high-paying jobs." Click here for more.
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2/6/02
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Connecticut governor John Rowland proposed new spending for higher education
and homeland security even while urging fiscal restraint. The state is facing a two-year budget deficit estimated at $1 billion. The governor's $13.5 billion budget proposal includes an 10-year, $1.3 billion spending plan for the University of Connecticut, a sequel to the $1 billion UConn 2000 program "that will complete the task of making the University of Connecticut one of the most modern and exciting public universities in the country." The 21st Century UConn plan would pump another $1 billion in bonding into the main campus in Storrs and regional campuses, and $300 million into the UConn Health Center in Farmington.
-Associated Press, 2/6/02
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An independent medical school and graduate studies program
is in the works for the Cleveland Clinic, which is apparently scrapping a proposal to work with Case Western Reserve University. Click here for more.
- The Cleveland Plain Dealer, 2/5/02
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HCA Inc. is going head-on with nurse staffing agencies
in its key national markets, in hopes of easing a severe shortage of nurses and cutting its temporary hiring costs. The national, for-profit hospital company is making a "very aggressive" move into the temporary staffing business for nurses in markets across the country, said Vice President Larry Burkhardt. An HCA subsidiary, All About Staffing, is requiring agencies to submit bids for new contracts that cut prices and eliminate non-compete clauses that prevented HCA from hiring nurses away from the agencies. Click here for more.
- The Tennessean, 1/31/02
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Purdue University says it deserves a share of profits from what may be the cure for the common cold.
Find a cure for the common cold, the old bromide goes, and you'll make a fortune. After millennia of cold viruses' vexing defenseless human beings, a French drug maker and its American partners may be at the cusp of doing just that. Standing alongside the drugmakers at the edge of perhaps epic profits, says the Purdue Research Foundation, should be Purdue University. It's not. Sanofi-Synthelabo of Paris and its partners are poised to collect a clutch of golden ouefs laid by this pharmaceutical fowl -- if U.S. regulators give the OK. By contrast, in this richly profitable game Purdue is coming up plain old goose eggs. At issue is the drug Picovir. Click here for more.
- Indianapolis Star, 1/29/02
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Last summer, University of Memphis counseling professors pumped beer
and sold peanuts at Memphis Redbirds games to help their department do a better job of training school counselors. Dr. Dick James said the story dramatizes how low Tennessee has sunk in paying for public universities. James, a 25-year veteran of the University of Memphis Department of Counseling, was among about 100 professors, staff members and students who rallied for higher education funding Saturday in downtown Memphis. "We don't want to see a day when a child with a kidney transplant is going to have to go out of state to get it done," said Dr. Robert Wyatt, 53, a professor of pediatric medicine and head of pediatric nephrology at UT. Click here for more.
- The Commercial Appeal, 1/27/02
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Florida's Nursing Shortage Solutions Act
addresses the increasing percentage of vacant nursing positions in the state, especially in acute care hospitals. The act has numerous provisions that would spend state tax dollars on recruitment and retention programs within hospitals, as well as secondary and post-secondary institutions. During a news conference, Gov. Jeb Bush said the financial incentives of working as a nurse are very attractive, but students have to be aware of the opportunities. Click here for more.
-Florida Times-Union, 1/30/02
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At least a third of Americans fail to see a dentist
even once a year. Tooth decay is the most common chronic childhood disease--half of first-graders already have a cavity. Large swaths of the country don't have fluoridated drinking water, considered one of the most important health advances of the 20th century. Two years after the surgeon general labeled Americans' bad oral health a "silent epidemic," a new report--using government data to assess each state--finds that the mouth is getting too little medical attention. Click here for more.
- CNN.com, 1/28/02
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President Bush will substantially increase the National Institutes of Health (NIH) budget
when he submits his fiscal year 2003 budget proposal to Congress next month, HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced today. The President's fiscal year 2003 budget proposal for NIH would increase its budget to $27.3 billion, an increase of $3.7 billion, the largest one-year increase ever for NIH. "The proposed NIH budget will support nearly 36,000 research project grants, an all-time record for the agency," Thompson said. Click here for more.
-HHS Press Release, 1/26/02
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Boldly printed drug labels
and a new education campaign are the cornerstone of a plan by consumer advocates and the government to make over-the-counter drugs more user-friendly. The National Council on Patient Information and Education kicked off its new "Be MedWise" campaign Tuesday with help from the Food and Drug Administration and other health organizations. Click here for more. -CNN.com, 1/23/02
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Severe overcrowding in America's emergency rooms may be a warning sign
that the nation's primary care and hospital systems are failing, analysts said Tuesday. Most say that the problem is not with the emergency departments themselves, but with the ability of the rest of the healthcare system--hospital inpatient wards, psychiatric hospitals, and primary care offices--to handle patient demand. They say the austerity measures brought by managed care companies and federal budget cuts in the 1990s have left hospitals unable to admit enough new patients. Click here for more.
- Reuters Health, 1/23/02
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University Health System (UHS) expects to receive a $10 million windfall
in additional federal funding in 2002. But this new Medicaid-related money--via the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services--still leaves the tax-supported Texas-based hospital system with a projected loss of $19 million for its 2002 budget, which has been unanimously approved by Bexar County Commissioners. After including more than $10 million in interest earned on its reserves, UHS officials are projecting a bottom-line loss of $8.8 million in the $534 million 2002 budget. That compares to $34 million in operating losses for 2000 and $24 million in 2001.
-San Antonio Business Journal, 1/21/02
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California would become the first state in the nation to limit the number of hospital patients assigned
to each nurse under regulations proposed Tuesday by Gov. Gray Davis. The new rules ultimately would prohibit hospitals from assigning a nurse to more than five patients in large hospital units devoted to patients recovering from surgery and serious illnesses. That's half the number typically assigned in many facilities, and half what the hospital industry had proposed. Nurses' unions and consumer advocates applauded the proposal. Click here for more.
- Los Angeles Times, 1/23/02
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To stay competitive, the University of Nebraska Medical Center is proposing a $70 million
construction and renovation project that includes a new home for the medical school and a gateway for the campus. The plan calls for a $39.5 million Center for Health Science Education. Click here for more.
- Omaha World-Herald, 1/19/02
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Washington state college students may face substantial tuition increases
next fall as Gov. Gary Locke and the Legislature try to cover the state's $1.25 billion budget shortfall. Locke's proposed budget anticipates tuition increases of up to 18 percent at the University of Washington and Washington State University, up to 15 percent at the state's other four-year universities and up to 12 percent at community and technical colleges. Click here for more.
- The (Tacoma) News Tribune, 1/21/02
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Donations of organs like hearts and livers are regulated zealously,
but when it comes to human tissues--ligaments, tendons, bones, skin and other body parts--there is little oversight. This situation worries a growing number of experts, who fear that improperly handled tissue can transmit dangerous or even lethal infections. Officials from companies that provide donor tissue generally attribute the infections to ambient bacteria in hospital operating rooms. But other experts say the cases point to serious holes in the system to monitor the trade in donor tissue. Click here for more.
- NY Times, 1/20/01
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Worker shortages have evaporated in many Minnesota industries, but not in health care,
where employers continue scrounging for everyone from registered nurses to home health aides. That's the word from a semi-annual state job vacancy survey released Thursday by the Minnesota Department of Economic Security. Click here for more. - St. Paul Pioneer Press, 1/18/02
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Georgia already doesn't have enough nurses.
In the coming years, it may not have enough nursing instructors. Between now and 2006, almost one-fourth of the faculty members in the state's schools of nursing will have retired or resigned, and replacements aren't being groomed quickly enough to make up the difference. And it isn't just a local problem. Regionally and nationally, nursing schools are facing a severe faculty shortage in the coming years. Between 2002 and 2006, schools in the Southeast expect to lose 18 percent of their nursing faculty to retirement, according to a survey conducted by the Southern Regional Education Board. "There is going to be a serious problem in the future," said Jill Hayes, who heads the Department of Nursing at North Georgia College & State University. "We're not educating nurses to go into the academic field."
-Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 1/16/02
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Both chambers of the New York Legislature today approved $696 million
in funding for hospital workforce recruitment and retention initiatives in fiscal years 2002 through 2004, the Healthcare Association of New York State reports. The provision is part of a three-year health care workforce bill negotiated by Gov. George Pataki with legislative leaders in recent days and strongly supported by HANYS.
-AHA News, 1/16/02
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After the death of a donor, Mt. Sinai hospital temporarily halts
living-donor operations. The New York City hospital, which uses more living donors for liver transplants than any other hospital in the United States, said the operations for adult recipients would be stopped while it investigated the case of the 57-year-old man who died on Sunday, three days after donating part of his liver to his brother, 54. The brother survived. Click here for more. - New York Times, 1/16/02
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In a city (Boston) full of medical innovations, this one raised some eyebrows.
Two respected physicians announced plans to open a medical practice that charges patients $4,000 a year on top of the medical costs covered by their health insurance. Patients who pay will get amenities and attention that virtually no managed care practice can provide nowadays: round-the-clock cellphone access to doctors, same-day appointments, nutrition and exercise physiology exams at patients' homes or health clubs and doctors to accompany them to specialists. Critics say they are abandoning lower-income patients to cater to the wealthy. Click here for more.
- New York Times, 1/15/02
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Health-care company HCA has agreed to give priority hiring status
to qualified soldiers participating in the U.S. Army Recruiting Command's Partnership for Youth Success (PaYS) program, a partnership with U.S. industry developed to help the Army attract, train, and deploy young people interested in health care and other careers. Under the agreement announced Jan. 10, recruits interested in receiving medical specialty training while in the Army sign a letter of intent to work for HCA when they complete their term of service. "This partnership will give HCA the opportunity to take advantage of this talent pool to help alleviate the national shortage of health care workers," said HCA President and Chief Operating Officer Richard Bracken.
Click here for more.
- AHA News, 1/11/02
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Las Vegas mayor is negotiating to build an academic medical center
on a 61-acre plot of land in the city's "downtown district." Las Vegas is the largest metropolitan area in the United States without an academic medical center. In an address last week, the mayor said that building the medical center might require a contribution from the gaming industry.
-AAMC News, 1/14/02
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A 10-year, $250 million expansion of West Virginia University's
Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Center has been endorsed by the university's board of directors. The plan must be approved by the state Higher Education Policy Commission before it may be put into place. As proposed, the expansion would be anchored by the $30 million Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute, and an $18 million medical library that would include classrooms.
-Associated Press, 1/13/02
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Idaho universities are planning cuts and preparing staff for layoffs
in anticipation of one of the leanest state budgets since the Reagan Administration. Last month, Gov. Dirk Kempthorne told the institutions to plan for a 10-percent reduction from this year's budget allotments. Even with the cuts, Idaho State University plans to raise tuition by 12 percent next year.
-Associated Press, 01/11/02
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The University of Utah may borrow to cover its share of current state budget cuts
and raise student tuition next fall to pay the debt. The university also will cap enrollments next fall and could begin cutting programs if the current financial situation shows no reversal by then, President Bernie Machen said this week. Click here for more.
- The Deseret News, Salt Lake City, UT, 01/09/02
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Faced with a $1.3 billion shortfall, Virginia Gov.-elect Mark R. Warner
wants the state's public colleges and universities to be more efficient, even if that means closing some of those schools' extended campuses in Northern Virginia. Too many public schools are duplicating their efforts, Mr. Warner said in a recent interview with The Washington Times. Click here for full story.
- Washington Times, 01/08/02
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To establish a biomedical research infrastructure network,
the University of Hawaii has received a $5.9 million federal grant. The network, called BRIN, is an alliance among higher education and research institutions with the common goal of enhancing biomedical research capacity in Hawaii, a UH spokesperson said Wednesday. To achieve the objective, BRIN partners will seek to increase biomedical research funding to the state by expanding research and developing opportunities for faculty and students at other institutions to participate in funded research, the university said. Other institutions that have joined UH in BRIN include Brigham Young University-Hawaii, Chaminade University, and Hawaii Pacific University, as well as The Queen's Medical Center, Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children and Straub Clinic and Hospital. The grant came from the National Center for Research Resources of the National Institutes of Health.
-Associated Press, 1/10/02
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The demand for genetic services is expected to increase
significantly as the Human Genome Project and other research yields scientific advances with clinical applications. "The Human Genome Project is certainly alerting people to the opportunities for preventive health care treatment," says Vivian Weinblatt, president of the National Society of Genetic Counselors. An estimated 1,800 genetic counselors practice in the United States, with most working in urban academic medical centers and hospitals. At least 34 master's-level genetic counseling programs exist nationwide. Click here for more. - Indianapolis Star, 1/9/02
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A majority of U.S. adults support the right to euthanasia
and physician-assisted suicide and believe that Attorney General John Ashcroft was wrong to block the Oregon proposition allowing the latter practice, according to a new Harris poll. In the survey of 1,011 adults conducted last month, 65 percent of respondents agreed that the "law should allow doctors to comply with the wishes of a dying patient in severe distress who asks to have his or her life ended." In addition, 63 percent disapproved of the 1997 Supreme Court ruling that Americans do not have a constitutional right to physician-assisted suicide. And 61 percent said they would be in favor of a law similar to Oregon's Death with Dignity Act if it was proposed in their state, while 34 percent would not. Harris concludes: "No matter which questions are asked, there is a strong, approximately two-to-one majority in favor of an individual's right to euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide."
-Harris release, 1/9/02
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University of California President Richard C. Atkinson today applauded
Gov. Gray Davis' proposal to accelerate several UC facilities projects as a key piece of his statewide economic stimulus package. "Accelerating these projects will provide construction jobs in the short term, and the education and research that will occur in the completed buildings will be a catalyst for California's economic growth over the longer term," Atkinson said. "Gov. Davis has proposed a wise, far-sighted investment in higher education for the benefit of the state's overall economic health." Click here for more.
- AScribe Newswire, 01/09/02
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Americans' spending on health care rose 6.9 percent to $1.3 trillion
in 2000, including a 17.3 percent boost in spending on prescription drugs, according to a Health and Human Services Department report released Jan. 7. Health care spending averaged $4,637 per person, up from $4,377 in 1999, the report said, marking what government economists called the "end of an era of reasonable health care cost growth throughout most of the 1990s." The report said hospital spending in 2000 rose to $412 billion, a 5.1 percent increase over 1999. For the first time in five years, nursing home expenditures increased, by 3.3 percent. The higher spending in all categories was attributed to the increased bargaining power of hospitals and health providers for higher insurance payments and the aging of the post-World War II baby boomers. For more click here.
- New York Times, 1/8/02
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Temporary medical staffing has become big business.
Staffing firms nationwide supply about 5 percent of the nurses at work in hospitals and bring in revenues of more than $7 billion a year, according to industry estimates. Some analysts predict spending on temporary staffing will grow 15 percent to 20 percent this year and for years to come, as hospitals and other medical institutions compete for a supply of nurses that is falling short of the demand for care. Some hospital officials blame the staffing industry for the bidding war for registered nurses. To attract nurses, staffing firms pay up to twice as much as hospitals. Stat Medical Services and other agencies have started offering full health insurance coverage and matching contributions to retirement funds for nurses who put in enough hours. Signing bonuses have climbed into the thousands. Agencies also let nurses dictate preferred hours of availability, desired hospitals and other workplace preferences. Click here for more.
- The Oregonian, 1/7/02
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On-demand health screening is welcomed by some,
like Maralyn Elser, who saw a handbill advertising screening to detect "invisible diseases" and jumped at the chance to get tested at a nearby recreation center. Two weeks later, the 68-year-old Oregon woman had surgery to clear a blockage in the carotid artery on the right side of her neck. While doctors do not routinely order expensive ultrasound tests for people who appear healthy, this emerging medical imaging industry is appealing to people who have no symptoms but are willing to pay out of pocket for medical screening tests. Click here for more.
- The Oregonian, 1/2/02
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Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center will lay off 500 to 700 employees,
or 10 percent to 15 percent of the staff, in part to forestall the possibility of selling the Harvard Medical School teaching hospital to a for-profit health care company. Paul Levy, Beth Israel's new CEO, said the layoffs are the first step in an urgent turnaround plan and will begin this month. The hospital's approximately 900 nurses will be exempt from layoffs, which means that some other departments will see their ranks shrink more than 15 percent. Physicians will not be spared, but administrators and other "behind-the-scenes" employees will be hardest hit.
The hospital has lost at least $50 million a year for the past three years, and executives and doctors have failed to implement several consultants' recommendations. In July, hospital trustees told chief executive Dr. James Reinertsen to resign. Click here for more.
- Boston Globe, 01/08/02
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A federal plan to use a telemedicine network and
prescription drug vending machines to make drugs more accessible and less expensive for patients in remote areas, was announced last week by Tommy Thompson, health and human services secretary. Under the pilot project, providers in participating clinics will fax prescriptions to a health center facility in Spokane, Wash., where pharmacists will fill the prescriptions by sending instructions via a computer network to vending machines located in the clinics where the prescriptions originate. The vending machines will dispense the medications in prescription bottles, which pharmacy technicians can pick up, label and deliver to the waiting patients. The process may end there, or patients can elect to use videoconferencing equipment to receive instructions about proper use of the medications from pharmacists at the central facility.
-HHS release, 12/28/01
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Federal inspectors have embarked on a comprehensive review
of AIDS prevention grants, spurred by fears among some legislators that the latest marketing campaigns aren't working and exceed the bounds of good taste. An initial audit, in October, led by Inspector General Janet Rehnquist, daughter of U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist, concluded that the workshops by the Stop AIDS Project of San Francisco appeared to directly promote sexual activity. That, she said, would be inconsistent with guidelines adopted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In response to Rehnquist's report, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson promised more widespread audits. Leaders of several AIDS prevention agencies say that they fear that the audits will squelch--or have a chilling effect on--creative campaigns that use sexually suggestive language and photos to promote safer sex. Click here for more.
-LA Times, 1/4/02
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As manufacturers shed workers and once-hot technology
companies cut staffing to the bone, the nation's health-care industry is showing no similar signs of distress. Last month alone, health-care concerns added 32,000 jobs, government figures show. Other industries eliminated more than 300,000 jobs, driving up the nation's unemployment rate to 5.7 percent in November, the fastest rate for job cuts in two decades, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. The hiring binge is expected to continue for the $1.3 trillion health-care industry, as it expands to serve a rapidly aging population of Baby Boomers while embracing sophisticated technology that requires more medical technicians and information specialists. Click here for more.
- Chicago Tribune, December 25
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Rural South Georgia is in critical need of doctors,
and the problem is likely to worsen if nothing is done to lure new physicians to the area. Ninety-six of Georgia's 159 counties have been designated "health professional shortage areas" by federal authorities. In fact, the doctor shortage is so severe in South Georgia that patients routinely fill the waiting rooms of the available physicians or travel to neighboring counties with hospitals. Health officials say that while medical schools are full, most new doctors choose to go to metropolitan areas. Others specialize in fields that require technology often too expensive for most rural hospitals to afford. Click here for more.
- Atlanta Journal Constitution, December 31
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Nevada officials are developing a plan to increase capacity
at the state's six nursing schools. The state has the worst nursing shortage in the nation per capita, but most of its schools are turning away qualified applicants because of lack of space. UNLV was the only state nursing school to have more seats than qualified applicants this fall. The Orvis School of Nursing at the University of Nevada, Reno received 82 applications for the fall semester, but had room for only 48, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported Dec. 26. In response to the shortage, the 2001 Legislature approved a bill calling for the state to double its enrollment capacity at Nevada?s six nursing schools, to 1,286 seats. Click here for more.
- Las Vegas Review-Journal, December 27
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A private medical group in Maryland is compiling a registry of physician e-mail addresses
so governments can send updated clinical advice to private doctors during bioterrorism incidents. So far, 5,500 of the state's 10,200 practicing physicians have registered their e-mail addresses with MedChi, the state medical society. Since September, MedChi has relayed more than a dozen alerts, mostly on anthrax and smallpox, to the e-mail addresses. District of Columbia and Virginia medical leaders say they are interested in improving their systems as well, but so far they remain well behind Maryland in reaching out to doctors in their private offices. The private effort in Maryland is endorsed by the state's top state health official, who said it will help him make other improvements to the public health communications network.
-Washington Post, 1/3/02
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A horse whose promising racing career was cut short by a hoof injury has made a comeback
at the University of Illinois veterinary college. Ten-year-old Ambro Mackintosh hasn't been able to race since he was a 3-year-old, but his new status as a sought-after sire is a major reason the school's horse program is breaking even--and offering students looks at horse reproduction. The former pacer bred 150 mares last year and 240 the year before, at $2,000 per artificial insemination. The school splits that fee with the horse's owner. "Last year was the first time in a long time we made a little money," said Kevin Kline, director of the school's horse program. Click here for more.
- St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 1/3/02
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A $45 million biotechnology "greenhouse" is being proposed by a
consortium of university and business groups in Pennsylvania. The idea for a regional "greenhouse" originated with former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge earlier this year to speed biotech research from the laboratory to commercial use. In June, the Legislature allocated $100 million to create three "life-science greenhouses" in the state. The financing for the greenhouses will come from Pennsylvania's $11.3 billion share of the settlement with the nation's tobacco companies.
- Nov. 16 Philadelphia Inquirer
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A new Nursing and Allied Health Recruitment Center
will develop strategies to address the state's scarcity of nurses and other health care professionals, the New Jersey Hospital Association has announced. Opened Nov. 14, the center will emphasize broad outreach efforts targeting students, mid-career adults and health professionals who choose not to work in the field, including one-on-one outreach to schools and guidance counselors, and marketing strategies in schools, malls and movie theaters. Director Barbara Tofani also hopes to build partnerships with education, business and other providers to create scholarships, job shadow programs, and statewide career days. The center will develop a library of recruitment and retention resources. An associated Web site provides information on educational programs, financial aid, career advancement and professional certification.
For more information go to http://www.njha.com.
- AHA News, 11/15
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New York's long-term care staffing crisis is getting worse
and providers are finding it tougher to maintain the workforce levels necessary to provide high quality care, according to a new report from the New York Association of Homes & Services for the Aging. The report says more than 90 percent of providers report shortages of nurses and certified aides as turnover rates for nurse's aides and non-clinical staff average 30 percent to 40 percent annually. More information is at http://www.nyahsa.org.
- AHA News, 11/14
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The Medical College of Wisconsin has received $11 million
in federal grants to help coordinate studies involving blood stem cell transplants. The studies will be done through a newly created national Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network that includes major universities, cancer centers, and other research centers. Similar efforts are underway for cancer research, but this is a first for blood transplants.
- Associated Press, 12/5/01
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There is growing concern that shortages in the supply
of tetanus, diphtheria, pertussis and pneumococcal vaccines may lead to children contracting preventable diseases. Shortages are attributed to fewer companies making vaccines and recent manufacturing problems. Some pediatricians are said to be telling parents to reschedule scheduled shots for their children. Health officials worry that if parents do not bring the children back, they will begin to come down with the disease the vaccines were meant to prevent.
- CNN.com, 12/4/01
For the complete article refer to http://www.cnn.com/2001/HEALTH/12/04/vaccine.shortage/index.html
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Andrew C. von Eschenbach will be named by President Bush today
to become the director of the National Cancer Institute. Eschenbach is a prostate cancer expert at the University of Texas. He is expected to take over the position in early 2002. Eschenbach was rumored to succeed Surgeon General David Satcher. Click here for more information.
- Houston Chronicle 12/6/01
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Health care professional, technical, and support jobs will increase 28 percent
this decade, employing 12.2 million people, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. About 1.6 million new positions in health care practitioner and technical occupations are projected by 2010. Of these, 561,000 are new RN positions. Openings for new and replacement RN openings are expected to total more than 1 million. Further details can be found at http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/mlrhome.htm.
- AHA News, 12/6/01
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The incidence of influenza has been low so far this year.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the proportion of respiratory specimens testing positive for flu ranged from 0.4 percent to 1.7 percent from Sept. 30 to Nov. 24, compared to 24 percent to 33 percent at the peak of the previous three seasons. The CDC noted that flu activity is expected to increase in the coming weeks and months, but vaccine supplies are plentiful. For more, go to http://www.cdc.gov.
- AHA News, 12/7/01
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John Baldwin will resign as dean of Dartmouth College Medical School
to focus on "the problem of the uninsured people in this country." Baldwin, 53, a cardiac surgeon, said he will push the college to charter an institute to study how a "rational, evidence-based system" of medical care for all can be implemented in the United States. While remaining as a professor of surgery, Baldwin plans to take a year's sabbatical to study health care policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He also hopes to find the time to return to the operating room. Baldwin's resignation is effective in June 2002.
- Associated Press, 12/11/01
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Patients soon may have the option of making key information
from their medical records available electronically to all the doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies involved in their care. A new non-profit organization called the Patient Safety Institute hopes to begin building a pilot version of an electronic network that would facilitate data-sharing among local doctors, hospitals, pharmacies, and medical laboratories. Data to be shared could include a patient?s current medicines, recent lab tests, allergies, and immunization record. The project is funded by contributions and loans from companies specializing in information technology and communications. For more information see http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28495-2001Dec11.html.
- Washington Post, 12/12/01
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The Kaiser Family Foundation reported Tuesday that the Internet
has overtaken the medical dictionary and encyclopedia as a key source of health information for teens and young people ages 15 to 24 years old. A sample of results: 68 percent of this age group have gone online to find health information; half look for content on specific diseases; 44 percent have looked up information on pregnancy, birth control, and sexually transmitted diseases; and 25 percent have received information about mental health issues and drug and alcohol problems. The report goes on to say that parents, teachers, and doctors are still the primary sources for health information. Click here for more information.
- Atlanta Journal Constitution, 12/12/01
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Obesity is reaching epidemic proportions
says Surgeon General David Satcher, and soon will be as great a threat to health as smoking. More than 61 percent of U.S. adults and 14 percent of adolescents are affected by obesity; some 300,000 deaths annually are directly related to obesity. In addition, Satcher noted, obesity costs the nation $117 billion per year. For more information, see http://www.cnn.com/2001/HEALTH/conditions/12/13/satcher.obesity/index.html for more information.
- CNN.com 12/13/01
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The St. Paul Companies will exit medical malpractice insurance
to avoid continuing heavy losses. This means the end of coverage by the St. Paul-based company, the nation's fourth-largest insurer, for 750 hospitals, 42,000 physicians and 73,000 other health-care workers nationwide, according to the New York Times. Losses had mounted, company spokespeople said, even though it had increased rates an average of 24 percent in more than 25 states. "Fueled by resentments against managed care, jury awards against doctors and hospitals now average $3.49 million each," the Times reported. In addition to $940 million in losses on its malpractice insurance, the St. Paul had $941 million in losses after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. See http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/13/business/13MEDI.html for more information.
- New York Times, 12/13/01
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New drug effectively treats the common cold,
according to researchers. In tests on more than 2,000 people, the drug when given within a day of first symptoms shortened illness by about a day, made people feel better within 24 hours, and cut the amount of virus they had, potentially lessening the chances they'd spread it to others. See http://www.pioneerplanet.com/health/hea_docs/209664.htm for more information.
- St. Paul Pioneer Press, 12/18/01
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"Stem cells have recently burst
from the obscurity of the research laboratory into the arena of national politics, propelled by assertions that they are either the fruits of murder or the panacea for the degenerative diseases of age," Nicholas Wade writes in the New York Times. See http://www.nytimes.com/pages/science/index.html for his and related articles on stem cell science and policy.
- New York Times, 12/18/01
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Nursing job opportunities will continue to be strong in 2002,
say employers and nursing associations,with hospitals offering bonuses or loan forgiveness programs. Nursing continues to be a profession in which job openings outnumber applicants. At the same time, enrollment at nursing schools is down 20 percent nationwide. This concerns health care administrators, who are looking for creative ways to attract people into the profession, where the demand for nursing services continues to rise. The Florida Nursing Association, for example, is planning on asking lawmakers to reduce out-of-state student tuition for people who want to earn master's degrees at state colleges. For more information on the nursing shortage in Florida, click here.
- South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 12/17/01
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More than three-quarters of all U.S. patients with the AIDS virus resist drug treatment.
About 78 percent of HIV patients tested have an infection that resists one or more of the drugs used to treat it, researchers reported on Tuesday. Unless better drugs are developed soon, or until a vaccine is invented that can control the virus, patients will have ever-lessening chances of using drugs to counter AIDS, the researchers told a conference sponsored by the American Society of Microbiology. For the full story click here.
- www.reuters.com, 12/18/01
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A Florida company is ready to introduce an ID device that can be implanted
into humans. These devices - read by a special scanner - can contain important medical information and/or serve as the ultimate form of identification. Some speculate that the device could be used for purposes similar to keys or ATM cards. Applied Digital Solutions currently makes implantable chips for livestock and a monitoring bracelet for Alzheimer's patients. The company expects to begin sales in South America within the next 90 days and hopes to have FDA approval in the United States by mid-2002. For more click here.
- Los Angeles Times, 12/19/01
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The trend toward inclusion of some form of spiritual practice in healthcare
education appears to be accelerating - and maturing, from the speculative to the practical. This year, 72 medical schools - well over half of those in the United States - have offered some kind of course on spirituality and healing. This represents an increase from only three such courses in 1992. Advocates point to scientific based evidence of the benefits of prayer and meditation to the reduction of stress. To read more, click here.
- Christian Science Monitor, 12/20/01
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The governor of Washington is submitting a budget that includes cuts
in state aid to higher education and gives universities unlimited ability to raise tuition next year. The state, which is facing a $1.2 billion shortfall, is looking at trimming aid to the state's four university's by 5 percent and community colleges by 3 percent, which would save $54 million. Higher education officials would be forced to raise tuition anywhere from 12 percent to 18 percent to make up for the cuts.
- Associated Press, 12/20/01
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Undergraduate nursing school enrollments increased 3.7 percent in 2001,
ending a six-year decline, according to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. The AACN cautioned, however, that even with the increase, the number of students in the educational pipeline is still insufficient to meet the projected demand for 1 million new nurses over the next 10 years. The survey found that total enrollment in 548 nursing programs leading to the baccalaureate degree was 106,557 in 2001. By comparison, the total enrollment in 1995, the year enrollments began to dip, was 127,683 for all baccalaureate programs. AACN officials attributed the rise in enrollment to more aggressive recruitment efforts.
- AHA News, 12/21/01
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The rate at which doctors prescribe antibiotics to non-hospitalized patients fell
by about one-quarter in the 1990s, a new study shows. The finding suggests efforts to cut down on the unnecessary prescription of antibiotics have been at least partially successful. However, the rate held steady in emergency departments and outpatient clinics. Moreover, the survey, by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, did find that the use of two powerful broad-spectrum drugs is on the rise (azithromycin/clarithromycin and quinolones). Click here for more.
- Rueters, 12/21/01
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