March, 2024

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Covid’s scientific silver lining: A chance to watch the human immune system respond in real time

STAT

While an increasingly anxious world watched a new coronavirus spread across the globe in early 2020, veteran immunologist Rafi Ahmed quickly grasped that his field was about to experience something truly extraordinary. His former student Ali Ellebedy was gnawed by frustration as Covid shutdowns stalled his influenza research; it took until the summer, when mass vaccination planning hit his radar, before the same realization kicked in.

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SAEM Clinical Images Series: Purple Finger

ALiEM - Pharm Pearls

A 30-year-old female with a past medical history of Crohn’s Disease presented to the ED for evaluation of an acutely bruised right 4th finger. She stated she was typing on a computer keyboard approximately 10 minutes prior to presentation and she noticed a sudden popping sensation at the base of her right ring finger. After the popping sensation, she noticed a cool sensation of the finger and numbness to the entire finger.

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After Amylyx drug failure, what’s next for ALS?

PharmaVoice

The company’s combo treatment Relyvrio was approved in 2022, but after failing a phase 3 trial, may be pulled from the market.

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Swedish researchers develop new AI computer model to detect lymphatic cancer

Pharma Times

In the study, the Lymphoma Artificial Reader System accurately detected 90% of lymphatic cancers

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Navigating Payroll Compliance: Future-Proofing Payroll in an Evolving Regulatory Landscape

Speaker: Jennifer Hill

Payroll compliance is a cornerstone of business success, yet for small and midsize businesses, it’s becoming increasingly challenging to navigate the ever-evolving landscape of federal, state, and local regulations. Mistakes can lead to costly penalties and operational disruptions, making it essential to adopt advanced solutions that ensure accuracy and efficiency.

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How expanded methadone access helped Switzerland defuse its drug crisis

STAT

ZURICH — The lobby of this addiction clinic is unremarkable, really, except for the network of metal chutes and tubes that hug the walls as they snake downward from a pharmacy on the upper floors. Every few minutes, a new prescription comes clattering down, delivering a bottle full of powerful and effective pills used to treat opioid addiction to a waiting patient at the front desk.

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More Trending

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STAT+: Gene-edited pig kidney transplanted into a living patient for the first time

STAT

In a new test of xenotransplantation, a medical team at Massachusetts General Hospital announced Thursday that, for the first time, it had transplanted a kidney from a CRISPR gene-edited pig into a living patient. Surgeons performed the milestone procedure over four hours on Saturday, March 16, without complications. As of Thursday morning, the organ recipient, a 62-year-old man named Richard Slayman, was “recovering well” and expected to be discharged soon, the hospital said in a

Hospitals 363
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STAT+: New gene therapy, to be priced at $4.25 million, has already transformed children’s lives

STAT

Every morning, Victoria Rasberry gets up before 6 a.m., walks to the bedroom down the hall, and helps her 8-year-old daughter Addi slide into a set of contraptions that squeeze and suck out the thick mucus constantly threatening to choke her airways closed. She feeds Addi breakfast through a stomach tube and makes sure she has the right mix of the 28 different medications required to keep her free of pain, infections, and seizures.

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A study says intermittent fasting is making people drop dead. Oh, come on

STAT

The news is everywhere in my social news feeds this morning: A popular fad diet is apparently lethal, scientific research says. Specifically, a study found that caloric restriction, also known as intermittent fasting, has a 91% risk of death due to cardiovascular disease. Except scientific research doesn’t say that — and not only should you not be worried about this study, you shouldn’t be wasting brain glucose thinking about it.

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Opinion: The evidence is clear: A liquid-only diet before a colonoscopy is unnecessary

STAT

Since colorectal cancer is on the rise in people younger than age 50, national guidelines have recently pushed the starting age for colorectal cancer screening down to 45. We need to spread the word. Yet we specialists continue to provide outdated and disproven recommendations on colonoscopy bowel preparation that make the process more difficult for the millions of patients who undergo colonoscopy every year: We tell them to adopt a clear liquid diet the day before their procedure.

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From Diagnosis to Delivery: How AI is Revolutionizing the Patient Experience

Speaker: Simran Kaur, Founder & CEO at Tattva Health Inc.

The healthcare landscape is being revolutionized by AI and cutting-edge digital technologies, reshaping how patients receive care and interact with providers. In this webinar led by Simran Kaur, we will explore how AI-driven solutions are enhancing patient communication, improving care quality, and empowering preventive and predictive medicine. You'll also learn how AI is streamlining healthcare processes, helping providers offer more efficient, personalized care and enabling faster, data-driven

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STAT+: The methadone clinic monopoly: Opioid treatment chains backed by private equity are fighting calls for reform

STAT

Private equity firms have acquired stakes in nearly one-third of all methadone clinics in recent years, gaining outsize control of the U.S. addiction treatment industry even as the country’s opioid epidemic has developed into a full-fledged public health crisis. A small handful of little-known financial institutions now has an ownership stake in 562 methadone clinics across the country, according to a first-of-its-kind STAT analysis.

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STAT+: As Humira biosimilars take over the market, CVS has created a new ploy: the drug ‘rebate credit’

STAT

The biggest enticement that large pharmacy benefit managers offer to the employers that hire them is drug rebates — a steady stream of money sent back to their clients, a tangible symbol of the discounts that PBMs are able to wrangle out of pharmaceutical companies. PBMs, the middlemen of drug pricing negotiations, also claim portions of those lucrative rebates for themselves.

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STAT+: During the pandemic, were great vaccines bad business? A company-by-company review

STAT

It’s been four years since Covid-19 emerged, igniting a pandemic that killed millions of people and brought the world to its knees. A key factor in taming the pandemic was the creation of effective vaccines , which have saved millions of lives. You’d think developing a successful vaccine would be an unmitigated win, from a financial perspective.

Vaccines 363
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Study: Gilead antiviral drug shows promise as a treatment for Ebola Sudan

STAT

A new study suggests the antiviral drug obeldesivir may be effective in curing Ebola Sudan infections, for which there are currently no approved vaccines or treatments. Scientists at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston tested the drug, made by Gilead, in primates, starting treatment 24 hours after the animals were given what should have been a lethal dose of Sudan ebolavirus by intramuscular injection.

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Why Every Small Business Needs an HCM Solution: A Comprehensive Guide

Managing HR tasks like payroll, compliance, and employee data can overwhelm small businesses. That’s where a Human Capital Management (HCM) solution comes in. Our eBook, Why Every Small Business Needs an HCM Solution: A Comprehensive Guide , shows how an HCM system automates tedious processes, ensuring your business stays compliant and efficient. You’ll learn how to simplify payroll, eliminate costly errors, and empower your employees with self-service tools.

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Opinion: No parent who has seen the children I’ve treated for measles would refuse a vaccine

STAT

Over the past year, I have watched many children die of measles. In the final stages, little lungs, filled with fluid and racked with inflammation, struggle for oxygen. The victims breathe faster and faster, gasping for air until, exhausted, they stop.

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STAT+: UnitedHealth is on a buying spree of outpatient surgery centers

STAT

UnitedHealth Group quietly acquired dozens of outpatient facilities in 2023, with a particular focus on surgery centers, according to a STAT review of company financial filings. Those acquisitions — nearly all of which the company never announced — build on the network of some 90,000 physicians UnitedHealth Group has amassed in recent years.

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STAT+: Medicare couldn’t cover Wegovy for weight loss. But now that it’s also a heart drug, the door is open

STAT

WASHINGTON — Novo Nordisk’s newly won permission to market the heart benefits of its obesity drug Wegovy could provide a backdoor way to expand access to the drug for people on Medicare, experts told STAT. Currently, Medicare is prohibited by law from covering medications for obesity treatment alone. While companies that manufacture wildly popular anti-obesity medications and their allies haven’t been successful in lobbying Congress to change the law , the Food and Drug

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Rigid rules at methadone clinics are jeopardizing patients’ path to recovery from opioid addiction

STAT

DETROIT — Every morning, Rebecca Smith, nursing a surgically repaired knee, carefully walks down the hallway of her brutalist brick apartment building, takes the elevator one floor to the lobby, and negotiates the sharply angled driveway outside. There, she waits for an Uber to take her to the last place she wants to go: her methadone clinic.

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Position Your Pharmacy for Expansion

Speaker: Chris Antypas and Josh Halladay

Access to limited distribution drugs and payer contracts are key to pharmacy expansion. But how do you prepare your operations to take the next step? Meaningful data: Collect and share clinical data regarding outcomes, utilization, and more Reporting: Limited distribution models require efficient tracking and reporting systems Workflows: Align workflows with specific pharma and payer contractual requirements For in-depth, expert insights on pharmacy expansion, watch this webinar from Inovalon.

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Girls are starting puberty earlier than ever. For some, that comes with major mental health risks

STAT

Zaria was just 9 years old when a nurse practitioner delivered news that rocked her world: The young girl was already showing signs of puberty development, and she was on track to get her period within the next year. Surprised by this timeline, Zaria’s mother, Chanell, worked with a pediatrician to plan healthier meals, hoping that managing her daughter’s weight gain could give her a couple more precious years with her childhood unchanged.

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Florida health officials provide scant details on measles cases, worrying health experts

STAT

On Sunday, public health officials in two Michigan counties warned their residents that they may have been exposed to measles. In Wayne County , an adult who had contracted the virus abroad had been in health-related settings in Dearborn on two days last week — two urgent care clinics, a CVS pharmacy, and a hospital emergency department. Health officials in neighboring Washtenaw County issued a similar alert about a different case — also an adult, also infected abroad —

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RSV monoclonal Beyfortus was 90% effective at preventing hospitalizations in children this winter: CDC

STAT

A new monoclonal antibody product to protect against respiratory syncytial virus was 90% effective at preventing little children from being hospitalized with RSV, according to new data from the first season it was in use. The data , published Thursday in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention publication, looked at how well Beyfortus worked in the children whose parents managed to secure a scarce dose of the drug.

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STAT+: In stunning outcome, Amylyx’s ALS drug fails large clinical trial

STAT

Amylyx Pharmaceuticals said Friday that its treatment for ALS, called Relyvrio, failed to provide any benefit for patients in a large clinical trial — a stunning outcome that now has the company considering a voluntary withdrawal of the approved medicine from the market. “This is really hard for us, and it’s really hard for our team who care so much, but it’s so much harder for people with ALS and their families, and we have to keep that perspective,” said a so

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Best Practices to Streamline Compensation Management: A Foundation for Growth

Speaker: Joe Sharpe and James Carlson

Payroll optimization can be one of the most time-consuming and complex factors of small business management. Yet, organizations that crack the code on streamlining employee compensation often discover innovative avenues for growth. With the right strategies in place, outsourcing and streamlining payroll processes can result in substantial time and resource savings.

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How the U.S. is sabotaging its best tools to prevent deaths in the opioid epidemic

STAT

The opioid overdose epidemic has burned through the U.S. for nearly 30 years. Yet for all that time, the country has had tools that are highly effective at preventing overdose deaths: methadone and buprenorphine. These medicines are cheap and easy to distribute. People who take them use illicit drugs at far lower rates, and are at far lower risk of overdose or death.

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Microplastics found in blood vessels linked to greater risk of heart problems, study finds

STAT

Micro and nanoplastics, tiny pieces of plastic scattered throughout the environment, have been increasingly found to be able to enter the body, raising questions about where they end up and how they affect people’s health. In a new study, researchers say they have for the first time detected these plastic pieces inside fatty plaques that accumulate in blood vessels and linked them to an increased rate of heart problems.

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Opinion: Free tuition won’t fix medicine’s diversity problem without admissions reform

STAT

Medical students at Albert Einstein School of Medicine in New York City gathered last week to hear a life-changing announcement: Ruth Gottesman revealed she would be donating $1 billion, ensuring no student at Einstein will pay tuition ever again. Leadership at Albert Einstein School of Medicine celebrated the donation as a means to attract a more diverse student body.

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Covid-19 increases risk of developing autoimmune disease, but vaccination helps, large study shows

STAT

Having Covid-19 increases a person’s risk of developing an autoimmune disease in the year after infection, a large study out of South Korea and Japan reports, but vaccination helps decrease that risk. Researchers used the medical records of 10 million Korean and 12 million Japanese adults to see whether those who had Covid were more likely to be diagnosed with autoimmune inflammatory rheumatic diseases, or AIRDs, in the year following infection.

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Enhance Healthcare Efficiency With Top Payroll & HCM Services

Running a healthcare facility requires precision and care, not just for patients but also for your staff. Our guide, "A Buyer’s Guide to Payroll & HCM Services," helps healthcare providers choose the best provider. Efficient payroll management ensures timely, accurate payments, critical for maintaining staff morale and trust. Compliance support helps navigate complex healthcare regulations and avoid costly fines.