Health Care Delivery

On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we feature several leaders in diversity, equity, and inclusion advancing health equity in their respective organization’s policy and practice initiatives.

Specific dosing regimens of treatments prescribed by blood specialists have not been widely studied, despite the advent of newer hemophilia therapies, the researchers said.

Jessica Allegretti, MD, MPH, medical director of the Crohn's and Colitis Center, Brigham and Women's Hospital, discusses the standard of care for the prevention and treatment of primary and recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI).

Baseline risk assessment that includes prior treatment history for cancer, prior cardiovascular events, and markers for potential heart damage are all important, emphasizes Tochi M. Okwuosa, DO, cardiologist and director of cardio-oncology at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.

Subanalyses of data from the LIBERTY PN-PRIME and LIBERTY PN-PRIME2 studies illustrate how dupilumab for prurigo nodularis can better patient outcomes, including quality of life and symptom burden.

Candida auris was first reported in the United States in 2016; the highly contagious fungal infection has been labeled an “urgent threat” by the CDC, and its spread may have aided by underresourced public health systems.

Gov. Mark Gordon sings a ban on the use of abortion pills in Wyoming; a new study shows that Affordable Care Act has reduced racial disparities in health care; California Gov. Gavin Newsom announces a contract to make affordable insulin.

Osimertinib (Tagrisso; AstraZeneca) now has shown a statistically significant and clinically meaningful overall survival benefit in both the early adjuvant and late-stage metastatic settings.

Age-specific risk factors for asthma-like symptoms were identified in the first, second, and third years of life, a new study finds.

Samyukta Mullangi, MD, MBA, oncology fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and incoming medical director at Thyme Care, explained Thyme Care’s value-based care (VBC) system in oncology and the benefits of care navigation.

The high court in North Dakota voted to protect abortion in that state; an outside panel of FDA expert advisors voted to support a full approval for Paxlovid; Sanofi follows competitors' price caps for insulin.

Medicare prospective payment for dialysis modestly increased availability and use of home-based dialysis treatment but did not affect historic racial disparities in home dialysis.

Spending on novel therapies in high-risk bladder cancer had minimal impact on Oncology Care Model payments to practices, according to this cohort study and an average performance estimation.

Lawyers were questioned in a federal lawsuit intending to overturn approval of a drug used for medication abortion; during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021, US maternal mortality increased for the third year in a row; the Alzheimer’s Association is lobbying Congress to push for Medicare coverage of new Alzheimer drugs under early access.

The Skin Pain Numeric Rating Scale, Worst-Itch Numeric Rating Scale, and Dermatology Life Quality Index were evaluated for their content validity, fit-for-purpose, and psychometric and measurement properties among patients with the chronic skin disease being treated with dupilumab.

Risk of flare in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) was low after fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) for the treatment of recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI).

A recent study identified disparities in cachexia incidence among patients with stage IV non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) across different racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups.

A health system transformational leadership framework and management system made visible and eliminated defects in value and was associated with reduced annual Medicare expenditures and increased quality between 2017 and 2020.

Findings of a meta-analysis showed that women with epilepsy were at increased odds of miscarriage, stillbirth, and maternal death, and risk of poor perinatal outcomes increased with greater use of antiseizure medication.

There may be discrepancies in the types of information patients want and the information they receive when multiple myeloma treatment decisions are made, a recent study found.

The Biden administration released the list of 27 Medicare Part B drugs that are subject to rebates back to the government for having price increases that rose faster than inflation as well as the removal of out-of-pocket costs for some vaccines covered under Part D.

In this new analysis, investigators found significant agreement between in-person and remote assessments.

COVID-19 strained already-burdened community partners, affecting service delivery, communication, and partnerships. Managed care organization (MCO) partnerships with these organizations evolved in response to changing needs and resources.

Patients who had ruxolitinib added to their prophylactic regimens had lower rates of acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD).

Manmeet Ahluwalia, MD, MBA, chief, Solid Tumor Medical Oncology; deputy director; and chief scientific officer at Miami Cancer Institute, addressed disparities in genomic testing among minority patients with cancer, as well as equitable care strategies at his organization’s Center for Equity in Cancer Care & Research.

When a series of winter storms in Austin, Texas, in February 2021, 62% of children with epilepsy were negatively affected, according to a new study.

Biden’s proposed budget emphasizes expanding health care and lowering drug costs; nasal spray zavegepant (Zavzpret) approved for treating adults with acute migraine; updated guidelines may help more women detect breast cancer early on.

A session at the ACCC 2023 Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit addressed the promise and potential drawbacks of multicancer early detection (MCED) testing for patients in the primary care setting.

A combination of evidence-based interventions and team-based approaches shows efficacy in helping physicians care for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), according to one study.

Given the cost and impact of chronic diseases on the US health care system, health technology like digital coaching for chronic diseases is increasingly being looked at as a way to offer personalized therapies on a wide scale.