Healthcare Consumerism

Health Care Money You May Be Entitled To

2011-08-05T13:19:00.000-04:00

At Lyfebank Ohio, we're always interested in the latest Health Care Reform news. Here's Elaine Farstad's version of Health Care Reform: she bills her doctor for the work she misses by having to wait inordinate amounts of time in his waiting room. And surprisingly enough, he pays her at her hourly rate of $47.00!

Be sure to check out the link in this article of physicians who adhere to the tenets of the Ideal Medical Practices Organization, which encourages its doctors to be on time.

Would you ever consider invoicing your doctor for your lost time? Please let us know in our comment section below.

Have a great weekend!

Would your doctor pay for wasted time?

By Elizabeth Cohen, Senior Medical Correspondent

June 30, 2011 9:22 a.m. EDT

Dr. Timothy Malia of Fairport, New York, gives his patients $5 if they wait longer than 15 minutes for their appointments.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

The average wait time at doctors' offices in the United States is 24 minutes
Some physicians are willing to pay patients for a long wait at the office
Keep in mind that sometimes a situation is out of a doctor's control

(CNN) -- Elaine Farstad got antsy as she waited for her doctor, who was late for her scheduled appointment. Then she got downright impatient. Then, as nearly two hours passed, she got mad. Then she came up with an idea.

"I decided to bill the doctor," she says. "If you waste my time, you've bought my time."

When Farstad returned home, she figured out her hourly wage working as an IT specialist at Boeing in Everett, Washington. She doubled it for the two hours she'd spent in the waiting room, and mailed the invoice to her doctor.

"It's ludicrous -- why would I wait for free?" says Farstad, who is now an engineering graduate student at North Carolina State University. "Like we all learned in kindergarten, it's about respecting each other."

In years gone by, doctors would likely have scoffed at the suggestion they reimburse patients for time spent waiting. But Farstad's doctor sent her a check for $100, the full amount she requested, and some tardy doctors tell CNN they give patients money (or a gift) before the patient even asks.

"I love this!" says Dave deBronkart, co-chair of the Society for Participatory Medicine. "It's magnificent that some physicians are valuing patients' time. It's a commitment to designing a practice that truly serves patients."

Gifts from late doctors

The average wait time at doctors' offices in the United States is 24 minutes, according to a report released in 2010 by Press Ganey, a group that researches health care performance.

When he keeps patients waiting more than 15 minutes, Dr. Timothy Malia, a primary care physician in Fairport, New York, hands them a $5 bill. If patients in Eugene, Oregon, wait more than 10 minutes to see Dr. Pamela Wible, they receive a handmade soap or a bottle of lotion. When Dr. Cyrus Peikari, an internist in Dallas, recently had to miss a day of work because of a family emergency, he gave the patients whose appointments he canceled $50 at their next appointment.

One patient didn't want to take the check, but Peikari insisted. "I suggested to him, 'Your time is just as valuable, if not more so, than mine.' "

Not all doctors are so sympathetic. Farstad tells about another appointment. It was for 8 a.m. with her gynecologist, and she had to leave at 8:40 a.m. when the doctor still wasn't there. In the parking lot, she ran into the doctor, who was just getting out of her car.

"The doctor told me she had a little one and she was never in the office until ten to nine," she remembers. "I asked her why she scheduled appointments at 8 a.m., and she said to give the patients time to do paperwork. I was so mad I was shaking. I never went back to her."

What to do when your doctor keeps you waiting

Keep in mind that sometimes a situation is out of a doctor's control. For example, some doctors are instructed by their bosses to book patients at 15 minute increments to make more money, which means if one patient needs more time, the patients later in the day will get delayed.

If that's the case, and the doctor is perpetually late and you don't like waiting, you can try one of these approaches.

Of the six doctors Elaine Farstad sent an invoice to, three have paid.

1. Send your doctor a bill
Here's an example of an invoice Farstad sent to a tardy physician. She says over the years she has billed six doctors who were more than 30 minutes late, and half have paid.

2. Find an on-time doctor
This map shows physicians who adhere to the tenets of the Ideal Medical Practices Organization, which encourages its doctors to be on time.

3. Schedule smartly
For example, try booking the first appointment after lunch. For more scheduling tips, read the previous Empowered Patient column: Waiting for the doctor... and waiting and waiting.

4. Mention the doctors in this article to your own doctor
Doctors might pay up pre-emptively if they hear their colleagues are doing the same, deBronkart says.

5. Blog about your doctor's lateness

DeBronkart, who blogs as "E-Patient Dave," wrote about his experience waiting 45 minutes to get an X-ray. He says the head of the radiology practice then called him and acknowledged they needed to change the way they scheduled patients.

Dropping Rx Drug Costs

2011-07-25T10:32:00.000-04:00

Originally found: http://www.cleveland.com/healthfit/index.ssf/2011/07/drug_prices_to_plummet_in_wave.html

Drug prices to plummet in wave of expiring patents

Published: Monday, July 25, 2011, 8:15 AM

By Associated Press

Associated PressVarious prescription drugs are displayed on the automated pharmacy assembly line at Medco Health Solutions Inc., in Willingboro, N.J. The cost of prescription medicines used by millions of people every day is about to plummet. The next 15 months will bring generic versions of seven of the world's 20 best-selling drugs, including the top two: cholesterol fighter Lipitor and blood thinner Plavix.

The cost of prescription medicines used by millions of people every day is about to plummet.

The next 14 months will bring generic versions of seven of the world's 20 best-selling drugs, including the top two: cholesterol fighter Lipitor and blood thinner Plavix.

The magnitude of this wave of expiring drugs patents is unprecedented. Between now and 2016, blockbusters with about $255 billion in global annual sales are set to go off patent, notes EvaluatePharma Ltd., a London research firm. Generic competition will decimate sales of the brand-name drugs and slash the cost to patients and companies that provide health benefits.

Top drugs getting generic competition by September 2012 are taken by millions every day: Lipitor alone is taken by about 4.3 million Americans and Plavix by 1.4 million. Generic versions of big-selling drugs for blood pressure, asthma, diabetes, depression, high triglycerides, HIV and bipolar disorder also are coming by then.

The flood of generics will continue for the next decade or so, as about 120 brand-name prescription drugs lose market exclusivity, according to prescription benefit manager Medco Health Solutions Inc.

"My estimation is at least 15 percent of the population is currently using one of the drugs whose patents will expire in 2011 or 2012," says Joel Owerbach, chief pharmacy officer for Excellus Blue Cross Blue Shield, which serves most of upstate New York.

Those patients, along with businesses and taxpayers who help pay for prescription drugs through corporate and government prescription plans, collectively will save a small fortune. That's because generic drugs typically cost 20 percent to 80 percent less than the brand names.

Doctors hope the lower prices will significantly reduce the number of people jeopardizing their health because they can't afford medicines they need.

Dr. Nieca Goldberg, director of the Women's Heart Program at NYU Langone Medical Center in Manhattan, worries about patients who are skipping checkups and halving pills to pare costs.

"You can pretty much tell by the numbers when I check the patient's blood pressure or cholesterol levels," that they've not taken their medications as often as prescribed, she says.

Even people with private insurance or Medicare aren't filling all their prescriptions, studies show, particularly for cancer drugs with copays of hundreds of dollars or more.

The new generics will slice copayments of those with insurance. For the uninsured, who have been paying full price, the savings will be much bigger.

Daly Powers, 25, an uninsured student who works two part-time jobs at low wages, says he often can't afford the $220 a month for his depression and attention deficit disorder pills. He couldn't buy either drug in June and says he's struggling with his Spanish class and his emotions. He looks forward to his antidepressant, Lexapro, going generic early next year.

"It'd make all the difference in the world," says Powers, of Bryan, Texas.

Generic medicines are chemically equivalent to the original brand-name drugs and work just as well for nearly all patients.

When a drug loses patent protection, often only one generic version is on sale for the first six months, so the price falls a little bit initially. Then, several other generic makers typically jump in, driving prices down dramatically.

Last year, the average generic prescription cost $72, versus $198 for the average brand-name drug, according to consulting firm Wolters Kluwer Pharma Solutions. Those figures average all prescriptions, from short-term to 90-day ones.

Average copayments last year were $6 for generics, compared with $24 for brand-name drugs given preferred status by an insurer and $35 for nonpreferred brands, according to IMS Health.

Among the drugs that recently went off patent, Protonix, for severe heartburn, now costs just $16 a month for the generic, versus about $170 for the brand name. And of the top sellers that soon will have competition, Lipitor retails for about $150 a month, Plavix costs almost $200 a month and blood pressure drug Diovan costs about $125 a month. For those with drug coverage, their out-of-pocket costs for each of those drugs could drop below $10 a month.

Jo Kelly, a retired social worker in Conklin, Mich., and her husband Ray, a retired railroad mechanic, each take Lipitor and two other brand-name medicines, plus some generic drugs. Both are 67, and they land in the Medicare prescription "doughnut hole," which means they must pay their drugs' full cost, by late summer or early fall each year. That pushes their monthly cost for Lipitor to about $95 each, and their combined monthly prescription cost to nearly $1,100.

Generic Lipitor should hit pharmacies Nov. 30 and cost them around $10 each a month.

"It would be a tremendous help for us financially," she says. "It would allow us to start going out to eat again."

For people with no prescription coverage, the coming savings on some drugs could be much bigger. Many discount retailers and grocery chains sell the most popular generics for $5 a month or less to draw in shoppers.

The impact of the coming wave of generics will be widespread — and swift.

Insurers use systems that make sure patients are switched to a generic the first day it's available. Many health plans require newly diagnosed patients to start out on generic medicines. And unless the doctor writes "brand only" on a prescription, if there's a generic available, that's almost always what the pharmacist dispenses.

"A blockbuster drug that goes off patent will lose 90 percent of its revenue within 24 months. I've seen it happen in 12 months," says Ben Weintraub, a research director at Wolters Kluwer Pharma Solutions.

The looming revenue drop is changing the economics of the industry.

In the 1990s, big pharmaceutical companies were wildly successful at creating pills that millions of people take every day for common conditions, from heart disease and diabetes to osteoporosis and chronic pain. Double-digit quarterly profit increases became the norm.

But the patents on those blockbusters, which were filed years before the drugs went on sale, last for 20 years at most, and many expire soon.

In recent years, many drug companies have struggled to develop new blockbuster drugs, despite multibillion-dollar research budgets and more partnerships with scientists at universities and biotech companies. The dearth of successes, partly because the "easy" treatments have already been found, has turned the short-term prognosis for "big pharma" anemic.

"The profit dollars that companies used to reinvest in innovation are no longer going to be coming," warns Terry Hisey, life sciences leader at consultant Deloitte LLP's pharmaceutical consulting business. He says that raises "long-term concerns about the industry's ability to bring new medicines to market."

But pharmaceutical companies can save billions when they stop promoting drugs that have new generic rivals, and U.S. drug and biotech companies are still spending more than $65 billion a year on R&D.

The 20 new drug approvals in the U.S. this year, and other important ones expected in the next few years, eventually will help fill the revenue hole.

For now, brand-name drugmakers are scrambling to adjust for the billions in revenue that will soon be lost. Many raise prices 20 percent or more over the last couple years before generics hit to maximize revenue. Some contract with generic drugmakers for "authorized generics," which give the brand-name company a portion of the generic sales.

Brand-name companies also are trimming research budgets, partnering with other companies to share drug development costs and shifting more manufacturing and patient testing to low-cost countries.

Pharmaceutical companies have cut about 10 percent of U.S. jobs in four years, from a peak of about 297,000 to about 268,000, according to Labor Department data. Nearly two-thirds of the cuts came in the last 1 1/2 years, partly because of big mergers that were driven by the need to shore up pipelines and boost profit in the short term by slashing overlap.

Drug companies also are trying to stabilize future sales by putting more sales reps in emerging markets such as China and India, and diversifying into businesses that get little or no generic competition. Those include vaccines, diagnostic tests, veterinary medicines and consumer health products.

As the proportion of prescriptions filled with generic drugs jumped to 78 percent in 2010, from 57 percent in 2004, annual increases in prescription drug spending slowed, to just 4 percent in 2010. According to the Generic Pharmaceutical Association, generics saved the U.S. health care system more than $824 billion from 2000 through 2009, and now save about $1 billion every three days.

The savings are only going to get greater as our overweight population ages. People who take their medicines regularly often avoid costly complications and hospitalizations, says AARP's policy chief, John Rother, bringing the system even bigger savings than the cheaper drugs.

In addition, many patients taking a particular brand-name drug will defect when a slightly older rival in the same class goes generic.

Global sales of Lipitor peaked at $12.9 billion in 2006, the year Zocor, an older drug in the statin class that reduces bad cholesterol, went generic. Lipitor sales then declined slowly but steadily to about $10.7 billion last year. That still makes Lipitor the biggest drug to go generic.

For patients, it's a godsend.

Douglas Torok, 59, of Erie, Pa., now spends nearly $290 every three months for insulin for his Type 2 diabetes, plus four daily pills, including Lipitor, Plavix and two generics, for his blood pressure and cholesterol problems. The $40,000-a-year foundry supervisor fears not being able to cover the out-of-pocket costs when he retires and doesn't have a generous prescription plan.

In the meantime, once Lipitor and Plavix get generic competition his copayment will plunge from the current $1 per day for each.

"I will pay $16 for 90 days" for both, says Torok, who hopes to travel more. "It's a big deal for me on my income."

Treat Rather Than Medicate

2011-07-15T09:32:00.001-04:00

The below article, originally found at http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/15/health-asthma-idUSL3E7IE0RM20110715 focuses on Asthma treatments rather than Asthma medications. Do you agree? Do you think that many things are mental over physical? Read the below article and share your feelings!

Treatment, not medicine, helps asthma patients feel better:study

(Reuters Life!) - Inhaling albuterol helps asthmatic lungs work better, but patients who get it don't feel much better than those treated with a placebo inhaler or phony acupuncture, according to a U.S. study.

The results, which appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, demonstrate the importance of, literally, caring for patients and not just providing drugs, said co-author Ted Kaptchuk of Harvard Medical School.

The findings also demonstrate the impact of the so-called "placebo effect," or the phenomenon seen in clinical trials when people given inactive, fake "treatments," such as a sugar pill or saline, show improvements.

"My honest opinion is that a lot of medicine is the doctor-patient relationship," Kaptchuk told Reuters Health.

"A lot of doctors don't know that, they think it's their drugs. Our study demonstrates that the interaction between the two is actually a very strong component of healthcare."

All of the 39 patients, each of whom had mild-to-moderate asthma, thought the placebos were just as effective as the real therapy.

Those who got albuterol reported a 50 percent improvement in symptoms. The ones who got phony albuterol said they improved by 50 percent as well, while those getting sham acupuncture had a subjective improvement rate of 46 percent.

The only thing that didn't work as well, according to the patients' impressions, was no therapy at all, with the asthmatics sent home after waiting for several hours. In those cases, patients reported 21 percent improvement.

Only when the researchers measured the patients' ability to force air from their lungs was the benefit of albuterol clear. The so-called FEV1 volume improved by 20 percent with the drug, nearly three times more than the 7 percent increase in patients getting the fake acupuncture, ersatz albuterol or no treatment.

Fake acupuncture turned out to be the most convincing treatment and was done doing needles that retract into the handle instead of going into the skin. In addition, the needles were "inserted" into the wrong acupuncture points, said Kaptchuk, who is trained in the discipline.

Eighty-five percent of the people who got it thought they were getting a real therapy, compared to 73 percent who received real albuterol and 66 percent who were getting placebo albuterol.

"Patients could not reliably detect the difference between this robust effect of the active drug and the effects of inhaled placebo and sham acupuncture," the researchers wrote.

They also said the findings show that a patient's self-report can be an unreliable indicator of actual improvement.

Kaptchuk said the test may help resolve the longstanding question of whether placebo treatments, because they seem to show a benefit, actually affect the physical illness.

"But changing subjective outcomes is very important for us," he said.

"There are lots of illnesses with no objective outcomes, like depression and chronic pain, and what we've demonstrated is that provision of care really does change people's experience." SOURCE:bit.ly/qjgMaW (Reporting by Gene Emery at Reuters Health; editing by Elaine Lies)

Food Pyramid- NO MORE!

2011-06-02T15:02:00.001-04:00

During the World War II era, American's were directed by the government to follow the food chart (on right). This chart and a message that was sweet and simple: as long as you eat healthy food, it is okay to cheat with the sweets and snacks every now and then. During this era American's were active in war, riding bicycles, playing sports, enjoying the weather, working for the war effort and overall were a very active population. However, as we know, the active lifestyles slowly turned into those of sedation and "couch potatoes." In turn, TV, internet, Wii, XBox, telephones, and other forms of technology grabbed the attention of American citizens and the USDA needed to change their message from eat healthy and cheat if you want to a more strict and focused guideline.
For the past 20 years nutritional guidelines have been a constant reminder of the growing health concern in the United States. Questions such as, "Are you eating enough fruits and vegetables?" "Are you SURE you want to eat that bag of potato chips?" or my personal favorite "Aren't you worried about your portion size?" have haunted almost every member of society once during a meal. However, there has never been an easy to understand, consistent message to the general public about what the right portion size is!
While in elementary and middle school, I learned about the following graphic:
The problem is/ was, that a pyramid with various foods did not help me understand what my dinner plate, lunch plate or snacks should look like. Luckily, my family understood the guidelines and always provided a balanced meal (the family rule was there should ALWAYS be something green on my dinner plate).
Yet, this is not always the case. What is a serving? How do you ensure that you have the perfect amount of carbohydrates while balancing fruit and vegetables? What happens when you go out to dinner and have no control over what the portions look like on your plate?

Additionally, this pyramid discusses a healthy lifestyle by only addressing one side of the problem. What about fitness? In school, when children learn about the pyramid, they have time to run around, play and have a fun recess on the playground or in the yard. As far as I remember, there is no class in 2nd grade that encourages students to "stay fit" or "work out." The First Lady's "Lets Move!" campaign to encourages children to stay active at home, but that is a new phenomenon to be recognized. For all of the above reasons, the government decided that the following pyramid should replace the relic from the 1990s(see right).
What is wrong with this pyramid you ask? It clearly includes fitness with the stairs and shows all of the food groups- however, it says nothing about quantity and portion control. It seems almost as if, in 2005, the USDA no longer cared about HOW MUCH food we ate as long as we knew what was supposed to be a balanced diet (meaning we eat the correct food groups and stay active).
This concept was a good idea... for those already living a healthy lifestyle! The pyramid from the 90's at least gave guidance on quantity- this just gives an outline.

It seems to me as if the newest food chart or nutritional guidelines, released June 2, 2011, is the best attempt to inform the public on portion control AND a balanced meal. The food plate (left) is a visual, friendly and easy way to understand what the food pyramids have been attempting to teach for the past 20 years! LyfeBank Ohio is thrilled that there is finally a joint effort encourage healthy food choices AND active lifestyles!
We also hope that you get active in your healthy lifestyle and make choices that promote wellness and active living. For more information about the new Food Plate, please visit http://www.choosemyplate.gov/. If you have any questions or concerns about the nutritional value of the food YOU put on your plate each day visit http://www.myfoodapedia.gov/ to learn more. Finally, if you are interested in "creating your own plate," contact LyfeBank Ohio or visit http://www.choosemyplate.gov/myplate/index.aspx to learn what is best for you!

Watch for a quick, informative and fun interpretation of the My Plate transition!

Dear 16-year old me

2011-05-16T14:00:00.001-04:00

LyfeBank Ohio is VERY excited for the upcoming Summer months. In our little town of Bexley, Ohio we have had 89 and 40 degree days with 72 hours of each other. However, with the upcoming, skin bearing weather, we want to make sure that all of our followers are safe in the sun. We encourage you to watch the below video and share it with ANYONE you believe may benefit.

We are always looking for more intriguing, useful, informative and relevant health care and health awareness resources. If you know of any other programs or causes you would like to see LyfeBank Ohio share, please contact Sarah Grinstein (SGrinstein@LyfeBankOhio.com).

Amended on : 6/14/2011 for additional information released by the FDA via an Associated Press Article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110614/ap_on_bi_ge/us_sunscreen_fda_rule;_ylt=Aq4ED1Gaod_Zi2TR9Ko5avTVJRIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJtZ3FkNmRyBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwNjE0L3VzX3N1bnNjcmVlbl9mZGFfcnVsZQRjcG9zAzEEcG9zAzIEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDbmV3cnVsZXN0b2N1

Last year (2010) an estimated 68,130 people in the U.S. were diagnosed with melanoma — the most dangerous form of skin cancer — and an estimated 8,700 died, according to the National Cancer Institute. Nearly $2 billion is spent treating the disease each year.

Food Revelation

2011-04-27T09:47:00.000-04:00

At the LyfeBank Ohio office, we are always discussing the growing obesity problem in the United States. It is for that reason that Jeannine and Sarah were ecstatic for the second season of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution to premier on ABC. However, after the first episode, the LyfeBank Ohio office was ‘up in arms’ with the stubborn attitude of the LA School board. Not only would the board immediately dismiss Jamie at their board meetings, but they banned him from any school that receives any benefits from the board. Jamie wasn’t allowed to look at the food, the kitchens or discuss the food with any students. Jeannine was in shock (understandable) that the PARENTS and EDUCATORS did nothing about the stubborn position of the LA school board- more specifically the superintendent of LA school district (John Deasy).

LUCKILY, people in LA and around the nation watched the first handful of episodes and were also shocked by the superintendent’s attitude (I’m glad it’s not just a LyfeBank Ohio concern). On April 26, Jamie Oliver and the Superintendent of the LA School District appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live. While on the show Deasy announced that he “wants” to discontinue offering flavored milk in his school district to fight childhood obesity.

As an office, we are not sure what changed his mind. Was it the national criticism he was receiving or was it that he truly had a “Food Revelation” that John Deasy can single handedly help fight obesity in the 2nd largest school district in the nation? I personally do not care one way or the other. As an office LyfeBank Ohio is VERY excited about the change and lesson learned from this situation.

If you want to make a change, go out and fight for it. Know what you want, figure out who you need to know, and work like a dog to make your goal a reality!

If you are interested in helping your county make a difference regarding obesity, health status, personal responsibility or anything else fostering a healthier America, please feel free to contact LyfeBank Ohio; we will help you make your change!

Learn About LyfeBank!

2011-04-19T09:49:00.001-04:00

Learn more about LyfeBank by watching this video

The Patient Access Network Foundation

2011-04-19T09:49:00.000-04:00

Assistance for Helping the Underinsured Access the Health Care They Need.

https://www.panfoundation.org/index.php

The Patient Access Network (PAN) Foundation was founded in October 2004 as a solution to help the underinsured access the health care they so desperately need to continue living a relatively normal and productive lifestyle.

Since then, PAN has provided more than 60,000 underinsured patients with over $99 million dollars in much needed financial assistance to cover out-of-pocket medical expenses. Many of these patients would have few alternatives without the help of PAN. That’s why charitable donations from both the public and private sector are so crucial to continuing the financial assistance provided by the Foundation.

The Patient Access Network Foundation is an independent, national 501 (c) (3) organization dedicated to providing underinsured patients with co-payment assistance through 21 disease-specific funds that give them access to the treatments they need.

If you’re interested in learning more about what you can do to help the underinsured lead healthier and happier lives, find out about the different ways to give to PAN. Donations are tax deductible and may be earmarked for use in specific funds. (Found on the PAN Foundation website)

The PAN foundation offers financial assistance to patients suffering from the following diseases:

Acromegaly

Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD)

Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS)

Breast Cancer

Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL)

Colorectal Cancer

Crohn's Disease

Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma (CTCL)

Cystic Fibrosis

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) Prevention and Treatment

Gaucher Disease

Growth Hormone Deficiency

Hepatitis B

Hepatitis C

Kidney Transplant Immunosuppressant

Multiple Myeloma

Multiple Sclerosis

Myelodysplastic Syndrome

Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma

Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV)

Retinal Vein Occlusion (RVO)

Rheumatoid Arthritis

Solid Organ Transplant

Thyroid Cancer

Uveitis

If you, or someone you love, are looking for assistance, please utilize this outstanding resource.

Please note, that LyfeBank Ohio does not endorse and has no relationship with the PAN Foundation. All we want to do is provide our readers and clients with the best information available.

The Breast Cancer Site

2011-04-19T09:43:00.000-04:00

There are many resources available for those suffering from Cancer and other terrible diseases. One resource that is "free" to all is www.thebreastcancersite.com. With a click of your mouse, you are able to supply free mammograms to women in need. Additionally, this site supplies various programs to help patients currently fighting cancer that cannot afford their medications- or that are currently uninsured. Below is one program made available through this site. If you are interested in learning more, we at LyfeBank Ohio, encourage you to give us a call or look around the website to see how you can help!

Help a Woman During Breast Cancer Treatment

Find the original article here

Help an underinsured woman with breast cancer obtain the medication she has been prescribed.
In the fight against breast cancer, women need all the help they can get. Imagine that you have a doctor's prescription for proven, life-saving drugs to help you in that battle. Now imagine that your insurance does not cover the cost of those drugs. Sadly, this is the case for an ever-expanding pool of Americans.
When insurance companies deny the costs of prescription medications, The Patient Access Network (PAN) Foundation can help. Traditional patient-assistance programs can only help the uninsured. In contrast, PAN seeks to help those patients whose insurance is inadequate to cover the costs of their treatment. Rather than consigning low-income and underinsured patients to the impossible choice between their health and their financial survival, PAN aims to bridge the gap in insurance coverage, helping patients obtain the medicine that their doctors have prescribed them.
You can help a woman with breast cancer afford her medication. Choose to provide:
One Day of Breast Cancer Medication ($21.00)
One Week of Breast Cancer Medication ($144.00)
One Week of Anemia Medication ($48.00). Anemia (a dangerously low level of iron) is a common side-effect of chemotherapy. Anemia can also develop from kidney conditions, heart disease, HIV-AIDS and other chronic diseases.
Patient Access Network (PAN) Foundation is an independent non-profit established in 2004 and dedicated to assisting patients who cannot afford the out-of-pocket costs associated with their treatment needs. With 20 disease-specific funds, PAN assists the underinsured in accessing health care treatments. Throughout all 50 states and three U.S. territories, PAN provides trained case managers with whom patients or advocates may speak about their care. Patient Access Network Foundation provides hope at times when people have nowhere else to turn.
After making your donation, you will receive an automated e-mail with a link to a full-color certificate of acknowledgment that you may print and frame for display or gift-giving. Adobe Acrobat Reader, or equivalent .pdf viewing program, is required to open the file. The certificate makes a great "instant" gift for an honored colleague, family member or friend.
Please note: Your donation is tax-deductible in the U.S.A., and you will receive a receipt from GreaterGood.org for your taxes. 100% of this gift goes to The Patient Access Network Foundation as a grant through GreaterGood.org.. GreaterGood Network stores do not receive any profit from the sale of this Gift That Gives More™; we bring it to you in the spirit of the greater good. GreaterGood.org has ultimate authority and discretion with regard to the distribution of its funds. All expenditures made are consistent with the exempt purposes of GreaterGood.org.

Columbus School gets Moving!!

2011-04-15T10:11:00.002-04:00

Originally found at: http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2011/04/15/copy/east-side-teacher-acts-on-michelle-obamas-call-to-get-moving.html?adsec=politics&sid=101

Written by:jshough@dispatch.com

East Side teacher acts on Michelle Obama's call to get moving

FRIDAY, APRIL 15, 2011 03:07 AM

BY JASON SHOUGH

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

While first lady Michelle Obama spoke yesterday to a crowd on the South Side, 25 high-school students in another part of town were stretching and kicking their legs.

It was the twice-a-week Fit Club meeting at Eastmoor Academy, a fitness program inspired by Mrs. Obama's Let's Move anti-obesity initiative.

Rio Green, a Spanish teacher at the East Side high school, founded the club in November after she read a newspaper article about Let's Move.

"I read it and thought, 'Wow, that would be an amazing thing to do with the students.'"

The club meets for an hour in the band room every Tuesday and Thursday after school, with students and Green exercising and discussing healthful eating habits.

Green, 26, prepares a different type of exercise for each meeting and has included kick-boxing, reggae workouts and hybrid forms of exercise that Green has created herself.

"We started with 40, until people started figuring out it was a real workout," Green said.

"It's much harder than gym," said Isaiah Earley, a 14-year-old freshman who joined the club in the fall.

Brittany Anderson, also a freshman at Eastmoor, said the club helps pull her away from the TV screen and computer monitor - a welcome change.

"Most of us sit in our house and are getting out of shape," she said.

Last year, the first lady aimed the national spotlight on promoting childhood wellness and, since then, school-based clubs and organizations on wellness have become increasingly popular.

The call to action was the perfect impetus for Green, who has struggled most of her life with her weight and had wanted to do something about it. She said the club has made her healthier.

"Students keep me on my toes," she said. "Every other day, they ask what I've eaten.

"It's about trying to make this a lifestyle change."

Fit Club also is raising funds for a multiple-sclerosis walk at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium this Saturday morning. Members have raised $500 so far, and many of the students will participate in the 1.5-mile walk.

Currently, 30 percent of children in Ohio are overweight, according to a state Health Department study released in March.

Last year, the Kaiser Foundation reported that children spend more than 50 hours a week in front of television and computer screens.

All students just need the chance to educate themselves and work out more, said Andrelisae Robinson, a 17-year-old junior at Eastmoor.

"I hope that everybody gets a program like this," Robinson said.

Health.com's 17 Worst Habits for Your Heart

2011-04-06T10:30:00.000-04:00

View Original Article here: http://www.health.com/health/gallery/thumbnails/0,,20475961,00.html

Health.com's 15 Exercise Tips for People with Type 2 diabetes

2011-03-30T14:39:00.000-04:00

Click here for the original article posted on Health.com 15 Exercise Tips for People with Type 2 Diabetes

Broker Battle Continues on Capital Hill

2011-03-30T14:01:00.000-04:00

Members of Congress and state insurance regulators are weighing whether to exempt agent and broker commissions from medical loss ratio calculation.

Under federal health reform insurers must spend 80 percent of individual and small-group premiums and 85 percent of large-group premiums on medical costs. Other expenses, including agent compensation must come from the administrative portion of medical loss ratio and is counted as a non-claims cost.

A House bill to exclude producer commissions from MLR formula has already been endorsed by a number of agent and broker groups. The bill, Access to Professional Health Insurance Advisors Act of 2011, was sponsored by Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and John Barrow, D-Ga.

Since the federal MLR standard was issued last December, these groups say requirements have had a devastating financial impact on net income for producers, as well as their staff, and it has also impacted producers’ employer and individual clients.

“In less than three months time [MLR requirements] have had a devastating financial impact on the collective membership of our associations, our members’ employees, and on the millions of employer and individual clients of our members,” reads a letter from The Agent/Broker Alliance, which represents more than 500,000 state-licensed producers, to Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty, chair of the Professional Health Insurance Advisors Task Force at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. The task force will convene on March 27 in Austin to discuss the impact of medical loss ratio requirements on health insurance brokers/agents.

“In every state, as a direct result of the new law’s MLR provisions, agency owners are reporting that they are reducing services to their clients, cutting benefits and eliminating jobs just to stay in business. At the same time, health insurance purchasers have more need for help than ever due to market and compliance changes related to PPACA,” the letter continues.

“Since the interim final rule on MLR was issued by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on December 1, 2010, health insurance carriers across the country have had to reduce the amount of commissions they imbed in health insurance premiums. Our members report that most health insurance carriers changed commission rates as of January 1, 2011, the date the MLR rule became effective.

"The majority of carriers have imposed the commission reductions on newly placed business, but a number of carriers across the country have also modified commissions for existing health insurance contracts. Those health insurance carriers that did not make commission changes for 2011 almost universally report to our membership that, unless a change is made in the MLR rules this year, they will be forced to reduce the amount of producer commissions from 2012 and beyond.”

Democratic Sen. Al Franken of Minnesota expressed his concern that the House bill would undermine the medical loss ratio provision he championed last year. The senator fought for reformed MLR regulation because of its potential to bring down health costs and expand coverage for consumers.

In a letter to the leadership of two key committees that wrote the health care law in 2010, Sen. Franken urged them to protect the medical loss ratio requirement: "I'm gravely concerned that a bill recently introduced in the House of Representatives would undermine the integrity of the MLR provision by allowing money that should be spent on health care costs to be spent on commissions for insurance agents and brokers.

"American families should not have to shoulder those fees through further increases to their health insurance premiums. I hope you will join me in protecting American families from unsustainable increases in their health insurance premiums by opposing any similar legislation coming before your committees."

The letter was sent to HELP Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, HELP Ranking Member Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., Finance Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Finance Ranking Member Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.

New Drug Approved by FDA for Lupus

2011-03-10T14:09:00.001-05:00

Originally posted on Yahoo! News by the Associated Press

By MATTHEW PERRONE, AP Health Writer – Wed Mar 9, 11:26 pm ET

WASHINGTON – The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved the first new drug to treat lupus in over 50 years, a milestone that medical experts say could prompt development of other drugs that are even more effective in treating the debilitating immune system disorder.

Known as Benlysta, the injectable drug is designed to relieve flare-ups and pain caused by lupus, a little-understood and potentially fatal ailment in which the body attacks its own tissue and organs.

Biotech drugmaker Human Genome Sciences Inc. spent 15 years developing Benlysta and will co-market it with GlaxoSmithKline PLC.

The companies estimate there are at least 200,000 lupus patients in the U.S. who could benefit from the drug.

But experts stress that Benlysta is not a miracle drug: It only worked in 35 percent of North American patients tested and was not effective for patients with the deadliest form of the disease. Additionally, it did not show positive results in African Americans, who are disproportionately affected by lupus.

FDA said in its news release it would require the drug developers to conduct another study exclusively in African Americans.

Dr. Betty Diamond, who has studied lupus for 30 years, said Benlysta should provide encouragement to researchers and drug developers.

"It will send out the message that it's possible to conduct a successful clinical trial in lupus and that's tremendously important to keep the pharmaceutical industry interested in this disease," said Diamond, a researcher at the Feinstein Institute in New York.

Janice Fitzgibbon of McLean, Virginia has been taking Benlysta for two years as part of the drug's clinical trial program.

"It's given me my life back," she said, after being so crushed by pain that she couldn't take her dog for a walk or drive her children to school.

"It's a bittersweet thing for me because I have friends with lupus for whom this drug won't work," said Fitzgibbon, who is 54. "There's no one-size-fits-all for lupus and I'm just extremely fortunate that my lupus is mild and is helped by Benlysta."

FDA approved the drug for systemic lupus erythematosus, the most common form of the disease. Ten-year survival for patients diagnosed with the illness is more than 85 percent, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Lupus patients have long struggled to draw attention to their disease, which affects women nine times more than men. African Americans are three times more likely to have the disease.

"I don't think there's a conspiracy here, but it just hasn't gotten a lot of funding and it hasn't gotten a lot of attention from the media," said Dr. Abby Abelson, chair of the Department of Rheumatologic and Immunologic Disease at the Cleveland Clinic.

Lupus causes fibrous tissue and inflammation of internal organs, skin rashes and joint pain. Most of Benlysta's benefit came from relieving muscle inflammation versus organ problems, as measured on a comprehensive checklist of lupus symptoms.

The disease occurs when the body's protector cells, known as antibodies, stop differentiating between foreign invaders, like bacteria, and healthy cells. The cause of this malfunction is not understood.

Currently most patients treat their disease with a variety of drugs that help ease inflammation, including painkillers, steroids and antimalarial drugs — which were first approved for lupus in the 1950s. Many patients say the side effects of those treatments are nearly as uncomfortable as the disease itself. Steroids can cause bone fractures, weight gain and infection.

Wednesday's approval completes a remarkable turnaround for Rockville, Md.,-based Human Genome Sciences which has been developing Benlysta since 1996 and has no other products on the market. The company originally tested Benlysta, known generically as belimumab, as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

When a mid-stage trial in lupus patients failed to meet researchers' goals in 2006, many analysts wrote the drug off and downgraded the company's stock. But when scientists reanalyzed the data they found that the drug helped block the antibodies that cause lupus symptoms in a subset of patients.

Analysts estimate the drug could reach annual sales exceeding $3 billion within five years.
Human Genome Sciences' stock has ballooned in the last two years — from 70 cents to roughly $25 per share — as the company's prospects have improved. Trading in its shares was halted pending the release of the FDA news after the market's close Wednesday. GlaxoSmithKline shares rose $1.36, or 3.5 percent, to $39.94 in extended trading.

Go to the original article here: FDA approves first new drug for lupus in 56 years

Prescription Drug Programs

2011-02-25T11:20:00.000-05:00

There are many prescription drug discount and assistance programs available for Individual health insurance clients.

The following sites are just a few that LyfeBank Ohio utilizes and we would like to share them with you. Please note, that we are not endorsing or supporting any of these sites, we just wanted to share the valuable information with you.

Needy Meds: http://www.needymeds.com/ :

NeedyMeds is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit with the mission of helping people who cannot afford medicine or health care costs. The information at NeedyMeds is available anonymously and free of charge.
For more information about NeedyMeds read the following:

The NeedyMeds Brochure is available to organizations that assist people who need help paying for their medicine. Click on this link to learn more.
The NeedyMeds Update List is a monthly email that will keep participants up to date about what is new at NeedyMeds.
If your organization is interested in hearing a speaker from NeedyMeds, check out the NeedyMeds Speaker's Bureau.
NeedyMeds welcomes Donations to help with the on-going work of providing information and education to assist those who cannot afford medical costs.

Partnership for Prescription Assistance:

http://www.pparx.org/ :

The Partnership for Prescription Assistance helps qualifying patients without prescription drug coverage get the medicines they need for free or nearly free. Our mission is to increase awareness of patient assistance programs and boost enrollment of those who are eligible. We offer a single point of access to more than 475 public and private programs, including nearly 200 offered by pharmaceutical companies. We have already helped millions of Americans get free or reduced-cost prescription medicines. To learn more, download a free brochure about the Partnership for Prescription Assistance or read our frequently asked questions.

Ohio Best Rx: http://www.ohiobestrx.com/ :

Ohio's "Best RX" is a prescription drug discount card program designed to lower the cost of prescriptions for Ohio residents without prescription drug insurance coverage who are:

60 years of age or over; OR
Under age 60 with annual family incomes of less than 300% of the Federal Poverty Level which is $32,490(single), $43,710(family of two),
$66,150 (family of four).

Pharmacy Checker: http://www.pharmacychecker.com/ :
PharmacyChecker.com LLC ("PC") collects, evaluates, and reports credentials, prices, and customer feedback regarding pharmacies that operate online and through mail-order and fax (generally referred to as “online pharmacies”. It is the leading independent source of information about online pharmacies. PC helps consumers continually find the lowest priced products from the most qualified and reputable online pharmacies. PC also provides customized reports and services as market intelligence about the online pharmacy industry. PC publishes pharmacy ratings, profiles, and drug price comparisons online athttp://pharmacychecker.com/.
To learn the details about our programs, products and services click here.

Stay tuned for more valuable information heading your way!

Health Reform Hits Main Street

2011-02-24T14:20:00.000-05:00

Written and produced by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Narrated by Cokie Roberts, a news commentator for ABC News and NPR and a member of Kaiser's Board of Trustees. Creative production and animation by Free Range Studios.

Health Reform Hits Main Street

Confused about how the new health reform law really works? This short, animated movie -- featuring the "YouToons" -- explains the problems with the current health care system, the changes that are happening now, and the big changes coming in 2014.

How Obama's Budget Affects Medications

2011-02-15T09:00:00.000-05:00

Obama budget targets brand name medicines

By Susan Heavey – Tue Feb 15, 8:19 am ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Big pharmaceutical companies could face increased competition from generic drugmakers under two proposals put forth by the Obama administration on Monday despite earlier savings extracted from drugmakers as part of last year's healthcare law.

President Barack Obama, as part of his 2012 budget proposal, called for cutting the number of years drugmakers could exclusively market brand-name biologic drugs to 7 years from 12.

He also set his sights on ending controversial "pay-for-delay" deals that affect traditional, chemical drugs by giving the U.S. Federal Trade Commission power to block them. Under such pacts, brand-name and generic drugmakers settle patent challenges with payoffs that delay lower-cost rivals from reaching the market.

The proposals face a tough challenge of getting through the divided Congress, but could alter the landscape for consumers' access to cheaper medicines.

They quickly drew industry protests.
While branded and generic drugmakers are divided over the biologics issue, "both the brand and generic drug industries will fight tooth and nail to preserve pay-to-delay settlements which provide substantial benefit to the industry," Bernstein analyst Aaron "Ronny" Gal said in a research note.

Still, they are unlikely to deliver a huge overall blow to the $890 billion global drug industry in which companies such as Pfizer Inc - and Merck & Co Inc - can see at least $1 billion a year in revenue from just one blockbuster medicine.

The Obama administration is turning to drugmakers to help squeeze out some savings to help reduce the deficit and cover other health initiatives such as the implementation of the health law passed last March that included about $80 billion in savings negotiated with brand name companies.

U.S. Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was unapologetic about the extra savings from industry, and saying the administration wants the best outcomes for patients. "This is a move in that direction," she told reporters.

The two proposals aimed at getting cheaper, generic medicines to the U.S. market would together save about $11 billion over 10 years.

The proposal impacting brand-name biologics is a more dramatic version of a similar provision included in the health law in which brand-name drugmakers won 12 years of exclusive sales under a new U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval process to allow generic versions of biologics.

Such medicines treat conditions ranging from cancer to arthritis and are made from proteins, which can make them more complex to manufacture and more costly.

Generic drugmakers had fought for a shorter period of exclusivity, and on Monday the administration said 12-years of protection harms consumer access to much needed drugs.

Its seven-year proposal "strikes a balance between promoting affordable access to medication while at the same time encouraging innovation to develop needed therapies," the White House said in budget documents.

The measure would start to see savings of $80 million starting in 2015 and altogether could save $2.3 billion from 2012 to 2021, it estimated.

The "pay-for-delay" plan would save $540 million starting in fiscal 2012 and nearly $8.8 billion through 2021, it added.

In a statement, branded industry group the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America said both measures would discourage industry investment into research and development and could stifle new medicines.

The Biotechnology Industry Organization said reducing exclusivity to 7 years would prevent biotech firms from recouping their investments. Meanwhile, the Generic Pharmaceutical Association applauded the 7-year biogeneric plan but called Obama's move on "pay for delay" misguided.

Obama's budget also renewed the call for generic drugmakers to pay fees for the FDA to review new generic medicines.

Other proposed fees would cover FDA reinspections of drug and device companies after manufacturing problems are uncovered. Hospitals and others participating in an outpatient drug pricing program known as 340B are also targeted.

Additionally, the administration calls for food safety industry fees starting in 2013 and pledged to work with Congress to enact them.

original source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/15/us-usa-budget-health-idUSTRE71E3PU20110215?pageNumber=1

CDC High Blood Pressure and Cholesterol Update

2011-02-02T10:55:00.001-05:00

Originally found here: http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/CardiovascularDisease/index.html

CDC Vital Signs offers recent data on the important health topics of key diseases, conditions, or risk factors. Data is gathered from CDC's national monitoring systems to communicate our data in important areas of public health, and the ways people can increase their health, prevent or control disease.

Heart disease, stroke, and other cardiovascular (blood vessel) diseases are among the leading cause of death and now kill more than 800,000 adults in the US each year. Of these, 150,000 are younger than age 65. These diseases are also two of the leading causes of health disparities in the US. Treatment of these diseases accounts for 1 in every 6 US health dollars spent. Two main reasons people have heart disease or stroke are high blood pressure* and cholesterol, which are common, deadly, and preventable. Nearly 2 out of 3 adults with high cholesterol and about half of adults with high blood pressure don't have their condition yet under control. Clearly, other steps are needed to gain control of these health risks.

* High blood pressure means at least 140/90 mmHg. High cholesterol in this report means high LDL ("bad") cholesterol.

** Symbols:
- Every 39 seconds an adult dies from heart attack, stroke,    or other cardiovasular disease.
- Nearly 68 Million people have high blood pressure but about 1 in 2 doesn't have it under control.
- 71 million US adults have high cholesterol but 2 in 3 don't have it under control.

Latest Findings from the CDC:
Improved care could save more than 100,000 lives a year.

Why is control difficult to achieve?
- More than 80% of people who don't have their blood pressure or cholesterol under control actually have health insurance. Not only do individuals need to be continually checked for these conditions, they also need good, affordable treatment along with regular follow-up care.
- Many people don't have regular access to medical care, prescription medications, or lifestyle counseling. Some people don't go back to the doctor when they should. This makes it difficult to control their blood pressure and cholesterol. About 1 in 2 adults stops taking cholesterol medicine.
- Improvements in the way health care is delivered are needed. Clinical services that detect and control high blood pressure or cholesterol are not being delivered to all those in need. Changes in how we reimburse for and provide health care services can improve health by giving more people access to treatment.
- People get 77% of their sodium (mostly salt) from eating processed or restaurant foods, which can raise blood pressure. Even people who want to eat low-salt foods may have trouble finding them in grocery stores or on restaurant menus.
- Trans fat found in fried and processed foods such as cookies and donuts can raise cholesterol, contributing to heart disease and stroke. Only 1 in 5 Americans lives where there are policies that eliminate artificial trans fat from restaurant foods.
- Everyday decisions can help keep a heart healthy. These include not smoking, eating right, exercising, and taking prescription medicines. Policies that make it easier for people to eat a healthy diet, walk or bicycle for transportation or fun, and have smoke-free areas can help lower blood pressure and cholesterol.

What can be done?
The Affordable Care Act- Will expand health insurance coverage to up to 94% of people under age 65 by 2019.
- Will require new health plans to cover preventive services for certain populations including
   *Testing for high blood pressure and cholesterol.
   *Counseling on the use of daily aspirin to reduce the risk of a heart attack or a stroke.
   *Using counseling and medication to help people quit smoking.
   *Managing obesity and providing counseling on diet and weight loss.
- Will provide more trained health professionals to treat people with high blood pressure and cholesterol.
- Will improve the delivery of services.

Policymakers can:
- Develop policies that reward effective disease prevention and chronic disease management.
- Develop policies that allow other health care professionals (pharmacists, dietitians, community health workers, nurses and nurse practitioners) to have a more active role in managing high blood pressure and cholesterol.
- Develop policies for medical care that increase the use of electronic health records and doctor reminder systems.
- Champion policies to reduce salt and eliminate artificial trans fat in the nation's food supply.

Doctors, nurses, and other health providers can:
- Follow current guidelines for prevention, treatment, and control of heart disease and stroke.
- Use electronic health records and registries of their patients with high blood pressure and cholesterol, or who smoke so patients get the follow-up care they need, and providers get feedback on their performance.
- Manage these conditions at every patient visit at every provider to help them control their blood pressure and cholesterol.
- Remind patients about follow-up care (e.g., automatic phone calls, Internet reminders) and self-monitoring of high blood pressure at home.
- Urge patients at every opportunity to quit smoking.

Individuals can:
- Follow your doctor's instructions and stay on your medications to control your blood pressure and cholesterol.
- Eat a healthy diet that is low in salt; low in total fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol; and rich in fresh fruits and vegetables.
- Take at least 1 brisk 10-minute walk, 3 times a day, 5 days a week.
- Don't smoke. If you smoke, quit as soon as possible.

Click here for access to the original article.

Florida Judge Strikes Down Obama Health Care Overhaul

2011-02-01T09:36:00.000-05:00

By MELISSA NELSON, Associated Press – Mon Jan 31, 6:53 pm ET
found in: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110131/ap_on_bi_ge/us_health_overhaul

PENSACOLA, Fla. – A federal judge declared the Obama administration's health care overhaul unconstitutional Monday, siding with 26 states that argued people cannot be required to buy health insurance.

Senior U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson agreed with the states that the new law violates people's rights by forcing them to buy health insurance by 2014 or face penalties. He went a step further than a previous ruling against the law, declaring the entire thing unconstitutional if the insurance requirement does not hold up.

Attorneys for the administration had argued that the states did not have standing to challenge the law and that the case should be dismissed.

Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said Monday the department strongly disagrees with Vinson's ruling and intends to appeal.

"There is clear and well-established legal precedent that Congress acted within its constitutional authority in passing this law and we are confident that we will ultimately prevail on appeal," she said in a statement.

The final step will almost certainly be the U.S. Supreme Court. Two other federal judges have already upheld the law and a federal judge in Virginia ruled the insurance mandate unconstitutional but stopped short of voiding the entire thing.

At issue was whether the government is reaching beyond its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce by requiring citizens to purchase health insurance or face tax penalties.

Vinson, who was appointed to federal bench by Ronald Reagan in 1983, said it is, writing in his 78-page ruling that if the government can require people to buy health insurance, it could also regulate food the same way.

"Or, as discussed during oral argument, Congress could require that people buy and consume broccoli at regular intervals," he wrote, "Not only because the required purchases will positively impact interstate commerce, but also because people who eat healthier tend to be healthier, and are thus more productive and put less of a strain on the health care system."

Obama administration attorneys had argued that health care is part of the interstate commerce system. They said the government can impose a tax penalty on Americans who decide not to purchase health insurance because all Americans are consumers of medical care.

But attorneys for the states said the administration was essentially coercing them into participating in the overhaul by holding billions of Medicaid dollars hostage. The states also said the federal government is violating the Constitution by forcing a mandate on the states without providing money to pay for it.

Vinson said the courts have generally not accepted similar arguments about Medicaid as a violation of state sovereignty and that the states did not provide enough evidence in this case.

"I appreciate the difficult situation in which the states find themselves," he wrote. "It is a matter of historical fact that at the time the Constitution was drafted and ratified, the Founders did not expect that the federal government would be able to provide sizable funding to the states and, consequently, be able to exert power over the state to the extent that it currently does."

He said that the only way the states would have legal standing to claim the Medicaid portion of the law is coercion would be for the Supreme Court to change the Constitution.

"Unless and until that happens, the states have little recourse to remaining the very junior partner in this partnership," Vinson wrote.

Still, opponents of the health overhaul praised his decision Monday afternoon. House Speaker John Boehner said it shows Senate Democrats should follow a House vote to repeal the law.

"Today's decision affirms the view, held by most of the states and a majority of the American people, that the federal government should not be in the business of forcing you to buy health insurance and punishing you if you don't," he said in a statement.

Democrats just as quickly slammed the ruling.

"This lawsuit is nothing more than an attempt by those who want to raise taxes on small businesses, increase prescription prices for seniors and allow insurance companies to once again deny sick children medical care," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in a prepared statement.

Former Florida Republican Attorney General Bill McCollum filed the lawsuit just minutes after President Barack Obama signed the 10-year, $938 billion health care bill into law in March. He chose a court in Pensacola, one of Florida's most conservative cities. The nation's most influential small business lobby, theNational Federation of Independent Business, also joined.

Officials in the states that sued lauded Vinson's decision. Almost all of them have Republican governors, attorneys general or both.

"In making his ruling, the judge has confirmed what many of us knew from the start; ObamaCare is an unprecedented and unconstitutional infringement on the liberty of the American people," Florida GOP Gov. Rick Scott said in a statement.

Other states that joined the suit are: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.

___

Associated Press Writer Curt Anderson in Miami contributed to this report.

Health Benefits of Laughter

2011-01-28T10:56:00.001-05:00

Health Benefits of Laughter: Stress Relief, Immunity, and More

By: Elizabth Scott M.S, About.com Guide Updated Jan. 10, 2011

Research has shown that the health benefits of laughter are far-ranging. While more studies need to be done, studies so far have shown that laughter can help relieve pain, bring greater happiness, and even increase immunity. Positive psychologynames the propensity for laughter and sense of humor as one of the 24 main signature strengths one can possess, and laughter yoga clubs are springing up across the country. Read on for more findings about the health benefits of laughter, and see how to incorporate more humor and fun into your life.

Stress Management Benefits of Laughter:

Hormones: Laughter reduces the level of stress hormones like cortisol, epinephrine(adrenaline), dopamine and growth hormone. It also increases the level of health-enhancing hormones like endorphins, and neurotransmitters. Laughter increases the number of antibody-producing cells and enhances the effectiveness of T cells. All this means a stronger immune system, as well as fewer physical effects of stress.
Physical Release: Have you ever felt like you "have to laugh or I'll cry"? Have you experienced the cleansed feeling after a good laugh? Laughter provides a physical and emotional release.
Internal Workout: A good belly laugh exercises the diaphragm, contracts the abs and even works out the shoulders, leaving muscles more relaxed afterward. It even provides a good workout for the heart.
Distraction: Laughter brings the focus away from anger, guilt, stress and negative emotions in a more beneficial way than other mere distractions.
Perspective: Studies show that our response to stressful events can be altered by whether we view something as a 'threat' or a 'challenge'. Humor can give us a more lighthearted perspective and help us view events as 'challenges', thereby making them less threatening and more positive. (For more on changing your perspective, see this article on cognitive reframing.)
Social Benefits of Laughter: Laughter connects us with others. Just as with smiling andkindness, most people find that laughter is contagious, so if you bring more laughter into your life, you can most likely help others around you to laugh more, and realize these benefits as well. By elevating the mood of those around you, you can reduce their stress levels, and perhaps improve the quality of social interaction you experience with them, reducing your stress level even more!

How To Use Laughter:

Laughter is one of my all-time favorite stress management strategies because it's free, convenient, and beneficial in so many ways. You can get more laughter in your life with the following strategies:

T.V. and Movies: There's no shortage of laughter opportunities from the entertainment, both at the theater and in the aisles of the video stores, as well as at home with T.V. comedies. While wasting your time watching something marginally funny may actually frustrate you, watching truly hilarious movies and shows is an easy way to get laughter into your life whenever you need it.
Laugh With Friends: Going to a movie or comedy club with friends is a great way to get more laughter in your life. The contagious effects of laughter may mean you'll laugh more than you otherwise would have during the show, plus you'll have jokes to reference at later times. Having friends over for a party or game night is also a great setup for laughter and other good feelings. (See this article on laughing more for additional tips on getting more fun and laughter into your life.)
Find Humor In Your Life: Instead of complaining about life's frustrations, try to laugh about them. If something is so frustrating or depressing it's ridiculous, realize that you could 'look back on it and laugh.' Think of how it will sound as a story you could tell to your friends, and then see if you can laugh about it now. With this attitude, you may also find yourself being more lighthearted and silly, giving yourself and those around you more to laugh about. Approach life in a more mirthful way and you'll find you're less stressed about negative events, and you'll achieve the health benefits of laughter. (See this article on maintaining a sense of humor.)
'Fake It Until You Make It': Just as studies show the positive effects of smiling occur whether the smile is fake or real, faked laughter also provides the benefits mentioned above. The body can't distinguish between 'fake' laughter that you just start doing on purpose, and 'real' laughter that comes from true humor--the physical benefits are exactly the same, and the former usually leads to the latter anyway. So smile more, and fake laughter; you'll still achieve positive effects, and the fake merriment may lead to real smiles and laughter.
More on Having Fun: See these additional suggestions on laughing more and having fun in your life.

_{Sources:
Bennett MP, Lengacher C. Humor and Laughter May Influence Health: III. Laughter and Health Outcomes. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, March 2008.
Bennett MP, Zeller JM, Rosenberg L, McCann J. The Effect of Mirthful Laughter on Stress and Natural Killer Cell Activity.. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, March-April 2003.
Berk LS, Felten DL, Tan SA, Bittman BB, Westengard J. Modulation of Neuroimmune Parameters During the Eustress of Humor-Associated Mirthful Laughter.. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, March 2001.
Skinner N, Brewer N. The Dynamics of Threat and Challenge Appraisals Prior to Stressful Achievement Events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, September 2002.}

Healthy Cooking: Heirloom Bean, Red Russian Kale and Wheat Berry Chili

2011-01-12T16:18:00.000-05:00

The following recipe is courtesy of http://jennshaggy.blogspot.com/. Author and Blogger, Jenn Shagrin, just released her first Vegan cookbook: Veganize This! Which can be found on amazon.com!

Heirloom Bean, Red Russian Kale and Wheat Berry Chili

· 2 1/2 cups cooked fresh Mixed Heirloom Beans (I used Scarlet Runner and Cannellini)

2 cups White Berries, cooked

· 1 large bunch Red Russian Kale, roughly chopped

· 1 large Onion, chopped

· 1 Yellow Bell Pepper, seeded and chopped

· 2 14 oz cans Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes

· 6 cloves Garlic, minced

· 2 1/2 TBSP Olive Oil

· 2 tsp Chili Powder

· Pinch of Jamaican Allspice

· 1 1/2 tsp Ground Cumin

· 2 cups No Chicken or Vegetable Broth

· 2 tsp Blue Agave Nectar (or Light Agave)

· Juice of 1 Lime

· 1 Avocado, diced

· 1/2 cup Fresh Cilantro Leaves, chopped

· Salt and Pepper, to taste

In a large pot over medium-high heat, heat the Olive Oil until it's hot but not smoking. Add the Garlic, and sauté 30 seconds until fragrant. Add in the Onion, Pepper, Jamaican Allspice, Chili Powder, Cumin, Salt and Pepper, and sauté for 5-7 minutes, until tender. Add the Canned Tomatoes, Heirloom Beans, Broth and Agave. Turn heat up to high and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to simmer and cover. Allow the soup to simmer for 25 minutes.
Add Kale and Cooked Wheat Berries to the pot, and allow the Kale to wilt and the Wheat Berries to heat through...about 5-7 minutes. Remove from heat, add in Lime Juice and taste for Salt and Pepper. Serve garnished with diced Avocado and Cilantro.

For more vegan recipes, click the here!

Healthy Cooking: Weight Watchers Old-Fashion Chicken Pot Pie Recipe

2011-01-10T10:37:00.001-05:00

This comfort food classic is transformed into a lighter version with reduced-fat crescent roll dough and a skim milk-based cream sauce. Make this recipe to your family's taste with different frozen vegetable blends such as an Asian mix or bell pepper and onion strips.

ADDED TO RECIPES ON TUE 12/21/2010

Ingredients

Serves 6

2 servings butter-flavored cooking spray

1 tsp butter

1 small onion, chopped

2 cups mushrooms, sliced

1/4 tsp paprika

1/4 tsp dried thyme, crushed

1/2 tsp table salt, or more to taste

1/4 tsp black pepper

2 cups frozen mixed vegetables

1 cup canned chicken broth

3 cups roasted chicken breast, chopped

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

1/2 cups fat-free evaporated milk, divided

4 rolls reduced-fat crescent roll dough, unrolled

Directions

Preheat oven to 375ºF. Coat a 10-inch round shallow baking dish with cooking spray.

Coat a large pot with cooking spray. Add butter and melt over medium heat. Add onion and mushrooms and cook, until tender, stirring frequently, about 5 minutes. Stir in paprika, thyme, salt and pepper. Add vegetables, broth and chicken. Cover and simmer 15 minutes.

In a small cup, combine flour and 1/4 cup of evaporated milk; stir into chicken mixture. Cook over medium heat until thickened, stirring constantly, about 2 minutes. Stir in remaining 1/4 cup of evaporated milk and cook until mixture is slightly thickened, about 2 to 3 minutes more.

Spoon chicken mixture into prepared baking dish. Unroll crescent rolls and arrange dough around inside edge of baking dish to form a border (there will be a hole in the middle). Bake until rolls are golden brown and filling is bubbly, about 15 minutes. Cut into 6 pieces and serve.

Weight Watchers POINTS® Value: 6

Preparation Time: 20 min
Cooking Time: 40 min

(c) 2010 Weight Watchers International, Inc. (c) 2010 WeightWatchers.com, Inc. All rights reserved.
WEIGHT WATCHERS and POINTS are the registered trademarks of Weight Watchers International, Inc. and are used under license by WeightWatchers.com, Inc.

Originally viewed: http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/weight-watchers-old-fashioned-chicken-pot-pie

HbA1c Testing Can Find Prediabetes

2011-01-10T10:16:00.000-05:00

Originally viewed from: Medical News: HbA1c Testing Can Find Prediabetes - in Endocrinology, Diabetes from MedPage Today

By Kristina Fiore, Staff Writer, MedPage Today
Published: January 07, 2011
Reviewed by Robert Jasmer, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco and
Dorothy Caputo, MA, RN, BC-ADM, CDE, Nurse Planner

Measuring glycated hemoglobin levels may be an appropriate means of catching patients with prediabetes, researchers say.

HbA1c testing yielded similar probabilities for developing diabetes and heart disease as those estimated by using the 2003 American Diabetes Association definition for prediabetes, Ronald Ackerman, MD, MPH, of Indiana University, and colleagues reported in the January issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

"The A1c test may provide a badly needed, clinically practical indicator of the composite risk for incident diabetes and cardiovascular disease," they wrote.

Action Points

Explain that measuring glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) levels may be an appropriate means of detecting patients with prediabetes.
Note that an HbA1c in a range of 5.5% to 6.5% defines prediabetes and identifies a population with risks for diabetes and heart disease comparable to that defined using results of fasting and two-hour glucose testing.

Fasting plasma glucose and two-hour plasma glucose, two commonly used tests for assessing diabetes and prediabetes, are limited because they require a patient to return on a separate day after an overnight fast -- a potential barrier to test completion, the researchers said.

Measuring HbA1c is easier -- it requires only one blood draw. In June 2009, in fact, the International Expert Committee, which represents several major diabetes groups, recommended using HbA1c to diagnose diabetes.

The recommendations of the committee have stirred up some controversy, still, the researchers said, only about 7% of patients with prediabetes -- who are thus at risk for later diabetes and heart disease -- are aware of their status.

To estimate the risks of developing diabetes and cardiovascular disease for adults with different HbA1c levels, Ackerman and colleagues assessed data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2003-2006.

Among adults who met the 2003 ADA definition for prediabetes, the probabilities for developing type 2 disease over 7.5 years and cardiovascular disease over 10 years were 33.5% and 10.7%, respectively.

The researchers found that using HbA1c alone -- with a range of 5.5% to 6.5% defining prediabetes -- would identify a population with comparable risks for diabetes and heart disease (32.4% and 11.4%, respectively).

But using a slightly higher cutoff -- beginning at 5.7% -- would identify increased risks of 41.3% for diabetes and 13.3% for heart disease.

These risks are comparable to those seen in patients enrolled in the Diabetes Prevention Program, which had an enrollment criteria of both elevated fasting plasma glucose and impaired glucose tolerance, the researchers said.

Thus, they concluded, using a bottom cutoff of 5.7% for diagnosing prediabetes may be more appropriate.

Either way, they said, HbA1c measurement "should be considered a means of identifying greater numbers of patients at risk for diabetes and heart disease" -- especially because "of its practical nature and wide availability."

The study was limited by its use of cross-sectional data, and it may be lacking in generalizability. For instance, a greater number of African Americans would be identified as having prediabetes than if using fasting plasma glucose or two-hour plasma glucose testing, the researchers noted.

The study was supported by the CDC and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Physician Faculty Scholars Program.

The researchers reported no conflicts of interest.

Primary source: American Journal of Preventive Medicine
Source reference:
Ackerman RT, et al "Identifying adults at high risk for diabetes and cardiovascular disease using hemoglobin A1c" Am J Prev Med 2011; 40(1): 11–17.

Opinin Piece: Health Care Reform, round 2

2011-01-10T10:04:00.000-05:00

Originally found at: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2013876439_brooks08.html?prmid=op_ed

Health-care reform: round two

The health-care reform law looks vulnerable, writes David Brooks. There is a strong likelihood that the current law will face an existential threat over the next five years. Each party should be preparing contingency plans.

By David Brooks

Syndicated columnist

The health-care reform law was signed 10 months ago, and what's striking now is how vulnerable it looks. Several threats have emerged — some of them scarcely discussed before passage — that together or alone could seriously endanger the new system. These include:

• The courts. So far, one judge has struck down the individual mandate, the plan's centerpiece. Future decisions are likely to break down on partisan lines. Given the makeup of the Supreme Court, this should concern the law's defenders.

• False projections. The new system is based on a series of expert projections on how people will behave. In the first test case, these projections were absurdly off base. According to the Medicare actuary, 375,000 people should have already signed up for the new high-risk pools for the uninsured, but only 8,000 have.

More seriously, cost projections are way off. For example, New Hampshire's plan has only about 80 members, but the state has already burned through nearly double the $650,000 that the federal government allotted to help run the program. If other projections are off by this much, the results will be disastrous.

• Employee dumping. This is the most serious threat. Companies and unions across America are running the numbers and discovering they would be better off if, after 2014, they induced poorer and sicker employees to move to public insurance exchanges, where subsidies are much higher.

The number of people in those exchanges could thus skyrocket, especially as startup companies undermine their competitors with uninsured employees and lower costs. The Congressional Budget Office projects that 19 million people will move to the exchanges at a cost of $450 billion between 2014 and 2019. But according to the economists Douglas Holtz-Eakin and James C. Capretta, costs could soar to $1.4 trillion if those who would be better off in the exchanges actually moved to them. The price of the health-care law could double. C. Eugene Steuerle of the Urban Institute, who has been among those raising the alarms about this, calls the law's structure "unworkable and unfair."

• Health care oligarchy. Since the law passed, there has been a frenzy of mergers and acquisitions, as hospitals, clinics and doctor groups have joined together into bigger and bigger entities. The drafters encourage this, believing large outfits would be more efficient. The downside to this economic concentration is there could be less competition and cost control. In many places, the political power of these quasi-monopolies would be huge, with unforeseeable results. The law bans doctors from starting up hospitals to increase competition.

• Public hostility. Right now about 53 percent of Americans oppose the health-care law and 43 percent support it, according to an average of the recent polls. Complaints are especially high among doctors. According to a survey by the Physicians Foundation, 60 percent of private practice doctors say the law will force them to close their practices or to restrict them to certain categories of patients.

Given this level of unhappiness, people will blame the Obama law for everything they hate about the health-care system. Political opposition was fierce in November, and it could easily shape the 2012 election and lead to changes or repeal.

Overall, there is a strong likelihood that the current health care law will face an existential threat over the next five years. Each party should be preparing contingency plans.

When the crisis comes, Democrats will face an interesting choice — to patch the Obama system or try to replace it with something bigger. The administration may want a patch, but by a ratio of nearly 2-1, according to a CNN poll, Democratic voters would prefer a more ambitious law. Liberals could logically say that the mistake was trying to create a hybrid system, rather than moving straight to a single-payer one.

Republicans are going to have to move beyond their current "Repeal!" posture and cohere behind a positive alternative. One approach, which Tyler Cowen of George Mason University has written about, is to allow more state experimentation. Another approach, championed by Capretta, Yuval Levin of National Affairs and Thomas P. Miller of the American Enterprise Institute, revolves around the words "defined contribution."

Under this approach, Republicans would say the federal government has a role in subsidizing health insurance — a generous role, but not unlimited. The government would provide needy citizens with a predefined amount of money to spend on insurance and allow them to shop in a transparent, regulated, but not micromanaged marketplace.

After the trauma of the last two years, many people wish the issue would go away. But it's not going away, especially since costs will continue to rise.

Some Congresses achieve health care; members of this Congress or the next one will have health care thrust upon them

Healthy Cooking: Spicy Black Bean and Corn Salsa

2011-01-05T12:46:00.003-05:00

Originally found at: http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/avocado_corn_salsa.html

Healthy recipe: Spicy Black Bean and Corn Salsa

July 31st, 2009 8:59 am CT

16 oz. cooked black beans
16 oz. fresh or frozen corn kernels
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
½ cups chopped green onion
¼ cups red onion
1/3 cup fresh line juice
1 tablespoon ground cumin
Black pepper to taste
½ cup chopped ripe tomatoes, drained

In large bowl, combine beans, corn, cilantro, green onion, red onion, lime juice, oil and cumin. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cover and chill at least 2 hours or up to overnight. Just before serving, stir in tomatoes. Serve with baked corn chips.

Makes approximately 5 cups

Serving size: ¼ cup

Each serving provides: 50 calories, 2 grams of protein, 5 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams fat, 2 grams fiber, less than 2mg sodium (if canned beans are selected, sodium may be higher)

FSA, HRA, HSA: Eligible and Ineligible Expenses

2011-01-03T16:54:00.000-05:00

Getting Reimbursement for Qualified Health Care Expenses from your Health Reimbursement Account (HRA), Health Savings Account (HSA) or Health Care Flexible Spending Account (FSA)

Starting January 1, 2011, you will not be able to use these spending accounts to pay for most over-the-counter drugs and medicines unless you have a doctor's prescription. You will not need a prescription for insulin and diabetic supplies.

Click the above links to see if YOUR expenses qualify.

To see the original website Click Here

Healthy Cooking: Lentil Chili

2011-01-03T12:56:00.001-05:00

LENTIL CHILI

This simple vegetarian chili recipe uses lentils instead of beans. Brown lentils work best as they will hold their shape even when tender after cooking. Serve with our Health Starts Here hearth bread from our bakery.

Ingredients

8 cups low-sodium vegetable broth, divided
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 large red bell pepper, chopped
5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
4 teaspoons salt-free chili powder
1 (16-ounce) package brown lentils (about 2 1/4 cups lentils)
2 (15-ounce) cans no-salt-added diced tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Method

Bring 3/4 cup broth to a simmer in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add onion, bell pepper and garlic and cook about 8 minutes or until onion is translucent and pepper is tender. Stir in chili powder and cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Add lentils, tomatoes and remaining 7 1/4 cups broth. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, partially covered, 30 minutes or until lentils are almost tender. Uncover and cook 10 minutes longer. Stir in cilantro and serve.

Nutrition

Per serving : 120 calories (5 from fat), 0g total fat, 0g saturated fat, 0mg cholesterol, 180mg sodium, 21g total carbohydrate (7g dietary fiber, 6g sugar), 6g protein

Tags: Dairy Free, Fat Free, High Fiber, Vegan,Vegetarian

Note: We've provided special diet and nutritional information for educational purposes. But remember — we're cooks, not doctors! You should follow the advice of your health-care provider. And since product formulations change, check product labels for the most recent ingredient information. See our Terms of Service.

CVS to buy Universal's Medicare unit for $1.25 billion

2011-01-03T09:28:00.002-05:00

By Dhanya Skariachan and Lewis Krauskopf – Fri Dec 31, 1:07 pm ET Link to Article

NEW YORK (Reuters) – CVS Caremark, No. 2 U.S. drugstore chain, agreed to buy Universal American's Medicare prescription drug business for about $1.25 billion to expand in a growing segment of the pharmacy benefit market.

The deal will more than double the size of CVS Caremark's business that provides prescription drug coverage under the Medicare Part Dprogram. Medicare is the U.S. government's healthcare program for the elderly.

Universal American shareholders are expected to receive about $12.80 per share to $13.00 per share in cash for the business, which accounted for less than half of the company's total revenue in the first nine months of 2010.

Universal American shares, which closed at $14.61 on Thursday, soared nearly 40 percent after the deal was announced on Friday. CVS shares stayed almost unchanged at $35.

CVS is acquiring the business for about 8 times operating earnings, a "pretty reasonable" price," said Jeff Jonas, an analyst at Gabelli & Co.

The acquisition will make CVS a more formidable competitor to health insurers such as UnitedHealth GroupInc and Humana Inc, both major participants in the Medicare business. CVS expects the deal to add to its earnings in its first full year.

"It's a good move for them (CVS)," said Kemp Dolliver, an analyst with Avondale Partners. "They become a larger competitor in Medicare Part D in a short period of time."

The deal comes just as the first of the post war "Baby Boom" population becomes eligible for Medicare coverage.

Per Lofberg, president of Caremark Pharmacy Services, also cited the anticipated shift of retirees from employer-based coverage to Medicare under the new U.S. healthcare law.

Dolliver said the expanded healthcare coverage could also benefit CVS's retail store operations.

"This is a population (those eligible for Medicare) that generates a lot of foot traffic, so you start moving them around into your stores from other people that makes a nice difference," Dolliver said.

CVS's move to expand its PBM operations comes as its chief rival, Walgreen Co, is seeking get out of the business. Walgreen, the No. 1 U.S. drugstore chain, hired Bank of America in October to sell its pharmacy benefits management unit.

DOUBLING MEDICARE ENROLLMENT OVERNIGHT

CVS will buy all of Universal American's shares outstanding and then distribute stock in a newly formed public company to Universal American shareholders. The newly formed company will own all other operations of Universal American, including its Medicare Advantage and traditional insurance businesses.

Universal American serves about 1.9 million Medicare prescription drug plan members, while CVS Caremark serves about 1.2 million Medicare drug plan members.

CVS has had a rocky history with its pharmacy benefits management business after buying Caremark for $27 billion in 2007. Caremark administers prescription drug benefits for employers and health plans and operates a large mail-order pharmacy operation.

Late in 2009, the PBM lost $4.8 billion in contracts heading into the new year, and the president of the unit departed. At the same time, CVS disclosed that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission was investigating some business practices of the combined company, leading many to question whether the merger made sense.

Since then, CVS has sought to fix the business, bringing in veteran Lofberg and changing the way it pitches to clients.

"Assuming you integrate it well and operate it well, I think it's a good deal for them," Jonas said. "But they're still getting the PBM back on track and recovering from some missteps."

The remaining business at Universal American will mostly be in Medicare Advantage, which are full-service health plans run by insurance companies under Medicare.

The U.S. government is scaling back payments to the Medicare Advantage plans, leaving some investors worried about companies that rely on them heavily.

"The Medicare Advantage business just gets such a low multiple in the market right now," Jonas said.

CVS said the Universal American deal won't affect its previously announced plans for dividends and share buybacks. It will shed more light on the deal when it gives its 2011 outlook on February 3.

Blood test to spot cancer gets big boost from J&J

2011-01-03T09:25:00.001-05:00

Link to Article

By MARILYNN MARCHIONE, AP Medical Writer – 2 hrs 31 mins ago

BOSTON – A blood test so sensitive that it can spot a single cancer cell lurking among a billion healthy ones is moving one step closer to being available at your doctor's office.

Boston scientists who invented the test and health care giant Johnson & Johnson will announce Monday that they are joining forces to bring it to market. Four big cancer centers also will start studies using the experimental test this year.

Stray cancer cells in the blood mean that a tumor has spread or is likely to, many doctors believe. A test that can capture such cells has the potential to transform care for many types of cancer, especially breast, prostate, colon and lung.

Initially, doctors want to use the test to try to predict what treatments would be best for each patient's tumor and find out quickly if they are working.

"This is like a liquid biopsy" that avoids painful tissue sampling and may give a better way to monitor patients than periodic imaging scans, said Dr. Daniel Haber, chief of Massachusetts General Hospital's cancer center and one of the test's inventors.

Ultimately, the test may offer a way to screen for cancer besides the mammograms, colonoscopies and other less-than-ideal methods used now.

"There's a lot of potential here, and that's why there's a lot of excitement," said Dr. Mark Kris, lung cancer chief at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. He had no role in developing the test, but Sloan-Kettering is one of the sites that will study it this year.

Many people have their cancers diagnosed through needle biopsies. These often do not provide enough of a sample to determine what genes or pathways control a tumor's growth. Or the sample may no longer be available by the time the patient gets sent to a specialist to decide what treatment to prescribe.

Doctors typically give a drug or radiation treatment and then do a CT scan two months later to look for tumor shrinkage. Some patients only live long enough to try one or two treatments, so a test that can gauge success sooner, by looking at cancer cells in the blood, could give patients more options.

"If you could find out quickly, 'this drug is working, stay on it,' or 'this drug is not working, try something else,' that would be huge," Haber said.

The only test on the market now to find tumor cells in blood — CellSearch, made by J&J's Veridex unit — just gives a cell count. It doesn't capture whole cells that doctors can analyze to choose treatments.

Interest in trying to collect these cells soared in 2007, after Haber and his colleagues published a study of Mass General's test. It is far more powerful than CellSearch and traps cells intact. It requires only a couple of teaspoons of blood and can be done repeatedly to monitor treatment or determine why a drug has stopped working and what to try next.

"That's what got the scientific community's interest," Kris said. Doctors can give a drug one day and sample blood the next day to see if the circulating tumor cells are gone, he explained.

The test uses a microchip that resembles a lab slide covered in 78,000 tiny posts, like bristles on a hairbrush. The posts are coated with antibodies that bind to tumor cells. When blood is forced across the chip, cells ping off the posts like balls in a pinball machine. The cancer cells stick, and stains make them glow so researchers can count and capture them for study.

The test can find one cancer cell in a billion or more healthy cells, said Mehmet Toner, a Harvard University bioengineer who helped design it. Researchers know this because they spiked blood samples with cancer cells and then searched for them with the chip.

Studies of the chip have been published in the journals Nature, the New England Journal of Medicine andScience Translational Medicine. It is the most promising of several dozen that companies and universities are rushing to develop to capture circulating tumor cells, said Bob McCormack, technology chief for Veridex.

The agreement announced Monday will have Veridex and J&J's Ortho Biotech Oncology unit work to improve the microchip, including trying a cheaper plastic to make it practical for mass production. No price goal has been set, a company official said, but the current CellSearch test costs several hundred dollars.

The companies will start a research center at Mass General and will have rights to license the test from the hospital, which holds the patents.

In a separate effort, Mass General, Sloan-Kettering, University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston will start using the test this year. They are one of the "dream teams" sharing a $15 million grant from the Stand Up to Cancer telethon, run by the American Association for Cancer Research.

Already, scientists have been surprised to find that more cancer patients harbor these stray cells than has been believed. In one study, the test was used on men thought to have cancer confined to the prostate, "but we found these cells in two-thirds of patients," Toner said.

This might mean that cancer cells enter the blood soon after a tumor starts, or that more cancers have already spread but are unseen by doctors.

Or it could mean something else entirely, because researchers have much to learn about these cells, said Dr. Minetta Liu, a breast cancer specialist at Georgetown University's Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. She led a session on them at the recent San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium and has been a paid speaker for Veridex. She hopes the cells will someday aid cancer screening.

"The dream is, a woman comes in for her mammogram and gets a tube of blood drawn," so doctors can look for cancer cells in her blood as well as tumors on the imaging exam, she said.

That's still far off, but Mass General's test already is letting doctors monitor patients without painful biopsies. Like Greg Vrettos, who suffered a collapsed lung from a biopsy in 2004, when he was diagnosed with lung cancer.

"It had spread to both lungs and they couldn't operate," said Vrettos, 63, a nonsmoker and retired electrical engineer from Durham, N.H. Tests from the biopsy showed that he was a good candidate for the drug Iressa, which he has taken ever since. He goes to Boston every three months for CT scans and the blood test.

"They could look at the number of cancer cells and see that it dropped over time. It corresponded with what the scans were showing," Vrettos said of doctors looking at his blood tests.

The test also showed when he had a setback last January and needed to have his treatment adjusted.

"I think it's going to be revolutionary," he said of the test.

Health insurers may face scrutiny

2010-12-27T12:00:00.000-05:00

JUSTIFYING BIG PREMIUM INCREASES

Health insurers may face scrutiny

Wednesday, December 22, 2010 02:51 AM
By Noam N. Levey

McCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

WASHINGTON - Moving to restrain skyrocketing health-insurance premiums, the Obama administration is proposing new rules requiring insurers to justify increases of more than 10 percent a year in 2011.

At the same time, administration officials are planning to step up federal review of premiums if state regulators cannot adequately protect consumers, a move cheered by many consumer advocates.

"Ultimately, we know that the bright light of sunshine convinces more insurers to think twice and check their math before submitting large rate hikes," Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius said yesterday in announcing the proposed regulation, authorized by the new health-care law. "This is our latest step to put consumers back in charge of their own health care."

The increased oversight comes as consumers nationwide struggle with rate hikes that have exceeded 30percent in some places, even as insurance-industry profits have swelled.

In the lead-up to passage of the new law, the soaring rates fueled calls to give state and federal regulators more power to scrutinize premiums and even deny increases that appear unjustified. Only some states now have such authority.

The draft regulations unveiled yesterday would not give state or federal officials the ability to deny rate hikes. Instead, the administration is relying on state regulators to scrutinize proposed rate increases and to assess if they are justified by increases in the cost of care or other factors.

Insurance companies have said their headline-grabbing rate increases are being driven by the rising cost of health care, an assertion that the industry's senior Washington lobbyist reiterated yesterday.

Karen Ignagni, head of America's Health Insurance Plans, criticized the 10 percent threshold as unrealistic. "It does not adequately factor in all of the components that determine premiums, including the cost of new benefit mandates and the impact of younger and healthier people dropping coverage," she said.

Insurers have fiercely resisted increased scrutiny of their rate-setting at the state and federal level.

Consumer groups, in contrast, largely applauded the additional oversight.

Under the new health-care law, states retain primary responsibility for policing the insurance industry. The Department of Health and Human Services has made grants to 46 states to help them increase oversight.

If states do not have the capacity to review rates, however, the federal department would step in to conduct the review under the proposed new rules.

Insurers whose rate increases are deemed unreasonable would be required to provide written justifications that would be posted on the federal government's new health website, www.healthcare.gov.

Link to Dispatch article

Health Benefits Ride 6.9% in 2010

2010-11-18T10:55:00.000-05:00

They’ve Gone Up 6.9% in 2010

by John Hollon on Nov 17, 2010, 11:27 AM

The year 2010 may be rapidly winding down, but the accounting of health care costs continues.

This is especially true in the wake of the passage of health care reform (more commonly known as Obamacare). In fact, the well-respected Mercer National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans was just released this week, and it makes one thing very clear: “2010 is Year Zero for health reform — the year against which the effects of the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) will be measured.”

Having said that, here are the highlights of the Mercer health plan survey as we get to the end of Year Zero:

Total health benefit costs rose 6.9 percent in 2010,up from 5.5 percent in 2009.
With reform requirements adding 1-2 percent to costs in 2011, employers say costs would rise by 10 percent next year if they made no changes, but they hope to hold the overall increase to 6.4 percent on average.
Large employers added consumer-directed health plans in 2010, helping to push up enrollment in these high-deductible plans to 11 percent of all covered employees.
Taking a cue from the PPACA, more employers are giving employees financial incentives to participate in wellness or health management programs.
The prevalence of retiree medical plans fell this year to its lowest level in almost 20 years; nearly one in 10 large employers instead provides retirees with a subsidy to purchase individual coverage.

In real dollar costs, the growth in the average total health benefit cost per employee, which had slowed last year to 5.5 percent, is now at 6.9 percent in 2010, or $9,562 per person. This is the biggest increase since 2004, according to the annual Mercer Health Plans survey, and it also shows that health benefit costs rose three times faster than the CPI in 2010.

High cost increases expected next year

The survey also found that employers expect high cost increases again in 2011. That’s not a big surprise, of course, because health care costs have been steadily rising for several years.

Employers who responded to the Mercer survey say that their costs would rise by about 10 percent next year if they made no health program changes, with roughly two percentage points of this increase coming solely from changes mandated by the PPACA for 2011. However, employers also day that they expect to hold their actual cost increase down to 6.4 percent by making changes to their plan design, or, by changing health plan vendors.

“Employers did a little bit of everything to hold down cost increases in 2010,” said Beth Umland, Mercer’s director of health and benefits research, in a press release about the survey. “The average individual PPO deductible rose by about $100. Employers dropped HMOs, which were more costly than PPOs this year. Large employers added low-cost consumer-directed health plans and found ways to encourage more employees to enroll in them – even sometimes dropping all other plan options. And more employers provided employees with financial incentives to take better care of their health.”

Large employers were hit harder

One other thing that also shouldn’t be a shock: Large employers experienced a much sharper health care cost increase than smaller employers this year. Costs rose by 8.5 percent among employers with 500 or more employees in 2010, but by just 4.4 percent among those with 10-499 employees.

“Large employers may have been taken by surprise by the uptick in the cost increase this year,” said Susan Connolly, a Partner in Mercer’s Boston office. “In last year’s survey, they predicted cost would rise by less than 6 percent. Higher prices for health care services seem to be part of the equation, but if the recession caused a slowdown in utilization last year, we may also be seeing the effect of employees getting care they’ve been putting off.”

Large employers most often are self-insured, which means they pay the actual cost of claims as they are incurred. If health benefit use is higher than expected, or the price of health care services rises, the actual cost could exceed the predicted cost. Small employers typically offer fully insured plans, in which premium cost is fixed in advance.

Mercer’s National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans includes public and private organizations with 10 or more employees; 2,836 employers responded in 2010, and the results represent about 800,000 employers and more than 104 million full and part-time employees. The survey has a margin of error of plus/minus 3 percent.

There is more detail on the highlights of the National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Planshere, but if you want to dive deep into the details and get the full survey and report it will cost you $600 ($1,200 if you want the report and all the tables that go with it). If that’s your thing, you can get it from Mercer here.

The bottom line here is that none of what is detailed in the Mercer survey should come as any great shock to anyone in HR, benefits, or finance in your organization. Health care costs have been rising for a number of years, and frankly, that continued growth rate is unsustainable for most organizations. If you haven’t gotten the wake up call about this before, perhaps this survey will finally do the trick.

John Hollon is Vice President for Editorial of TLNT.com, and the former Editor of Workforce Management. He has written extensively about human resources (HR) and talent management. Contact him at john@tlnt.com, and follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/johnhollon

What’s the biggest driver of health care costs? Our personal behaviors

2010-10-27T15:28:00.000-04:00

What’s the biggest driver of health care costs? Our personal behaviors.
By: Steve Shortell, dean of the School of Public Health: Berkley

The recently passed Affordable Care Act extends health insurance coverage to 32 million Americans, including at least 6 million people in California alone. But expanding access to health care will do little to improve our health.

Fifty percent of the determinants of health are due to our behaviors; 20 percent to environmental factors; 20 percent to genetics; and only 10 percent to having access to medical care. Yet in California and as a nation we spend 96 percent of health expenditures on medical services and only 4 percent on preventing disease and promoting health.

The majority of the most costly health conditions are preventable, including obesity, diabetes, heart disease and asthma. Physical inactivity and obesity cost the state $388 million per year in workers’ compensation and $11.2 billion in lost productivity.

Fifty-six percent of California adults and 30 percent of our children are overweight or obese. The total economic impact of asthma in the state is $14 billion, including 14 million lost school days and 14.5 million lost workdays. Even a modest 5 percent reduction in these and related illnesses could save the state up to $1.6 billion a year.

Interventions are needed that recognize the interaction between our personal behaviors – diet, exercise, lifestyle – and the communities in which we live.

Taking personal responsibility for our health is important. But we can make healthy choices only if there are healthy options to choose from. We need to ensure that the decisions we make about our community are those that promote healthy living; that make it easier for us to do things that promote our health and well-being and difficult to do things that are harmful.

This means access to clean air, safe water, fresh fruits and vegetables, environmentally safe buildings, parks, recreation, roads, and education and cultural opportunities. This is the philosophy of “health in all” policies in which the goal of reducing illness and injury is embedded in cooperative efforts that link our public health and medical institutions with our education, agriculture, housing, transportation and related sectors.

For example, if we design housing with access to trees, parks and recreational facilities, residents are more likely to engage in physical activity and less likely to suffer from heat-related illnesses in extreme weather than if we have housing designed or located without such features. Building attractive and green housing has health benefits.

The health care reform legislation offers some opportunity to enact “health in all” policies. A Prevention and Public Health fund is created along with a Federal Preventive Services Task Force and a Public Health Council. Ten billion dollars will be allocated over the next five years for prevention programs. This includes a “Creating Healthier Communities” grant program for health departments to implement various prevention initiatives to reduce chronic diseases and eliminate inequalities in health by race, ethnicity and socioeconomic status.

But California, and many other states, will be challenged to respond to this opportunity due to a severe shortage of trained public health professionals, inadequate data systems and the need for performance standards.

To seize the opportunity to invest in health and reduce the economic burden of disease on the state will require creative leadership on the part of both public officials and the private sector. Concerted efforts to provide the leadership and resources to address the underlying behavioral, social and environmental determinants of health will have a greater impact on our health status and economy than any of the health care delivery system efforts to cope with the expanded access to care afforded by the increase in health insurance coverage.

View original post: http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2010/10/27/whats-the-biggest-driver-of-health-care-costs-our-personal-behaviors/

Employers looking at health-insurance options

2010-10-25T11:55:00.003-04:00

Monday, October 25, 2010 02:53 AM
By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar

ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON - The new health-care law wasn't supposed to undercut employer plans that have provided most people in the U.S. with coverage for generations.
But last week a leading manufacturer told workers their costs will jump partly because of the law. Also, a Democratic governor laid out a plan for employers to get out of health care by shifting workers into taxpayer-subsidized insurance markets that open in 2014.

Although it's too early to proclaim the demise of job-based coverage, corporate numbers crunchers are looking at options that could lead to major changes.

"The economics of dropping existing coverage is about to become very attractive to many employers, both public and private," said Gov. Phil Bredesen, D-Tenn.

That's not going to happen, White House officials say.

"The absolute certainty about the Affordable Care Act is that for many, many employers who cover millions of people, it increases the incentives for them to offer coverage," said Jason Furman, an economic adviser to President Barack Obama.

Yet at least one major employer has shifted a greater share of plan costs to workers, and others are weighing whether to force employees to strike out on their own.

"I don't think you are going to hear anybody publicly say 'We've made a decision to drop insurance,'" said Paul Keckley, executive director of the Deloitte Center for Health Solutions, a major accounting and consulting firm. "What we are hearing in our meetings is, 'We don't want to be the first one to drop benefits, but we would be the fast second.'"

When lawmakers debated the legislation, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected it would only have minimal impact on employer plans. About 3 million fewer people would be covered through the job, but they'd be able to get insurance elsewhere.

Two provisions in the new law are leading companies to review their plans.

One is a hefty tax on high-cost health insurance aimed at the most generous coverage. Although the "Cadillac tax" doesn't hit until 2018, companies may have to disclose their exposure to investors well before that. A Boeing spokeswoman said concerns about the tax were partly behind a 50 percent increase in insurance deductibles.

The tax is 40 percent of the value of a plan above $10,200 for individual coverage and $27,500 for a family plan. Family coverage now averages about $13,800.

Furman said blaming a cost increase next year on a tax that won't take effect for eight years "stretches credibility very far past the breaking point."

Tennessee Gov. Bredesen said last week that employers could save big money by dropping their health plans and sending workers to buy coverage in the exchanges. They'd face a fine of $2,000 per worker, but employers could even afford to give workers a raise and still come out ahead, Bredesen wrote in the Wall Street Journal.

"I don't know if the intent was to find an exit strategy for providing benefits, but the bill as written provides the mechanism," said Deloitte's Keckley, the consultant.

A Senate Finance Committee spokeswoman says that when companies do the math, they'll decide to keep offering coverage. That's because employers get to deduct the cost of workers' health care from corporate taxes. If a company drops the coverage, its income taxes go up and it will face a bigger bill for Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes.

Happy to be of assistance by way of sharing this information.

Daniel S. Robins, CFP
Robins Benefit Group
(614) 545-3555 x3

TODAY Show Interview: The Rising Cost of Health Insurance

2010-10-21T09:02:00.001-04:00

Order Affordable Drugs through Canada using Pharmacychecker.com

2010-10-20T16:59:00.000-04:00

Safety of PharmacyChecker-Approved Internet Pharmacy in Free Trade Zone Demonstrated in an Article Meant to Attack It

On July 13, 2010, in Online Pharmacy Verification Services, by Tod Cooperman, MD, President, PharmacyChecker.com, and Gabriel Levitt, Vice President, PharmacyChecker.com

The Partnership for Safe Medicines (PSM), a front group for the pharmaceutical industry, recently published a piece in which its vice president, Bryan Liang, conducted an interview with the Inspectorate of General Health in the Netherlands Antilles on the topic of free trade zones and pharmaceuticals sold through them.
While Dr. Liang attempted to paint a sinister picture of pharmacies in free trade zones, noting a potential to “assist foreign and suspect online sellers,” the Inspectorate gave a most positive description of the one and only operation under his purview that has been approved by PharmacyChecker.com. He stated:

“The one Internet pharmacy established in the Airport Economic Zone is licensed, as are the pharmacists and pharmacy technicians. Thus, the pharmacy is recognized by the Netherlands Antillean government. All laws and regulations on pharmaceuticals and on the practice of pharmacy do apply. The Inspectorate for Pharmaceutical Affairs has full jurisdiction and authority in these matters, including in the free trade zone.
The Internet/mail-order pharmacy is not allowed to dispense any controlled substance. Furthermore, the responsible pharmacist has been given specific instructions on how to stop any counterfeit medicine that enters the country and is subsequently re-exported. For example, the pharmacist is supposed to have a pedigree system in place, by which the source of all medicines can be traced and verified. Medicines can only be imported from reputable (licensed) pharmaceutical wholesalers and/or manufacturers abroad (applying the “know your supplier” principle).”

PharmacyChecker.com is well aware of these safeguards. We made sure they were in place and verified before permitting the pharmacy to become a member of the PharmacyChecker.com Verification Program, including an onsite inspection by Dr. Ram Kamath, Pharm.D, our Director of Pharmacy Policy and International Verifications, who found that the pharmacy meets good standards of mail-order pharmacy practice. The pharmacy is inspected by us annually. Dr. Kamath, by the way, co-designed the state drug importation program called I-SaveRx for the State of Illinois. That program was then adopted by four other states, including Kansas, under the leadership of former Governor Kathleen Sebelius, now Secretary of Health and Human Services. It was also supported by then Congressman Rahm Emanuel, now White House Chief of Staff.

The PSM’s post also squeezes in an implication that PharmacyChecker.com allows rogue online pharmacies to advertise on search engines, based on an earlier misleading article written by PSM’s Bryan Liang himself. That article and several others published by pharma-industry-funded groups wrongly attribute rogue online pharmacy ads to PharmacyChecker.com.
In our opinion, the most “suspect” aspect of the Partnership for Safe Medicines’ blog article is that it shows the continuing efforts of this organization to misinform the public about safe Canadian and other international pharmacies.

Preventing Breast Cancer: Largest-Ever Review Completed

2010-10-20T16:35:00.001-04:00

In Honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month
WWW.THEBREASTCANCERSITE.COM

Preventing Breast Cancer:
Largest-Ever Review Completed

WASHINGTON, DC – The largest review of research into lifestyle and breast cancer ever conducted has confirmed that women can reduce their risk by maintaining a healthy weight, being physically active, drinking less alcohol and breastfeeding their children.

The massive American Institute for Cancer Research/World Cancer Research Fund (AICR/WCRF) project looked at the evidence on the links between breast cancer and diet, body weight and physical activity.

The new study is an update to the breast cancer chapter of Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity and the Prevention of Cancer: a Global Perspective, the expert report on cancer prevention published by AICR and WCRF in 2007. The conclusions on breast cancer in the 2007 report were based on data from 873 studies, while the newly updated review includes evidence from an additional 81 studies that have been published since then. The update will be published on the Expert Report website, www.dietandcancerreport.org.

Estimate: Over 70,000 US Breast Cancer Cases Preventable Every Year

“This study represents the clearest picture we have ever had on how lifestyle affects a woman’s risk of breast cancer,” said Professor Martin Wiseman, MD, Medical and Scientific Adviser for AICR and WCRF.

“We are now more certain than ever that by maintaining a healthy weight, being physically active and limiting the amount of alcohol they drink, women can dramatically reduce their risk.”

“We estimate that almost 40 per cent of breast cancer cases in the US – or about 70,000 cases every year – could be prevented by making these straightforward everyday changes,” added AICR Director of Research Susan Higginbotham, PhD, RD.

New Report Reinforces AICR Recommendations

Because of the link between excess body fat and cancer, AICR recommends aiming to be as lean as possible without becoming underweight.
AICR also recommends being physically active for at least 30 minutes every day.
If you drink at all, limit consumption to two drinks a day for a man and one for a woman.
AICR also recommends that mothers breastfeed exclusively for up to six months and then add other liquids and foods. Evidence is convincing that mothers who breastfeed reduce their risk for breast cancer. There is also probable evidence that children who are breastfed have a lower risk of gaining excess weight as they grow.

A Continuous Review of Recommendations

The report on breast cancer is part of the Continuous Update Project, a unique effort run by AICR and WCRF. The long-term goal is to continuously update the findings of the AICR/WCRF 2007 expert report so that cancer prevention advice is always based on the latest research.

Breast cancer is the first type of cancer the researchers have looked at as part of this update project, and they have now added started to review the evidence for colon cancer and prostate cancer, both of which are expected to finish early in 2010. The long-term aim is for the evidence on every type of cancer to be continually updated.

Empowering Individuals with the Latest Information

Marilyn Gentry, Chief Executive of AICR and WCRF, said, “As a cancer charity we believe people should have access to advice that’s based on the latest scientific research – that’s why we are so proud of our Continuous Update Project.

“When people read about new research, it’s hard for them to take the findings and put them in a meaningful context – to weigh new results against the research that has gone before. This project exists to help them do just that.

“The project is still in its early stages, but we are dedicated to providing people around the world with access to up-to-date advice about how they can make everyday changes that reduce their cancer risk. This is a vital part of the global fight against cancer.”

Pill-Splitting Cuts Prescription Costs

2010-10-20T10:00:00.000-04:00

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ―

Click to enlarge 1 of 1: AP

Everyone is looking to save money these days and saving on prescriptions is no exception.

Some doctors and patients are doing this through a technique called pill-splitting. For example, if an 80 milligram dose of a medication costs about the same as a 40 milligram dose, the patient can save money by purchasing the larger dose and cutting it in half.

Dr. Scott Drab at the University of Pittsburgh says it's becoming more and more common.

"What they do is the prescription is written for a higher does and it says specifically on the prescription that the patient will be splitting the dose," he said.

That's what patient Saul Cohen's doctor recommended when they discovered he could save half the cost of his Lipitor cholesterol medication.

"I used to split my 40-milligram tablets into 20s, therefore I saved half, which was about $700 a year," Cohen said.

Statins, like Lipitor, are good candidates for pill-splitting, as are anti-depressants and high blood pressure medications. Flat, round pills are the easiest to split, as are pills with a scored center.

Pills that are not safe to split include coated pills, time-released medications, medication for which precise dosing is very important, and capsules, because "there's often powder or pellets in there that don't allow for uniform and equal dosing," Dr. Drab said.

Medication can only be safely split in half, never in thirds or quarters, and should always be split using a professional pill splitter, versus a knife or razor blade. And don't split pills in advance – only as you need them.

With prescription costs topping $277 billion a year in the U.S., Dr. Drab says some insurance companies are even encouraging doctors and patients to pill-split.

"Not only is it common but there are actually health plans out there that are creating incentives for their patients to split medications, cost savings and cost-sharing with the patient," he said.

To view video please follow this link: Pill-Splitting Video

(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

Pill Splitting: Which ones are safe to divide?

2010-10-20T09:54:00.000-04:00

Our 2nd annual prescription drug survey found that some Americans are splitting pills to save money on high priced prescription drugs. That strategy could indeed cut your medication bill, but there's a right way and a wrong way to split pills. If you're considering splitting your pills, these tips from our free pill splitting guide will help ensure that you do it the right way.
First, ask your doctor or pharmacist whether your medication can be safely split. Some medications cannot be split (more on that below), but in general, many common ones can, including aspirin, cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins, and many high blood pressure and depression drugs.
Second, always use a pill splitter to ensure you've split the medication into equal halves. Pill splitters are widely available from pharmacies for $3-10 dollars. Or check with your health insurance company—some will send you a pill splitter for free (it saves them money too).
Don’t split your pills with a knife. Studies show that doing so too often leads to unequal halves. Pills should only be split in half, not into smaller portions, such as thirds or quarters. The easiest pills to split are relatively flat round ones with a scored center, a slightly indented line that runs across the center of the pill. However, not every pill that has a scored center is meant to be split.
Don't split your pills in advance. Some pills may deteriorate when exposed to air and moisture for long periods after being split. So for medications taken on a regular basis, only split your pill on the day you take the first half, and then take the other half on the second day or whenever you are scheduled to take your next dose.

If your doctor has prescribed half tablets, your pharmacy may split the pills for you. So when you pick up the prescription or a refill, ask if the pills have been split so you don't inadvertently split them again. Also be aware that the prescription label may refer to "one tablet" even though your doctor has told you to split the pills. If you're not sure about the label instructions or your doctor’s instructions, check before splitting or taking your medication.There is no official or complete list of medicines that can be split. And it can actually be dangerous to split some drugs. Generally, the following kinds of pills should not be split:

Chemotherapy drugs
Anti-seizure medicines
Birth control pills
Blood thinners (Coumadin, warfarin)
Capsules of any kind that contain powders or gels
Pills with a hard outside coating
Pills designed to release medication over time in your body
Pills that are coated to protect your stomach (enteric coating)
Pills that crumble easily, irritate your mouth, taste bitter, or contain strong dyes that could stain your teeth and your mouth.
Combination tablets that contain two or more medicines, in which the amount of one active ingredient changes from one tablet size to the next, but the amount of the other does not. (You’ll have to ask your doctor or pharmacist.) Hera are some examples:

amlodipine/atorvastatin (Caduet)
amlodipine/olmesartan (Azor),
amoxicillin/clavulanic acid (Augmentin, and others),
ezetemibe/simvastatin (Vytorin),
irbesartan/hydrochlorothiazide (Avalide)
oxycodone/acetaminophen (Percocet, and others)
sitagliptin/metformin (Janumet)

Some medications that can be split (but always check with your doctor or pharmacist beforehand; your situation may require something different):

amlodipine (Norvasc)
atorvastatin (Lipitor)
citalopram (Celexa)
doxazosin (Cardura)
finasteride (Proscar) [NOTE: Women should NOT handle crushed or broken tablets if pregnant or possibly pregnant. Broken tablets loose some of the protective outer coating, thus allowing absorption of finasteride through the skin. The drug may cause a male fetus to be born with abnormalities of its sex organs.]
levothyroxine (Synthroid)
lisinopril (Zestril)
lovastatin (Mevacor)
paroxetine (Paxil)
quinapril (Accupril)
sertraline (Zoloft)
simvastatin (Zocor)
tadalafil (Cialis)
vardenafil (Levitra)

For more on pill splitting, check out our free guide.
—Steve Mitchell, associate editor, Consumer Reports Health Best Buy Drugs

To learn more about how you can get the most value for your health care dollar when it comes to prescription drugs, check out our free Best Buy Drugs reports.

Health-Insurance Reform Muddies Premium Renewals

2010-10-13T16:42:00.000-04:00

Health-insurance Reform Muddies Premium Renewals

BUSINESS FIRST OF COLUMBUS - BY Carrie Ghose

Can I sign my 24-year-old up for our company’s insurance now? Is our coverage canceled? Why is our deductible going up?

Harried benefits managers across Central Ohio are fielding calls from sometimes misinformed employees while trying to figure out for themselves how to comply with federal insurance reform – and what the changes will cost – making this fall’s renewal season anything but routine.

“People are just overwhelmed with the planning process for 2011 right now. There are so many variables,” said Christopher Goldsmith, Cleveland-based vice president with the Sibson Consulting division of Segal Co.

Employers might be more nervous than necessary about explaining the changes to workers, said Carrie Alexander, a consultant with the Toledo-based Findley Davies health benefits and human resources consulting firm.

“What we’ve been recommending is, just focus on the changes for 2011, because after that it’s anybody’s guess,” she said. “A lot of the communication is reassuring employees (that) it does not mean your coverage is being removed.”

Usual suspects

Most provisions of the Affordable Care Act, such as coverage mandates, don’t take effect until 2014. But an estimated half of employer-sponsored plans won’t get grandfathered status under the law, so they must make several changes with any renewals after Sept. 23. Those include covering prevention completely, eliminating lifetime benefits caps and keeping employees’ children on plans up to age 26.

So far this year, rate increases for individual and small group plans filed with the Ohio Department of Insurance have included about 5 percentage points attributed to costs to comply with requirements in the federal reform law, said Doug Anderson, the state’s chief policy officer. State actuaries determine if the increases are justified based on claims experience and the new requirements, and have rejected some proposed rates while accepting others.

Overall, underlying medical costs that drive premiums are expected to rise about 11 percent next year, according to annual surveys of employers and insurers by consultants Aon Corp., Mercer and Segal. They attribute up to 2 percentage points to reform, below the increases seen so far in Ohio. The consultants are looking mostly at large employers, where rates are set according to individual negotiations instead of state-reviewed formulas, Anderson said.

After beefing up wellness programs and shifting even more costs to workers, employers aim to wrestle their increases down to 6 percent or so.

The bulk of the increase is due to familiar trends such as greater use of medical services, flashier technology and designer drugs. The single largest factor is higher prices in contracts with hospitals pressured by shortfalls from government plans and unpaid care, Goldsmith said.

“Hospitals have to make up the difference somewhere and, unfortunately, private insurers seem to be the best place to look,” said Tiffany Himmelreich, spokeswoman for the Ohio Hospital Association. “Statewide, a little over half of hospitals have negative margins.”

‘Zero tolerance’

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will have “zero tolerance” for blaming large rate increases on reform, Secretary Kathleen Sebelius wrote in September to America’s Health Insurance Plans, a national trade group. The department will issue rules this fall for extra state or federal review of “potentially unreasonable rate increases,” which could result in being banned from participating in the health insurance exchanges set to begin in 2014. Those additional reviews would begin next year, Anderson said.

This year’s changes bring up-front expenses for employers, such as removing co-payments, before any savings under the law kick in, consultants said.

“You would be sticking your head in the sand if you didn’t think costs were going up,” said Bill Shimp, principal with Columbus insurance agency Gardiner Allen DeRoberts.

About 10 percent of Central Ohio plans have no lifetime caps on benefits, compared with 37 percent nationally, according to a survey by United Benefits Advisors LLC, a coalition of independent agencies, including Gardiner. Removing caps should add about half a percentage point to rates, Goldsmith said. Employers are most worried about keeping or adding adult progeny, consultants said. While 19- to 25-year-olds in the main are healthier, they’re also in prime child-bearing years. Most employers can’t turn them away even if they’re married or covered by their own employers.

“With unemployment rampant ... we’re going to see a fair number of these adult children making the decision to stay on their parents’ plans,” Goldsmith said.

Employee buy-in

It will probably take several rounds of communication – letters to employees, a staff meeting, a paycheck flier – to fully explain plan changes, said Lori Hall, Columbus-based manager of human relations consulting services for the Employers Resource Association, a Cincinnati nonprofit with 1,400 member businesses.

“You can’t do a hit-and-run ‘Here’s the change,’ ” she said.

Shimp said the complexity of the federal reform law has helped his agency add clients who previously have handled benefits design on their own.

Employers also are seeking literal buy-in. U.S. workers paid an average of $4,000 this year toward family coverage, up 47 percent from 2005, according to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research and Educational Trust. Premiums rose 27 percent in that time.

In the Mercer survey of 1,100 companies, about 57 percent say they’ll ask workers to pay even more through higher payroll deductions or out-of-pocket costs next year.

Not only are employers nudging workers away from traditional PPO plans to lower-cost high-deductible plans, Hall said, they’re raising those deductibles, in some cases to $3,500 from $2,500.

Employers also are charging employees more of the premium if they elect family over single coverage, pushing generic drugs, penalizing high use of emergency rooms and CT scans, and amping up wellness and coaching on chronic disease.

“The time to focus on health and prevention is now,” Goldsmith said, “so those efforts can have an effect.”

614-220-5458 | cghose@bizjournals.com

NY seeks to ban sugary drinks from food stamp buys

2010-10-11T10:39:00.000-04:00

By SARA KUGLER FRAZIER, Associated Press Writer Sara Kugler Frazier, Associated Press Writer Fri Oct 8, 1:37 am ET

NEW YORK – Using food stamps to buy sodas, teas, sports drinks and other sugar-sweetened beverages would not be allowed in New York City under a new government effort to battle obesity.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Gov. David Paterson announced Thursday that they are seeking permission from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the nation's food stamp program, to add sugary drinks to the list of prohibited goods for city residents receiving assistance.
If approved, it would be the first time an item would be banned from the federal program based solely on nutritional value.
Spending government money on "foods of little or no nutritional value not only contradicts the intent of the program, it also effectively subsidizes a serious public health epidemic," New York officials wrote in their proposal.
The idea has been suggested before, including in 2008 in Maine, where it drew criticism from advocates for the poor who argued it unfairly singled out low-income people and risked scaring off potential needy recipients.
In 2004, the USDA rejected Minnesota's plan to ban junk food, including soda and candy, from food stamp purchases, saying it would violate the Food Stamp Act's definition of what is food and could create "confusion and embarrassment" at the register.
New York City Health Commissioner Thomas Farley said he believes New York's request has a better chance of being approved than the "skimpy" 2004 Minnesota program because it focuses only on beverages.
He said it also has the advantage of being a temporary program with an evaluation plan to study its effectiveness.
USDA spokesman Aaron Lavallee said Thursday the agency received the proposal and will consider it.
The food stamp system, launched in the 1960s, serves some 40 million Americans per month and does not currently restrict any food item based on nutrition.
Recipients can essentially buy any food for the household, although there are some limits on hot or prepared foods. Food stamps also cannot be used to buy alcohol, cigarettes or items such as pet food, vitamins or household goods.
The ban would apply to any beverage that contains more than 10 calories per 8 ounces, except for milk products, milk substitutes like soy milk and rice milk, and fruit juices without added sugar.
A 20-ounce sugar-sweetened drink can contain the equivalent of as many as 16 packets of sugar.
Some New Yorkers who receive the assistance said officials had good intentions but felt the proposal went too far.
"I can see the sodas, but suppose somebody's in bad shape and they just want juice?" said Harold Vilson, a 56-year-old Brooklyn resident who said he uses food stamps.
"If people want to buy that stuff, they should be able to. If it's not an illegal product, they should be able to buy what they want to buy."
The program would be temporary, so officials could study its effects over two years. It would apply only to food stamp recipients in New York City — 1.7 million of the city's more than 8 million residents — and would not affect the amount of assistance they receive.
"Sugar-sweetened drinks are not worth the cost to our health, and government shouldn't be promoting or subsidizing them," said Bloomberg, who also has outlawed trans-fats in restaurant food and has forced chain restaurants to post calorie counts on menus.
In fiscal year 2009, New Yorkers received $2.7 billion in food stamp benefits and spent $75 million to $135 million of that on sugary drinks, the city said.
Officials said stores that participate in the food stamp program would be responsible for enforcing the ban. They acknowledged the possibility that food stamp users could travel outside city limits to buy the prohibited drinks.
Advocates for the poor expressed alarm about the proposal, which the New York City Coalition Against Hunger said "punishes poor people for the supposed crime of being poor."
"It's sending the message to low-income people that they are uniquely the only people in America who don't know how to take care of their family," said Joel Berg, the group's executive director. "The problem isn't that they're making poor choices, the problem is that they can't afford nutritious food."
There still are many unhealthful products New Yorkers could purchase with food stamps, including potato chips, ice cream and candy. Officials said the proposal targets sugary drinks because they are the largest contributor to obesity.
More than half of adult New York City residents are overweight or obese, along with nearly 40 percent of public school students in kindergarten through eighth grade.
City officials said lower-income residents are most likely to drink one or more sugar-sweetened drinks a day; adult-onset diabetes is also twice as common among poor New Yorkers compared to the wealthiest.
In New York, a proposal to adopt a penny-per-ounce tax on sweetened soda failed to get out of the state Legislature earlier this year; Bloomberg backed the state proposal.

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East Side teacher acts on Michelle Obama's call to get moving

BY JASON SHOUGH

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

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Safety of PharmacyChecker-Approved Internet Pharmacy in Free Trade Zone Demonstrated in an Article Meant to Attack It

Preventing Breast Cancer: Largest-Ever Review Completed

Preventing Breast Cancer:Largest-Ever Review Completed

Estimate: Over 70,000 US Breast Cancer Cases Preventable Every Year

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A Continuous Review of Recommendations

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Pill-Splitting Cuts Prescription Costs

Pill Splitting: Which ones are safe to divide?

Health-Insurance Reform Muddies Premium Renewals

Health-insurance Reform Muddies Premium Renewals

BUSINESS FIRST OF COLUMBUS - BY Carrie Ghose

Usual suspects

‘Zero tolerance’

Employee buy-in

NY seeks to ban sugary drinks from food stamp buys

Preventing Breast Cancer:
Largest-Ever Review Completed