About healthcare IT
CHIME survey shows huge increases in telehealth use: “Most healthcare executives were doing less than 25 virtual visits a day prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. The majority are now doing 50 telehealth visits a day and a full one-third of executives are doing more than 250 visits a day, according to a survey from the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME).
Perhaps not surprising the survey of nearly 200 digital healthcare executives revealed huge increases for virtual visits and appointments.”
NIH launches platform for nationwide coronavirus patient data: “The new platform is funded by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), which is part of the NIH. It will systematically collect clinical, laboratory and diagnostic data from health care provider organizations across the country. The NIH will aggregate and harmonize the information into a standard format readily available for use by researchers and health care providers.”
HCSC partners with Epic: 3 things to know:”Health Care Service Corp., the Chicago-based parent of five Blue Cross and Blue Shield health plans, tapped Epic to launch a new health information exchange platform between insurers, providers and patients.”
About pharma
US appeals court strikes down HHS rule requiring drug prices in TV ads: “A U.S. appeals court upheld a ruling June 16 that struck down a rule from HHS requiring drugmakers to put the wholesale prices of their drugs in TV ads…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in favor of the drugmakers, saying that HHS lacked the authority to establish the rule and that it acted "unreasonably" in making it.”
Common cholesterol drugs could slow spread of breast cancer to brain: “A new study from the University of Notre Dame shows drugs used to treat high cholesterol could interfere with the way breast cancer cells adapt to the microenvironment in the brain, preventing the cancer from taking hold. Patients with breast cancer who experience this type of metastasis typically survive for only months after diagnosis.
Statins, a group of drugs commonly prescribed for those with high cholesterol, were shown to interfere with a pathway that allows a cancer cell to recycle cell surface proteins and therefore make it easier for cancer cells to live within the brain.”
PBMs and Drug Spending in 2019: CVS Health and Express Scripts Outperform Prime Therapeutics: This report is a great annual analysis of drug spending. The entire article is worth reading but here is a summary: “Once again, we find that commercial drug spending did not race higher—contrary to what you keep hearing from journalists and politicians. Spending rose by less than 3% in 2019, continuing a multiyear trend of slow growth. At some plan sponsors, total drug spending even declined. For specialty drugs, higher utilization—not drug costs—was again the biggest factor driving specialty spending growth.”
About health systems
Beaumont, Advocate Aurora explore merger: “Southfield, Mich.-based Beaumont and Advocate Aurora, which has dual headquarters in Downers Grove, Ill., and Milwaukee, said they began partnership discussions in late 2019 but paused talks to allow both organizations to focus on the COVID-19 pandemic. On June 17, the health systems signed a nonbinding letter of intent to create a health system that would span across Michigan, Wisconsin and Illinois. “
7 health systems report $1B+ losses in Q1: With respect to the above article, Advocate Aurora had a net loss of $1.3B in Q1. Six other large systems’ results are listed.
About the public’s health
Two-Thirds of Patients With TNBC Do Not Receive Recommended Care: “Almost 70% of women diagnosed with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) do not receive care for their disease that is in accordance with guideline recommendations from the National Comprehensive Cancer Center (NCCN), reported study results out of ASCO20 Virtual, this year’s annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
This despite breast cancer being the most common cancer diagnosed in women and up to 20% of all cases accounted for by the TNBC subtype, which itself is usually diagnosed between age 40 to 50 years…”
Trump health officials pledge COVID-19 vaccine will be free to the 'vulnerable': “Any potential vaccine for COVID-19 will be free for any ‘vulnerable’ American who can't afford it, Trump administration officials pledged Tuesday.”
Trump praises scientists for developing AIDS vaccine that doesn’t exist: “President Donald Trump falsely suggested that scientists have developed a vaccine for AIDS, the late stage of HIV infection in which the virus badly damages the immune system.
‘They’ve come up with the AIDS vaccine,’Trump said during a press conference on police reform, referring to scientists.” In context with other comments he was probably referring to antiretroviral drugs.
White House Left States On Their Own To Buy Ventilators. Inside Their Mad Scramble: As lack of central coordination caused states to compete for resources (like ventilators), prices increased significantly. The article provides examples.
Pandemic spurs massive declines in health spending: This Altarum study found that national health spending was 24.8% lower in April compared to April 2019. Prescription drugs increased to 13% of the total, hospital care was 26%, and physician and clinical services were 15%. Annual figures are usually 9-10%, 30% and 20%, respectively.
About health insurance
Medicaid's legislative agency reports to Congress: 5 takeaways: “The Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission released its June 2020 Report to Congress, which included recommendations on dually eligible beneficiaries, the Medicare Savings Programs and coordination between Medicaid and Tricare.”
MedPAC urges MA, ACO tweaks to speed up value-based payment reform: “Medicare Advantage and accountable care organizations could be vehicles for much needed value-based payment reform in Medicare, but not without better aligned incentives and improved quality assessment, according to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission's June report to Congressreleased Monday.
For ACOs in the Medicare Shared Savings Program, the commission suggests HHS use national provider identifiers instead of taxpayer identification numbers. Using TINs could grant some ACOs unwarranted shared savings through favorable patient selection, MedPAC concluded.”