About Covid-19
Coronavirus has infected majority of Americans “Before omicron, one-third of Americans had been infected with the coronavirus, but by the end of February, that rate had climbed to nearly 60 percent — including about 75 percent of kids and 60 percent of people age 18 to 49, according to federal health data released Tuesday.”
Know your variants: A coronavirus 'cheat sheet' A good summary of the topic.
Abbott Makes $3.3B on COVID-19 Tests in First Quarter of 2022 “Abbott said it earned $3.3 billion in global COVID-19 testing-related sales in the first quarter, an increase of more than 57 percent over the same period last year, led by sales of its rapid testing products.
But the company expects that windfall to come to an end in the coming months, with its projection for the entire year set at $4.5 billion — and most of that in the first half.”
Covid-19 data reporting is becoming less frequent, making trends harder to track “Many states are scaling back on how often they report key Covid-19 statistics, a shift that some experts worry might hinder efforts to mitigate outbreaks and negative effects of the coronavirus.
A year ago, all 50 states were reporting new Covid-19 cases on a daily basis. But that has gradually trailed off. This week, Pennsylvania will be the latest state to switch from daily to weekly updates, leaving just six states that will still be reporting new Covid-19 cases every day of the week.”
About health insurance
HHS to appeal Texas ruling that struck down key parts of surprise billing rule “The Biden administration has filed an appeal to a ruling that vacated key parts of a rule that bans surprise medical bills.
The Department of Health and Human Services announced in a legal filing late Friday that it is appealing the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The decision to appeal the ruling originally issued back in February comes as HHS has other legal fights over the regulation.”
UnitedHealth Aims To Sell Change Healthcare’s $2.2B Claims Editing Service “UnitedHealth Group will sell Change Healthcare’s CHNG.O claims editing business for $2.2 billion to private equity firm TPG Capital if regulators approve a proposed merger between the two health companies.
Change Healthcare disclosed the plan in a filing made to the Securities and Exchange Commission Friday. UnitedHealth Group declined to comment and Change Healthcare didn’t immediately respond to an interview request.”
Illinois expands Medicaid to more noncitizens, midwives “The Illinois General Assembly has passed legislation that expands Medicaid coverage to midwife services and to noncitizen residents ages 42 and older.
Medicaid coverage of licensed midwife services will begin Jan. 1, 2023.
Illinois expanded Medicaid coverage to noncitizens 65 and older in 2020, becoming the first state to do so, according to the State-Journal Register.. On July 1, the age will decrease to 42.”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
UHS improves on revenue, dips on profits in Q1 2022 “UHS reported $153.9 million in net income for the quarter, down from the $209.1 million it logged during the same period last year. However, net revenues grew year over year from $3 billion to nearly $3.3 billion.”
A systematic review of the prediction of hospital length of stay [LoS]: Towards a unified framework Despite the continuing efforts to predict and reduce the LoS of patients, current research in this domain remains ad-hoc; as such, the model tuning and data preprocessing steps are too specific and result in a large proportion of the current prediction mechanisms being restricted to the hospital that they were employed in. Adopting a unified framework for the prediction of LoS could yield a more reliable estimate of the LoS as a unified framework enables the direct comparison of length of stay methods.
Massive Growth in Expenses and Rising Inflation Fuel Continued Financial Challenges for America’s Hospitals and Health Systems An analysis from the AHA provides background on cost increases in drugs, labor and supplies, as well as the impact of inflation.
About pharma
FDA plans study into how patients and physicians make prescription decisions “he FDA’s Office of Prescription Drug Promotion (OPDP) wants to find out how patients and physicians weigh the trade-offs between risks and benefits when starting a new prescription drug. What characteristics influence treatment choices and how do people reach the decision for one drug over another? The OPDP will be answering these questions through a new study (PDF).
The study will focus on Type 2 diabetes and psoriasis, splitting 800 patients and 800 physicians who have or specialize in those diseases to compare the preferences of the two groups. Participants will be asked to make specific choices based on profiles of fake prescription drugs in a process that will take 20 minutes.”
Novartis backs full-year outlook as Q1 growth led by Entresto Details by drug are provided.
About the public’s health
Aspirin Use to Prevent Cardiovascular Disease: Preventive Medication “The USPSTF recommends against initiating low-dose aspirin use for the primary prevention of CVD in adults 60 years or older.”
Judge Says Migrants Must Still Be Denied Entry for Health Reasons “The federal government has announced plans to lift the order, known as Title 42, on May 23 — a move that is expected to create a considerable surge of migration from Mexico. Several states have challenged the plan, saying it will create chaos on the border and lead to significant impacts on states forced to handle the newly arriving migrants.
Judge Robert R. Summerhays of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana did not yet rule on the issue of whether Title 42, adopted early in the coronavirus pandemic, should be kept in place. But he said he would in the meantime grant a request from the states of Missouri, Louisiana and Arizona to prevent the federal government from taking any early steps to disregard Title 42 for certain migrants and process them under normal immigration procedures.”
About healthcare IT
EHR vendors ranked by percentage of hospital market share FYI
US agency unveils framework to evaluate health apps “The Defense Health Agency's branch for connected health developed a framework to evaluate the thousands of health apps available.
The framework, called the App Rating Inventory, was created to support clinical decisions regarding app selection, according to a study published April 15 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.
The App Rating Inventory produces scores for three categories: evidence, content and customizability. The evidence category is based on six measures, and the content and customizability categories are based on 11 measures each. All 28 measures are weighted equally.”
About healthcare personnel
PAI-Avalere Health Report on Trends in Physician Employment and Acquisitions of Medical Practices: 2019-2021 “Key Findings:
Nearly 3 of 4 physicians are now employed by hospitals, health systems and other corporate entities such as private equity firms and health insurers.
More than one hundred thousand (108,700) physicians shifted to employment since January 2019. This growth split nearly evenly between hospital employees (58,200 additional physician employees) and other corporate entities (50,500 additional physician employees).
Of those, 83,000 physicians (76%) became employees since the pandemic began.
2021 alone saw a marked increase in employed physicians, growing by 19%, from 69.3% to 73.9% of all physicians…
Hospitals and corporate entities, including private equity firms and insurance companies, now own over half (52.1%) of physician practices (hospitals own 26.4% and other corporate entities own 27.2%).
While hospital and health system acquisitions continued at a steady pace (9% growth), the sharpest increase (86% growth) in medical practice acquisitions over the three-year study period was by corporate entities.
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated corporate ownership of physician practices and physician employment by hospital systems and other corporate entities in the last half of 2020 and throughout 2021.
Every region of the country saw a steady trend towards increased employment and hospital and corporate ownership of practices, but there are distinct differences among regions.
The South saw the highest rate of acquisitions by corporate entities (94% increase).
The Midwest continued to have the highest percentage of physicians employed by hospitals and health systems (63.5%, growing 9% over the study period).”
About health technology
Philips Subpoenaed by DOJ Over Sleep-Apnea Device Recall “Royal Philips NV has been subpoenaed by the Justice Department in relation to a sprawling and costly recall of breathing-aid devices affecting millions of sleep-apnea patients.
The Dutch healthcare conglomerate is amid a huge recall over concerns that a type of foam used in certain breathing-aid devices could degrade and release harmful, possibly cancer-causing particles. Philips said its Respironics division and some other subsidiaries received the subpoena on April 8 to ‘provide information relating to events leading to the Respironics recall.’ It said it was cooperating with the agency.”