About healthcare quality
RaDonda Vaught gets 3 years probation for fatal medication error “RaDonda Vaught, a former nurse convicted of a fatal medication error, was sentenced to three years of supervised probation May 13. She received a deferred sentence, meaning charges could be wiped from her record pending successful completion of probation.
Ms. Vaught, 38, was convicted of criminally negligent homicide and abuse of an impaired adult for a fatal medication error she made in December 2017 after overriding an electronic medical cabinet as a nurse at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn. The error, in which vecuronium, a powerful paralyzer, was administered instead of the sedative Versed, led to the death of 75-year-old Charlene Murphey. Ms. Vaught faced up to eight years in prison.
Davidson County criminal court Judge Jennifer Smith said the court in its sentencing considered Ms. Vaught's offense was not motivated by any intent to violate the law, and that she will ‘never again be in a position to repeat this fatal error.’
’She has been stripped of her nursing license and started a new livelihood outside of healthcare,’ Ms. Smith said.”
About Covid-19
FDA rejects antidepressant seen as possible Covid-19 treatment “The Food and Drug Administration declined Monday to authorize a 30-year-old generic antidepressant as a treatment for Covid-19, dealing a major blow to a small group of doctors who have organized around the pill for months, arguing that it could provide a cheap and accessible way to prevent hospitalizations and death both in the U.S. and around the world.
In an unusual two-page summary — the FDA does not generally disclose the reasoning behind rejections — regulators said that the doctors failed to provide adequate evidence of effectiveness of the drug, called fluvoxamine.”
‘A magnet for rip-off artists’: Fraud siphoned billions from pandemic unemployment benefits “The exact scope of the fraud targeting federal aid initiatives is unknown, even two years later. With unemployment benefits, however, the theft could be significant. Testifying at a little-noticed congressional hearing this spring, a top watchdog for the Labor Department estimated there could have been “at least” $163 billion in unemployment-related “overpayments,” a projection that includes wrongly paid sums as well as “significant” benefits obtained by malicious actors.
So far, the United States has recaptured just over $4 billion of that, according to state workforce data furnished by the Labor Department this March.”
COVID-19 hospitalizations up in 43 states “Hospitalizations are up 24 percent nationwide over the last 14 days, with a daily average of 21,547 people hospitalized with COVID-19 as of May 16.”
About health insurance
Investor Alert: Bronstein, Gewirtz & Grossman, LLC Notifies Oscar Health, Inc. (OSCR) Investors of Class Action and Encourages Shareholders to Contact the Firm “Bronstein, Gewirtz & Grossman, LLC notifies investors that a class action lawsuit has been filed against Oscar Health, Inc…and certain of its officers, on behalf of shareholders who purchased or otherwise acquired Oscar Class A common stock pursuant and/or traceable to the registration statement and prospectus… issued in connection with the Company's March 2021 initial public offering ("IPO" or the "Offering")…
This class action seeks to recover damages against Defendants for alleged violations of the federal securities laws under the Securities Exchange Act of 1933.
The Complaint alleges that the Registration Statement was materially false and misleading and omitted to state: (1) that Oscar was experiencing growing COVID-19 testing and treatment costs; (2) that Oscar was experiencing growing net COVID costs; (3) that Oscar would be negatively impacted by an unfavorable prior year Risk Adjustment Data Validation (RADV) result relating to 2019 and 2020; (4) that Oscar was on track to be negatively impacted by significant SEP membership growth; and (5) that, as a result of the foregoing, Defendants' positive statements about the Company's business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis.”
Humana’s CenterWell Senior Primary Care and Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe Announce Second Joint Venture to Develop and Operate Value-Based Primary Care Clinics for Medicare Patients “Humana Inc.’s CenterWell Senior Primary Care and Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe (“WCAS”) have established a second joint venture (‘JV’) to further expand access to value-based primary care clinics for Medicare patients. The new JV will deploy up to $1.2 billion of committed capital to develop approximately 100 new senior-focused, payer-agnostic primary care clinics between 2023 and 2025 and operate them to profitability. This JV between Humana’s CenterWell Senior Primary Care and WCAS follows an earlier JV that is currently deploying up to $800 million of capital to open 67 clinics by early 2023 and support their ongoing operations.
WCAS, a healthcare and technology-focused investment firm, will have majority ownership of the JV, while Humana will own a minority stake. All de novo clinics developed through the Humana-WCAS joint ventures will be managed and operated under Humana’s CenterWell Senior Primary Care brand.”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
CommonSpirit posts $591M quarterly operating loss “CommonSpirit Health, a 142-hospital system based in Chicago, reported an operating loss for the three months ended March 31, according to financial documents released May 13.”
Providence's operating loss hits $510M in Q1 “Citing inflation and labor cost pressures, Renton, Wash.-based Providence recorded an operating loss of $510.16 million in the first quarter of 2022, according to financial documents released May 13. In the same quarter one year prior, Providence posted an operating loss of $221.91 million.”
About pharma
Lilly bags FDA approval for dual-targeted type 2 diabetes drug Mounjaro “The FDA on Friday cleared Eli Lilly's once-weekly dual GIP and GLP-1 receptor agonist Mounjaro (tirzepatide) to improve glucose control in adults with type 2 diabetes…
Mounjaro is also being evaluated as a potential weight-loss treatment in the Phase III SURMOUNT development programme in overweight and obese individuals across six clinical trials. Eli Lilly recently reported results from SURMOUNT-1 showing that the drug helped patients without type 2 diabetes lose up to 22.5% of their body weight. Readouts from the SURMOUNT-2, SURMOUNT-3 and SURMOUNT-4 studies are due in 2023.
Eli Lilly has so far not yet submitted a filing for Mounjaro as a weight-loss treatment.”
About the public’s health
Texas Court Allows Abuse Inquiries of Parents of Transgender Children “The Texas Supreme Court ruled on Friday that investigations of parents with transgender children for possible child abuse could continue, after an emergency appeal by state officials including Gov. Greg Abbott. The ruling reversed lower-court decisions that had temporarily halted the inquiries statewide.”
And in a related story: Alabama’s Transgender Youth Can Use Medicine to Transition, Judge Rules
”A federal judge temporarily halted part of a new law that prevents doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and hormone therapies to transgender youth. He upheld a ban on sex-altering operations.”
About healthcare IT
AI May Be More Prone to Errors in Image-Based Diagnoses Than Clinicians “Researchers have found that deep neural networks (DNNs) make mistakes in image-based medical diagnoses that humans are less likely to make, and they hypothesize that these mistakes may indicate that clinicians and artificial intelligence (AI) use different features for analysis when looking at medical images.
According to a study published in Scientific Reports, DNNs can fail when performing image-based medical diagnosis tasks because their predictions can be unrelated to the underlying pathology of the condition they are designed to diagnose. For example, an AI skin classifier learns to associate surgical skin markings with malignant melanoma, increasing the classifier’s false positive rate by 40 percent, according to the researchers.”
About health technology
Medtronic completes Intersect ENT acquisition “Medtronic announced that it completed its previously announced $1.1 billion acquisition of Intersect ENT…for $28.25 per share in an all-cash transaction.
As a result of the transaction, Medtronic acquires Intersect ENT’s Propel and Sinuva drug-eluting sinus implant product lines and technology, intellectual property and the company’s Menlo Park facility. Intersect ENT’s employees also will join Medtronic, according to a news release.
Medtronic said that former Intersect ENT brand Fiagon was divested simultaneously at close [per FTC requirement], with its Cube and VenSure products not included in the acquisition.”
Shortage of Contrast Media for CT Imaging Affecting Hospitals and Health Systems “The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) continues to report shortages of GE Healthcare’s iohexol and iodixanol intravenous contrast media products for computed tomography imaging. In an April 19 letter to customers, GE Healthcare said it was rationing orders for its iohexol products after a COVID-19 lockdown temporarily shut down its production facility for iodinated contrast media in Shanghai, China…
GE Healthcare said it expects product supply availability to improve the week of May 23, but until then a 20% allocation level has been established.”
Limaca's Precision-GI Endoscopic Biopsy Device Designated a Breakthrough Device “The device, which is deployed through an instrument channel in an endoscope, features a motorized, rotational cutting needle for taking biopsies of tumors.”