There is a new iPhone application that allows radiologists to read scans from their phones. Using a $20 iPhone application called OsiriX, radiologists made correct diagnoses of appendicitis in 124 of 125 computed tomography scans, researchers reported.
At the end of a third day of Senate debate over healthcare legislation, Democrats and Republicans said that they had broken an impasse over the question of how and when to vote on the first amendments, the New York Times reports. But even as lawmakers announced an agreement to begin voting, Democrats accused Republicans of stalling debate and obstructing the legislation. Republicans said it was unrealistic to expect quick action on such a big bill, and they denied they were stalling, reports the Times.
Republican lawmakers pressed their case that new U.S. recommendations advising against routine mammograms for women in their 40s could be used to ration healthcare under reform legislation before Congress. The guidelines, issued Nov. 16 by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, scaled back recommendations for annual mammograms to screen for breast cancer in women in their 40s with an average risk for the disease. At a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's subcommittee on health, members of the task force acknowledged that their description of the new guidelines might have been "poorly worded," leading people to think they were suggesting that screenings were unneeded for any patients in their 40s, the Washington Post reports.
The California Medical Association is opposing healthcare legislation being debated in the U.S. Senate, saying it would increase local healthcare costs and restrict access to care for elderly and low-income patients. The Association represents more than 35,000 physicians, making it the second-largest state medical group in the country after Texas. They group join a handful of other state medical associations that have opposed the bill in recent weeks, including those in Florida, Georgia, and Texas, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Democrats on a House panel offered a measure of sympathy for the federal task force that recommended less-frequent mammograms, while Republicans said the task force's message was wrong and could lead to unnecessary deaths, the Wall Street Journal reports. The remarks came at the first congressional hearing on the guidelines issued by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force on Nov. 16. The suggestions have provoked outrage from influential cancer groups, women's advocacy organizations, and radiologists.
Mercy Medical Center-Sioux City (IA) has agreed to pay $400,000 to settle allegations that it purposely overcharged federal healthcare programs for the care of heart patients. Mercy Medical Center-Sioux City denied wrongdoing, but it agreed to pay the money to settle the matter. A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office said this was the first time in Iowa history that a hospital had been prosecuted for overbilling the government under a program that pays extra for particularly expensive procedures. The "outlier" program is meant to encourage healthcare providers to take on unusually complicated cases, and prosecutors accused Mercy of using the arrangement to overcharge Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal programs for the care of heart patients.