Even before it went on the market in 2002, doctors were talking about how the back surgery product known as bone morphogenetic protein-2 would revolutionize medicine. It did - but in ways no one imagined. Instead of offering 100% success in fusing ailing spines with virtually no complications, BMP-2 became a biotech breakthrough associated with skepticism and scandal, epitomizing questions over whether corporate-funded research carried out by financially conflicted doctors can be trusted.
Patients admitted to hospital intensive care units need high-tech, high-cost, lifesaving care, but the professionals who tend to them may not always agree with the decisions regarding that care. A study conducted in Europe and Israel was completed to assess how healthcare workers viewed the "appropriateness" of care in ICUs. Inappropriate care was defined as care that clashes with the healthcare professional's beliefs or professional knowledge. Researchers surveyed 1,651 doctors and nurses. One-quarter of the nurses said they perceived some inappropriate care in at least one patient as did 32% of the doctors.
The increasing use of hospital services may be contributing more to high readmission rates than the severity of patients' conditions or the care they receive after being discharged, according to researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health. The study, which appears in the Dec. 15 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, is the latest research on a hot-button healthcare issue related to cost and quality of care. The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services says the focus on readmission rates is pivotal because one out of three Medicare beneficiaries who leave the hospital today will be back in the hospital within a month.
Drug companies are working to develop a pure, more powerful version of the nation's second most-abused medicine, which has addiction experts worried that it could spur a new wave of abuse. The new pills contain the highly addictive painkiller hydrocodone, packing up to 10 times the amount of the drug as existing medications such as Vicodin. Four companies have begun patient testing, and one of them ? Zogenix of San Diego ? plans to apply early next year to begin marketing its product, Zohydro. If approved, it would mark the first time patients could legally buy pure hydrocodone. Existing products combine the drug with nonaddictive painkillers such as acetaminophen.
Local hospitals have begun assessing their patients' prescription drug histories and their potential to abuse those drugs, part of a broader effort to end a local and statewide overdose epidemic. Montgomery County has an unusually high accidental overdose death rate of 23 per 100,000 people, twice the rate of Ohio's other urban counties. Last year, 127 people died in the county from unintentional drug overdoses.
A group of 29 area hospitals participating in a regional patient safety improvement project were able to reduce readmission rates by 7 percent — preventing 400 unneeded hospitalizations and saving $3.8 million in unnecessary health-care spending — in the third quarter of the year. Those findings were part of a survey summary report released Tuesday by The Health Care Improvement Foundation. An affiliate of the Delaware Valley Healthcare Council, the foundation is an independent nonprofit organization that leads health-care initiatives aimed at improving the safety, outcomes, and care for health-care consumers in southeastern Pennsylvania. Independence Blue Cross is a major supporter.