Why Don’t More Doctors Discuss Vaccines With Their Patients?

October 13, 2009 Doctors, Medicare No Comments

By Laura Landro

Why Don’t More Doctors Discuss Vaccines With Their Patients?In the push to get Americans vaccinated against both the seasonal flu and the swine flu, infectious disease experts and public health officials are also sounding the alarm about continuing low rates of adult vaccination for a host of other preventable diseases, as I write in my latest column.

Despite evidence that vaccines are among the most cost-effective ways to prevent disease, studies show a pretty high level … Continue Reading

Medical Malpractice: How Much Money Would an Overhaul Save?

October 12, 2009 Doctors No Comments

By Jacob Goldstein

Medical Malpractice: How Much Money Would an Overhaul Save?As we’ve noted before, it’s tough to know just how much medical malpractice contributes to health-care spending. Not only do you have direct costs like malpractice premiums, you also have the harder-to-quantify indirect costs of defensive medicine, like extra tests doctors order out of fear of lawsuits.

But its the job of the number crunchers at CBO to put a number on that sort of thing, and they’ve … Continue Reading

Medicare Payments to Doctors, the Senate Finance Bill and CBO

October 12, 2009 Doctors, Medicare No Comments

By Jacob Goldstein

Medicare Payments to Doctors, the Senate Finance Bill and CBOThe Senate Finance Committee’s health-overhaul bill leaves in place a planned 25% cut in Medicare payments to doctors in 2011. Congress probably won’t allow this to happen; lawmakers will likely swoop in, as they’ve donerepeatedly in recent years, and block the planned cuts.

But when CBO does its projections, it doesn’t take into account what Congress is likely to do — it looks … Continue Reading

Why Other Drugmakers Want to Be More Like J&J

October 12, 2009 Drugs No Comments

By Jacob Goldstein

Why Other Drugmakers Want to Be More Like J&JJohnson & Johnson’s third-quarter earnings, out today, provide the latest reminder of why other drugmakers want to be more like J&J.

In a nutshell: It’s a tough time to be in the prescription drug business, what with stiff competition from generics manufacturers and payers pushing for lower costs on branded drugs. So it’s nice to have other lines of business propping up sales.

J&J … Continue Reading

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Drugs

South Korean FDA Probes Roche for Aiding Tamiflu Stockpiling

November 8, 2009

By Shirley S. Wang
Should companies be allowed to buy large quantities of medicine like Tamiflu to have on hand in case their employees develop the H1N1 flu virus? Not according to the law in South Korea, where it’s illegal for non-medical professionals to purchase big lots of drugs. Punishment is up to five years in [...]

Boosting Medical Students’ Training in Drug Abuse

November 7, 2009

By Shirley S. Wang
There’s lot of action these days aimed at curbing the abuse of prescription drugs. The FDA is working on a plan to make it harder for people to get access to unauthorized prescription painkillers, pain specialists have come out with guidelines to help doctors manage pain-drug-abusing patients and drug companies have been [...]

What Will Pfizer’s R&D Look Like a Year from Now?

October 21, 2009

By Jonathan D. Rockoff
Pfizer’s huge R&D shop is even bigger now that the company has swallowed Wyeth. To get a sense of the changes that could be in store, the Health Blog spoke today with the company’s two top R&D execs — Martin Mackay, a Pfizer veteran who will lead small-molecule work, and Mikael Dolsten, [...]

See Your Doctor: The Dawn of Consumer Drug Ads

October 13, 2009

By Jacob Goldstein
For a look back at a key breakthrough in the history of the pharmaceutical industry, we turn now to Joe Davis, a retired ad guy who lives in Vermont.
Back in the mid-1980s, Davis came up with an idea: Run a TV ad for Seldane, the allergy medicine, but don’t say the drug’s name. [...]

Why Other Drugmakers Want to Be More Like J&J

October 12, 2009

By Jacob Goldstein
Johnson & Johnson’s third-quarter earnings, out today, provide the latest reminder of why other drugmakers want to be more like J&J.
In a nutshell: It’s a tough time to be in the prescription drug business, what with stiff competition from generics manufacturers and payers pushing for lower costs on branded drugs. So it’s nice [...]

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Research

What Will Pfizer’s R&D Look Like a Year from Now?

October 21, 2009

By Jonathan D. Rockoff
Pfizer’s huge R&D shop is even bigger now that the company has swallowed Wyeth. To get a sense of the changes that could be in store, the Health Blog spoke today with the company’s two top R&D execs — Martin Mackay, a Pfizer veteran who will lead small-molecule work, and Mikael Dolsten, [...]

Are Mammograms and PSA Tests Overrated?

October 21, 2009

By Jacob Goldstein
Catch cancers early and treat them before they become deadly. That’s the idea behind cancer screening, and that’s clearly how it works with pap smears for cervical cancer and colonoscopy for colon cancer.
But in some cases screening can lead to aggressive treatment of slow-growing tumors that would never have caused a problem [...]

The Problem With Ranking Countries’ Health-Care Systems

October 20, 2009

By Jacob Goldstein
The oft-cited WHO ranking that said the U.S. has the 37th best health-care system in the world is dated and had problems even when it was new, WSJ stats maven Carl Bialik writes in his column today.
The ranking was published in 2000, and came up against a major problem: Good data weren’t available [...]