Latest Conference Articles

Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), have historically been a black box for those paying into them, partly because medications are confusing, explained Martin Makary, MD, MPH, a surgical oncologist and chief of the Johns Hopkins Islet Transplant Center.

A discussion with University of California at Berkeley sociologist Arlie Hochschild, PhD, author of the best-seller Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, addressed how social psychiatry can help bridge the current political divide.

The 175th Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, meeting in San Francisco, California, featured research about loneliness among minority women at midlife.

Jonathan Avery, MD, director of addiction psychiatry, New York-Presbyterian Hospital, Weill Cornell Medical Center, explained why it’s important to diagnose and treat concurrent substance use disorders and mental illnesses at the same time.

The use of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) has expanded to patients experiencing psychosis, who can learn to cope with delusional beliefs or hearing voices, explained David Kingdon, MD, professor of mental health care delivery, University of Southampton.

Lee Schwartzberg, MD, FACP, executive director, West Cancer Center, explains how partnerships like OneOncology can help community practices adapt to the rapidly changing cancer care and diagnostic landscape.

Looking at readmissions for congestive heart failure, we realized that the majority of our patients were being readmitted because of care coordination and social determinants of health, explained Susan Mani, MD, vice president of Clinical Transformation and Ambulatory Quality at LifeBridge Health.

Sebastian Schneeweiss, MD, ScD, professor of medicine and epidemiology, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital, and co-founder of Aetion, discusses current use of rapid-cycle analytics and what efforts are needed to improve understanding and uptake.

Encouraging clinical trial participation is the only way we’ll get the answers to the questions we need for future generations, explained Howard A. "Skip" Burris, III, MD, FACP, FASCO, president, clinical operations, and chief medical officer of Sarah Cannon Research Institute.

Crescent Moore, PharmD, PhD, BCPS, senior consultant, BluePeak Advisors, explains efforts by CMS to address the opioid epidemic put forward by their 2020 Call Letter.

Clinical trials should be a part of the conversation early and throughout the cancer journey, explained Katie Goodman, RN, BSN, CCRP, director of clinical research, Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute.

Programs that address chronic conditions have the potential to improve employee satisfaction, reduce costs, and improve employee health, said speakers at the Midwest Business Group on Health’s 39th Annual Conference, held May 8-9 in Chicago, Illinois.

Martin Makary, MD, MPH, a surgical oncologist and chief of the Johns Hopkins Islet Transplant Center, dicscusses how hospitals have responded to having to post standard charges of their services online by uploading their chargemasters.

Trust is crucial when employers are trying to have successful healthcare programs and engage employees to change behaviors, said panelists at the Midwest Business Group on Health’s 39th Annual Conference, held May 8-9 in Chicago, Illinois.

Under the Oncology Care Model (OCM), there's a wide range of practice sizes, creating challenges for evaluation, said Basit Chaudhry, MD, PhD, founder of Tuple Health.

As the United States debates the feasibility and benefits or harms of a single-payer system, the important thing is to have a fact-based discussion and to ask questions, Jan Berger, MD, JD, chief executive officer of Health Intelligence Partners and medical director of the Midwest Business Group on Health (MBGH), said during a session at MBGH’s 39th Annual Conference, held May 8-9 in Chicago, Illinois.

Jeff Patton, MD, chief executive officer of Tennessee Oncology, offers his reaction to CMS' proposal to ease restrictions on how Part D managed the 6 protected classes of drugs.

Lee Schwartzberg, MD, FACP, executive director, West Cancer Center, explains reimbursement challenges that community settings face with access to multigene testing.

If you wait for lagging outcomes, such as readmissions, it may be months before you realize if the initiative is working or not, explained Susan Mani, MD, vice president of Clinical Transformation and Ambulatory Quality at LifeBridge Health.

Healthcare is very comfortable with treating a disease, but it’s not as good with handling cures. However, the advent of gene therapy and precision medicine means more and more expensive cures are coming down the pipeline, said panelists on the last day of Asembia’s 15th annual Specialty Pharmacy Summit, held April 29 to May 2 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

There’s a lot of room to move in terms of improving management of medications, said Michael Steinman, MD, professor of medicine, University of California, San Diego.

Out-of-pocket (OOP) costs remain a problem, and even patients who are receiving co-pay assistance worry about these expenses. Unfortunately, charitable foundations that provide financial assistance are under increasing strain as demand rises, with funds running out of money quickly, explained Ayesha Azam, senior director of medical affairs, Patient Access Network Foundation.

Analyses of real-world data have broadened the understanding of multiple sclerosis (MS) and provided a snapshot into patient conditions and healthcare costs in the years leading up to and the years after an MS diagnosis, explained Bruce Pyenson, FSA, MAAA, Principal, Consulting Actuary, Milliman, Inc, during a session highlighting findings of a recent Milliman white paper at Asembia’s 15th annual Specialty Pharmacy Summit, held April 29 to May 2 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

During a session at Asembia’s 15th annual Specialty Pharmacy Summit, Greg Simon, president, Biden Cancer Initiative, outlined commitments that came out of the Cancer Moonshot, the work of the Biden Cancer Initiative, and ongoing challenges that patients with cancer face.

New technologies are enabling pharmacists to play a bigger role in managing overall care delivery and the cost of care for patients with cancer, explained Matt Farber, MA, senior director of Patient Care and Advocacy for Walgreens.

During his keynote speech at Asembia’s 15th annual Specialty Pharmacy Summit, Scott Gottlieb, MD, reflected on governing principles he learned during his time as FDA commissioner, highlighted secular trends for which FDA wrote modern rules, and outlined ongoing reimbursement challenges. He even discussed the likelihood of some form of Medicare for All passing.

A policy from the Trump administration to benefit patients and alleviate the high cost of prescription drugs would eliminate rebates from pharmaceutical companies to pharmacy benefit managers. However, there is still a lot of uncertainty around the rule. Two speakers from Deloitte Consulting LLP outlined what models are expected to result from the changes to rebates and how they will affect various stakeholders in healthcare.

During a session at World Health Care Congress 2019, Senator Bill Cassidy, MD, offered his alternative to Medicare for All, which is modeled after the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and discussed other healthcare issues on his radar.