Health Care Cost

With Medicare-aged Americans accounting for over 15% of the population and significant health care costs, stakeholders have leveraged various approaches, including the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey, for estimating costs.

Deemed the “Medicare” effect, patients aged 65 years who have Medicare coverage had an increased incidence of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) but were less likely to receive a late-stage diagnosis and had lower mortality rates.

New research has found the 340B program is slowing uptake of biosimilars by incentivizing use of more expensive biologics.

Using propensity score matching in a US nationally representative sample, authors found the effect of nonadherence to diabetes guidelines on health care expenditures of patients with diabetes.

Debt limit deal will not effect Medicaid; a national safety board may make health care safer; experimental hemophilia therapy reduces bleeding.

AHIP president and CEO Matthew Eyles will step down later this year; the House Energy and Commerce Committee moved a series of health care measures concerning pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs); US debt default could stop FDA drug and device reviews, said FDA chief.

The FDA approved Celltrion Healthcare’s Yuflyma (adalimumab-aaty), which is a high-concentration, citrate-free formulation.

Although lack of routine testing and limitations to current diagnostic testing likely lead to underreporting of respiratory syncytial virus, RSV still poses a substantial economic burden.

Blue Cross Blue Shield in Massachusetts sets agreement with Tufts Medicine using equity benchmarks; drug prices covered by Medicaid to undergo yearly audit; South Carolina abortion ban headed to governor as Planned Parenthood announces national staff cutbacks to shift resources to the states.

The World Health Organization (WHO) prepares for the next pandemic; new restrictions on reproductive health services in the South; Thermo Fisher Scientific receives FDA approval for a first-of-its-kind preeclampsia test.

Researchers took both the learning curve of the new process and the COVID-19 pandemic into consideration.

Compared with first-line immunotherapy or chemotherapy alone, combination chemoimmunotherapy for advanced/metastatic non–small cell lung cancer has significantly higher antineoplastic drug and associated medical costs.

WHO urges caution regarding artificial intelligence (AI) bias; South Carolina ban would restrict abortion at 6 weeks; appeals court pauses ruling barring free preventative health services.

Medicare Part D low-income subsidies alone are insufficient to improve the uptake and equitable use of high-cost, orally administered antimyeloma therapy.

Aflibercept was a less cost-effective treatment for retinal vein occlusion (RVO) compared with bevacizumab, although visual acuity outcomes were similar.

The researchers of a new study highlighted the unique financial burden facing these patients, eligible for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT), who often require lengthy hospitalizations and have associated risks of acute and chronic morbidity.

Although commercial accountable care organization populations are healthy on average, some individuals might benefit from programs for high-risk patients to mitigate high levels of health care utilization.

Knowledge is limited on the potential exclusion from pay-for-performance (P4P) programs of patients living with diabetes who have with individual or neighborhood social risks.

The possible consequences for health care if the United States breaches the debt ceiling; skepticism follows proposal for over-the-counter birth control pill; North Carolina governor calls potential abortion ban harmful.

Long-term tele-messaging was more effective than no messaging and short-term messaging for positive airway pressure use, and it was highly likely to be cost-effective with an acceptable willingness-to-pay threshold.

This study examines the availability of cost-effectiveness analyses for medical devices, both in terms of the number of studies and when studies are published.

Financial toxicity is defined as financial hardship related to cancer and can have major effects on patients’ quality of life

Some of the health care transformations that were forced by the COVID-19 pandemic could continue to benefit patients and the health care system, Jacques Sokolov, MD, said during his keynote address at the National Association of Managed Care Physicians (NAMCP) Spring Managed Care Forum 2023.

Researchers set out to collect empirical evidence on how a capitated risk-based county plan performs as a viable public option in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplace in California

FDA accelerates approval of drug for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS); hundreds of thousands could lose Medicaid coverage under Republican debt bill including work requirements; the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) reports that half a million veterans have filed claims for health benefits related to toxic exposures.

The projected cost reductions held both for patients switching from a different extended-half-life product and for patients switching from a standard-half-life product.

Ten-year mean costs associated with psoriasis-related health care visits were 10 times higher for patients with generalized pustular psoriasis (GPP).

By better understanding the nature of atopic dermatitis and its varying comorbidities, providers might be able to better predict patient outcomes, said Raj Chovatiya, MD, PhD, assistant professor of dermatology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

The Biden administration and drug manufacturers are looking at different ways to keep free access to COVID-19 vaccines; mifepristone remains available without new restrictions while a court battle continues; the goal to reduce HIV in the US by 2030 may fall short, some warn.

President Joe Biden signs order to boost care worker compensation and support caregivers; social media adds are fueling weight loss medication demands; an investigational metabolic modulator has been shown to mitigate fatigue in patients with long COVID.