Health Care Delivery

An FDA advisory panel Friday unanimously endorsed the third US COVID-19 vaccine, a 1-shot vaccine produced by Janssen, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson (J&J), and an emergency use authorization by the FDA is expected to follow shortly.

The study examined various factors used in an internationally developed risk stratification strategy to assess which ones had evidence of being significant in determining a child’s prognosis from the deadly disease.

Patients with osteoarthritis-related pain were shown to benefit from cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) via telephone, in which the treatment significantly improved sleep and fatigue after 12 months, with pain temporarily relieved as well.

A survey found that 42% of US working adults were more stressed or anxious in the past year about taking a sick day to care for themselves or someone else compared with years past, with 1 sick day currently associated with a $227 earnings loss.

On this edition of Managed Care Cast, we present a short excerpt from a January webinar titled “Color and COVID-19: The Virus’ Disproportionate Impact” hosted by the MJH Life Sciences™ COVID-19 Coalition about how the pandemic has had an unequal, devastating impact on communities of color.

The Midwest Business Group on Health's program this week on behavioral health will explore strategies that employers have implemented to address rising anxiety and financial stressors in the workforce amid the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

Multimorbidity affects 1 in 4 US adults and leads to increased health care use and lower quality of life.

Older patients are at greater risk of death in the earliest stages of dialysis, while females possibly are at a higher risk than men, a review of studies found.

The current guidance emphasizes that the mRNA-based Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are safe for people with multiple sclerosis (MS) taking disease modifying therapies (DMTs).

As Medicaid is a federated program between states and the federal government, it has historically been difficult for innovation to spread state to state, hindering any comparison of quality metrics.

The researchers prefaced their study by highlighting that pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and all forms of PH continue to be highly morbid and sometimes fatal, particularly in cases requiring hospitalization in the intensive care unit.

The Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus disease 2019 vaccine can be stored at higher temperatures; the Biden administration pledges $4 billion over 2 years to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance; Medicare payments will soon decrease for hundreds of hospitals.

During a 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference session, members of The Commonwealth Fund Task Force on Payment and Delivery System Reform discussed policy recommendations aimed at preparing the United States for future pandemics and addressing care inequities brought to light by the coronavirus disease 2019 crisis.

Sachin Jain, MD, MBA, FACP, president and CEO at SCAN Group and SCAN Health Plan, discusses how data can help ensure that vulnerable populations aren't harmed by value-based payment models.

In a panel at the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference, representatives from 3 community health plans across the United States discussed how payers are driving telehealth access and utilization in the wake of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

Living far from a hospital did not increase risk of in-hospital mortality, according to a recent study among veteran populations with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

Compared with being offered standard testing services, offers of initial and repeat self-testing led to a 3.5-fold greater uptake of testing for HIV among transgender individuals in a new study out of England and Wales.

On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we highlight a new feature on AJMC.com, the website of The American Journal of Managed Care®, called Clinical Spotlight, where our editors provide a series of interviews with leading experts in certain specialties.

Novartis' drug, which combines sacubitril and valsartan, is the first to directly treat patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction.

Former HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Sachin Jain, MD, MBA, CEO of SCAN Group and Health Plan, took time to reflect on the advent of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and examine the Biden administration’s opportunity to enact influential health policy on the first day of the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference.

Kicking off the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference, Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, stressed the important role that accurate data play in the effort to prioritize health equity during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

Patients with ovarian cancer who lived within 10 miles of Kansas’s only National Cancer Institute–designated cancer center, and those of a non-White race, were shown to have less of a survival advantage.

The FDA approved a prescription tongue muscle stimulation device that claims to reduce mild sleep apnea and snoring in patients with obstructive sleep apnea.

Experts outlined the impact value-based insurance design (VBID) has had on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic response and future potential applications of the model.

A new study assessed the genomic alterations identified by ctDNA analysis compared with tissue-based comprehensive genomic profiling in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.

Breast cancer oncologists explore more recent advances using oral chemotherapies to treat metastatic breast cancer.

Patients’ socioeconomic status is a significant factor in predicting survival rates for multiple myeloma, according to a new study.

A new study published in JAMA Psychiatry found emergency department (ED) visit rates for mental health conditions, suicide attempts, drug and opioid overdoses, intimate partner violence, and child abuse and neglect all increased between mid-March through October 2020, compared with the same time period in 2019.

A new study of dupilumab indicates that the drug is a safe and effective treatment for atopic dermatitis (AD) in elderly patients, with efficacy comparable to that seen in younger patients.

With New York being at the crossroads of the HIV epidemic and the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, a group of researchers wanted to know what, if any, correlation there was between the 2 disease states.