health care

Oxycodone is one of the opioids that the FDA wants relabeled to emphasize risks.

Health & Safety

FDA Requires Strong New Safety Warnings For Opioids

5:16pm March 22, 2016

by Rob Stein

The Food and Drug Administration is demanding that the instructions for the most commonly prescribed opioids include so-called black box warnings about dangers of abuse, misuse, overdose and death.

Do the benefits of wider data sharing outweigh the risks from a breach involving treatment for substance use?

Health & Safety

Feds' Plan To Ease Privacy Rules On Addiction Treatment Spurs Debate

3:40pm March 22, 2016

by Michelle Andrews

Current guidelines require patients to specify who gets information about their care. But advocates of change say that restriction is out of step with the world of electronic medical records.

Standing water and abandoned tires make Houston's Fifth Ward hospitable for mosquitoes.

Houston Prepares Now For Zika's Potential Arrival This Summer

8:25pm March 21, 2016

by Joe Palca

When summer brings heat, humidity and mosquitoes, cities along the Gulf Coast may become gateways for Zika into the U.S. Impoverished areas are likely to bear the brunt, health officials say.

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Indianapolis-based Anthem wants Express Scripts to cough up more of the rebates it gets from drugmakers.

Health & Safety

Anthem Sues Express Scripts For A Bigger Slice Of Drug Savings

4:03pm March 21, 2016

by Alison Kodjak

The giant health insurer says Express Scripts, a manager of drug benefits, should be passing along more of the savings it negotiates with drugmakers.

Aspirin Both Triggers And Treats An Often-Missed Disease

7:52am March 21, 2016

by Angus Chen

Some people struggle for years with asthma and sinus infections, unaware that they have a disease called aspirin-exacerbated respiratory disease. For them, aspirin can be both cause and cure.

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Seniors Face Higher Drug Costs As Coinsurance Becomes More Common

2:50pm March 18, 2016

by Michelle Andrews

How coinsurance hurts: If a drug costs $200, a patient may owe 20 percent of the cost, or $40, instead of a flat copayment of $20. The higher the cost of the drug, the bigger the coinsurance bite.

"We are now shifting our attention to changing the underlying delivery system to make it more cost effective and higher quality," says Peter Lee, executive director for Covered California, the state's health insurance marketplace.

California Insurance Marketplace Aims To Kick Out Poor-Performing Hospitals

1:19pm March 18, 2016

by Chad Terhune

Doctors, hospitals and insurers are balking at a Covered California proposal to eject providers of care that have inordinately high costs and low quality from its networks.

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Medical Debt Rains Pain On Families, Even In the Sunshine State

12:22pm March 17, 2016

by Sammy Mack

More than 30 percent of Floridians report having serious financial problems, compared with 26 percent of adults nationwide. Digging into those poll numbers shows large medical bills can be ruinous.

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Drug-Company Payments Mirror Doctors' Brand-Name Prescribing

9:51am March 17, 2016

An analysis of Medicare data shows that the more money a doctor gets from pharmaceutical companies, the more likely he or she is to prescribe brand-name medications. And that influences cost.

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Medicare wants to experiment with tying the prices it pays for medication to effectiveness.

Medicare To Experiment With Tying Drug Costs to Effectiveness

9:39am March 16, 2016

by Julie Appleby

The goal is to rein in drug price increases while increasing the chance that patients will get the medication that works best for them. It's an idea that's getting increasing private-sector traction.