http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. A Yale team of researchers has looked at the cost of seeking out-of-network medical care, and whether private insurance companies are transparent about the cost. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-out-of-network-doctors-worth.html Health Wed, 14 Nov 2012 08:10:41 EST news272103024 In the United States, the cost paid for statins (drugs to lower cholesterol) in people under the age of 65 who have private insurance continues to exceed comparable costs paid by the government in the United Kingdom (U.K.) by more than three fold. These results from Boston University's Boston Collaborative Drug Surveillance Program, are a follow up of an ongoing comparison of prescription drug costs between the U.S. and U.K. The initial results reported on relative drug costs in 2005. The current updated results for 2009 appear this week in the journal Pharmacotherapy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-prescription-drugsa-comparison-countries.html Medications Thu, 01 Nov 2012 04:29:37 EST news270962944 Forty percent of people who received health care outside of their insurance network did so out of necessity, finds a new study in Health Services Research. About half of those patients did not know how much they would have to pay for their out-of-network care. Out-of- network care can occur during an emergency medical situation or when the network status of a physician or hospital is unknown or if an in-network doctor is unavailable. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-people-out-of-network-patient.html Health Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:10:02 EST news270464431 (Medical Xpress)—Most doctors treat Lyme disease with antibiotics for two to four weeks after diagnosis, but if symptoms persist after that, medical guidelines recommend against antibiotic retreatment. That recommendation may not be warranted. A newly published statistical review of the four studies upon which those guidelines are based reports flaws in design, analysis, and interpretation that call into question the strength of the evidence against retreatment. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-lyme-retreatment-guidance-flawed.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Thu, 30 Aug 2012 13:26:42 EST news265551994 Implantable devices for treating cardiac arrhythmias, which include ICDs, are already underused in parts of Eastern and Central Europe and there is a risk that the financial crisis could exacerbate the problem. The European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), a registered branch of the ESC, is tackling this issue through ICD for Life. The initiative aims to raise awareness about the importance of ICDs and sudden cardiac death in countries in Central and Eastern Europe. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-dont-lifesaving-icds-financial-crisis.html Cardiology Wed, 29 Aug 2012 10:55:21 EST news265456506 (AP)—The United States' most influential pediatricians group says the health benefits of circumcision in newborn boys outweigh any risks and insurance companies should pay for it. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-circumcision-pluses-outweigh-pediatricians.html Health Mon, 27 Aug 2012 04:50:15 EST news265261809 Aetna, one of the biggest U.S. health insurers, claimed a bigger stake in the burgeoning market for government-funded coverage Monday when it announced plans to buy a leading provider of Medicaid and Medicare coverage for $5.7 billion. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-aetna-coventry-health-bn.html Other Mon, 20 Aug 2012 06:46:17 EST news264663966 (HealthDay) -- For children diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, life expectancy has increased, with about a 15-year improvement seen from a 1950-1964 subcohort to a 1965-1980 subcohort, according to a study published online July 30 in Diabetes. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-life-childhood-diabetes.html Diabetes Fri, 10 Aug 2012 12:51:45 EST news263821897 As part of the Affordable Care Act, hospitals and medical centers are required to report their quality-of-care and risk-standardized outcomes for stroke and other common medical conditions. But reporting models for mortality that don't consider stroke severity may unfairly skew these results. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-07-hospitals-stroke-care-markedly-severity.html Health Tue, 17 Jul 2012 16:00:10 EST news261750250 "Every time I see what I pay for me and my family's health it makes me sick," says Fiona, a 46-year-old mother of two who -- unlike some 50 million Americans -- actually has health insurance. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-sight-health.html Health Thu, 28 Jun 2012 07:53:53 EST news260088804 Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) require an array of specialized health care services. With these services come higher costs for parents and insurance providers. University of Missouri researchers compared costs and types of services for children with ASD to costs and services for children with other conditions like asthma or diabetes. The researchers found children with ASD paid more for health care than children with other conditions. In addition, children with ASD used more services yet had less access to specialized care. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-health-care-disparities-children-autism-spectrum.html Autism spectrum disorders Mon, 11 Jun 2012 16:56:51 EST news258652596 (Medical Xpress) -- Standard performance measures used by health care systems and insurance companies to assess how well physicians are controlling their patients’ blood pressure tell an incomplete and potentially misleading story, according to a study by researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-standard-clinical-blood-pressure.html Health Wed, 06 Jun 2012 08:00:41 EST news258188222 (HealthDay) -- Office kitchens and break rooms are germ "hotspots," and sink and microwave handles in these areas are the dirtiest surfaces touched by office workers on a daily basis, according to a new study. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-germs-lurk-office-kitchens-rooms.html Health Wed, 23 May 2012 14:30:01 EST news256998456 (AP) -- Cancer patient Kathy Watson voted Republican in 2008 and believes the government has no right telling Americans to get health insurance. Nonetheless, she says she'd be dead if it weren't for President Barack Obama's health care law. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-fate-frail-patients-hinges-supreme.html Health Thu, 17 May 2012 12:22:45 EST news256476158 The odds that someone undergoing spinal surgery at a particular hospital will have to be readmitted to the same hospital within 30 days is an important measure of the quality of care patients receive. That's because these "hospital readmission rates" often reflect problems like hospital-acquired infections or complications from surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-spinal-surgeries-successful-statistics-ucsf.html Surgery Tue, 17 Apr 2012 16:30:01 EST news253889032 (Medical Xpress) -- An unusual clinical trial based at the University of Chicago Medicine is seeking to determine whether a drug approved for patients with advanced prostate cancer might be safer and just as effective if taken at a much lower dose with food instead of at the full dose on an empty stomach. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-clinical-trial-impact-food-anti-cancer.html Cancer Mon, 16 Apr 2012 08:50:16 EST news253785000 (AP) -- A possible misunderstanding about President Barack Obama's health care overhaul could cloud Supreme Court deliberations on its fate, leaving the impression that the law's insurance requirement is more onerous than it actually is. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-supreme-court-health-overhaul.html Health Wed, 11 Apr 2012 10:18:39 EST news253358298 (HealthDay) -- Screening people at high risk for lung cancer could be at least as cost-effective as screening for breast, colorectal and cervical cancers, a new study suggests. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-lung-cancer-screening-analysis.html Cancer Mon, 09 Apr 2012 16:40:01 EST news253207319 The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Wednesday on whether President Barack Obama's landmark health care law should be struck down if its key requirement that all Americans buy insurance is declared unconstitutional. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-day-supreme-court-health-law.html Health Wed, 28 Mar 2012 11:57:07 EST news252154620 The US law that extends health insurance coverage to most Americans, dubbed "Obamacare" by its detractors, is 2,400 pages long but only certain points have been challenged before the US Supreme Court. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-obama-health-law.html Health Fri, 23 Mar 2012 04:36:25 EST news251696177 US President Barack Obama's landmark health reform faces a make-or-break test in the Supreme Court next week in a historic case likely to shape the nation's future political landscape. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-obama-health-reform-supreme-court.html Health Fri, 23 Mar 2012 04:30:01 EST news251695007 (AP) -- What does birth control really cost anyway? http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-wide-price-range-birth.html Obstetrics & gynaecology Fri, 09 Mar 2012 04:27:01 EST news250489612 (AP) -- Nearly two years after President Barack Obama signed landmark legislation to cover the uninsured, a new poll finds his health care overhaul is neither better liked nor better understood. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-poll-health-overhaul-unpopular.html Health Thu, 08 Mar 2012 13:44:19 EST news250436650 Seven US states have filed a lawsuit challenging a requirement in President Barack Obama's 2010 health care law that religious organizations provide insurance covering birth control. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-states-obama-birth.html Other Fri, 24 Feb 2012 04:40:10 EST news249280803 Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have found that laws permitting children to stay on their parents' health insurance through age 26 result in improved access to health care compared to states without those laws. This analysis indicates the potential positive impact of a key provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA). The study appears in the March issue of the journal Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-young-adults-parents-health-access.html Health Mon, 13 Feb 2012 03:30:01 EST news248325629 (Medical Xpress) -- There are ways in which patients who leave the hospital against medical advice wind up paying for that decision. Being saddled with the full cost of their hospital stay, however, is not one of them. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-patients-medical-advice.html Health Mon, 06 Feb 2012 05:56:27 EST news247730172 In the United States, the cost paid for statins (drugs to lower cholesterol) in people under the age of 65 who have private insurance is approximately 400 percent higher than comparable costs paid by the government in the United Kingdom (U.K.). These findings, from the Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) Boston Collaborative Drug Surveillance Program, are the first results of a comprehensive comparison of prescription drug costs between the U.S. and U.K. The study appears on-line in the journal Pharmacotherapy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-statin-percent-higher-uk.html Medications Thu, 05 Jan 2012 13:55:09 EST news244994100 A new large, international study finds that the immunosuppressant drug mycophenolate mofetil is superior to azathioprine, an older immunosuppressant, as a maintenance therapy for lupus nephritis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-mycophenolate-superior-azathioprine-treatment-lupus.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Wed, 16 Nov 2011 17:39:38 EST news240687558 (AP) -- Millions of women stand to gain free access to a broad menu of birth control methods, thanks to a recommendation issued Tuesday by health experts advising the government. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-govt-birth-free.html Health Tue, 19 Jul 2011 14:47:51 EST news230305649 (AP) -- Physicians are threatening to stop serving nearly a million Puerto Ricans as a result of a dispute between the island's government and an insurance company over reimbursements for treating poor people. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-doctors-threaten-medicaid-cutoff-puerto.html Health Thu, 14 Jul 2011 05:38:55 EST news229840723