Healthcare Management News & Features

Off-Label Avastin Use For Wet Macular Degeneration

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has only approved Avastin for cancer of the colon and lungs. In off-label use, however, Avastin is proving itself as a “miracle drug” that’s currently used by some doctors to treat other cancers, including breast, prostate, renal cell, head and neck, pancreatic, ovarian and hepatocellular.

Understanding Focused and Ongoing Professional Practice Evaluations

The 2007 Joint Commission (JCAHO) standards strengthen and extend the peer-review process. They call for hospitals to make unbiased credentialing and privileging decisions based on physician performance. Hospitals evaluate that performance using two types of professional practice evaluations — focused and ongoing.

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Free Guide: How to Apply the Joint Commission Standards to Hospital Peer Review

The medical staff standards of The Joint Commission have strengthened the peer review process, with explicit requirements for focused and ongoing professional practice evaluations. Download our free guide and learn how these standards affect your credentialing, privileging and peer review committee operations.

Treatment of Multiple Myeloma: Two Steps Forward - One Step Back?

Multiple myeloma (MM) is a malignancy of plasma cells, the antibody-producing cells of the bone marrow. Approximately 17,000 individuals are diagnosed with MM in the United States each year, most over 65 years of age. Less than 10 percent are under 50. Symptoms include bone pain and fractures caused by weakening of bones, anemia, weakness, fatigue and weight loss. Individuals under 65 have generally better outcomes, but the typical survival is between 20 and 40 months.

External Peer Review Heads off Litigation

Internal politics and the threat of a lawsuit prompted a 600-bed hospital in central Illinois to hire an Independent Review Organization (IRO) to provide an external peer review. A patient of Dr. Ian Gilpin filed a lawsuit against the doctor and the hospital over complications after the surgery.

When Should Cases Be Sent For External Peer Review

Ensuring objectivity and fairness is a big challenge in hospital peer review, which is why hospitals are increasingly turning to Independent Review Organizations to help improve the process.  As a result, having established criteria for sending cases out for external peer review is important.  Without objective guidelines, medical staff and peer committees encounter resistance to the use of external review organizations.  In a reprint of recent articles that appeared in Hospital Peer Review, these and other key issues are explored.

Presidential Candidates On Healthcare

"The next president of the United States will confront major health policy decisions that will affect the lives of all Americans. With the first of the presidential caucuses and primaries only six months away, the pressure is on for the candidates to provide Americans with their plans to improve the nation's health care system -- and rightfully so. Despite spending over $2 trillion a year on health care -- 18% of the U.S. GDP and twice as much as any other nation -- the United States ranks only 45th in life expectancy and 37th in a World Health Organization study on the performance of national health systems. 1,2 The U.S. federal government currently spends more on health care than on Social Security and national defense combined, the next most expensive items, but Americans get the right treatment only 55% of the time.

Posted 1.14.08

The Right Vision of Healthcare

Yaron Brook, managing director of BH Equity Research and executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, has a op-ed this week in Forbes by the above title. He brings up several interesting questions and skewers both political parties approaches to health care reform.

Posted 1.9.08

Software Diagnosis and Quality

According to a 2003 study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association, at least one in 12 patients who die were diagnosed incorrectly. While doctors face some hard to diagnose cases, will turning to technology to bridge this gap make a difference in these numbers, or healthcare quality? Younger doctors are more comfortable with technology and are ready to rely on it. As the doctors from the baby boom retire, will automated diagnosis become more the rage?

Posted 1.10.08