Medicare could potentially waste up to $605 million annually from the packaging of controversial Alzheimer’s drug aducanumab if it is approved for widespread use, according to a University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) study. “Given Medicare’s premium increase in 2022 partly due to aducanumab, greater focus on efficient vial packaging could improve the value of…

Baby neck floats are under fire again after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warned against their use in water therapies following the death of one baby and hospitalization of another in unsupervised usage. “Do not use baby neck floats for water therapy intervention,” the FDA wrote in a media statement released on June 28….

It can happen in an instant. One day your dad is living on his own, independent and mostly healthy despite advancing age. The next he’s in bed with a broken something, dependent on his grown children and forced to move into a long-term care facility because you don’t have time to research alternatives. I’m not…

More than 20 percent of U.S. adults—50 million people—live with chronic pain such as spinal disorders and disc disease, pinched nerves, low back pain, neck pain, complex regional pain syndromes, fibromyalgia, shingles, diabetes-caused neuropathies, and arthritic and musculoskeletal conditions, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. People suffering with chronic pain were frequent…

A study has found that drugs with high abuse potential are around six times more likely to be approved as compared to drugs with low abuse potential for pain medications. “The probability of successful development programs was 27.8 percent for high abuse potential compounds and 4.7 percent for low abuse potential compounds,” the authors wrote…

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) ruled in favor of two doctors challenging convictions on drug distribution charges for over-prescribing controlled opioids on the rationale that their actions may have been in “good faith.” The justices ruled 9–0 on June 27 (pdf), siding with Dr. Xiulu Ruan and Dr. Shakeel Khan. Justice Stephen…

The majority of American hospitals are still not transparent on their pricing of hospital procedures, even though transparency policies were initiated in 2019, according to recent studies on hospital pricing for joint replacements and other procedures. A study by Cleveland Clinic Foundation found that only around a third—32 percent—of hospitals were totally transparent with their…

Less than 6 percent of medical drugs have high-quality evidence to support their benefits, according to a recent study by the University of Oxford. The study found that, of the 1,567 eligible medications approved under the Cochrane Reviews from 2008 to 2021, more than 94 percent were not supported by high-quality evidence. Cochrane Reviews is…

On November 23, 2021, former South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan died at the age of 90. According to South Korea’s JTBC TV, a former Cheong Wa Dae (South Korean presidential palace) secretary revealed that Chun had not eaten properly for 10 consecutive days since he received the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. His health deteriorated rapidly and…

Long before COVID-19 made the public aware of the importance of good air ventilation, designers had been concerned with how physical environments affect people’s well-being and mental health. In the 20th century, hospital design underwent a profound change. Hospitals used to be a place for only the treatment of diseases and injuries—or places strongly associated…