Yep, There's a Medical Code for Being Bitten by Shamu

Today's post was shared by Mother Jones and comes from www.motherjones.com

Sarah Kliff reports on the ongoing battle over the ICD-10, a set of medical codes for illnesses and injuries that's far more detailed than the current ICD-9: There are different numbers for getting struck or bitten by a turkey (W61.42 or W61.43). There are codes for injuries caused by squirrels (W53.21) and getting hit by a motor vehicle while riding an animal (V80.919), spending too much time in a deep-freeze refrigerator (W93.2) and a large toe that has gone unexpectedly missing (Z89.419). ....Hospitals and insurers have fought the new codes, calling them a massive regulatory burden....ICD-10 proponents contend that adding specificity to medical diagnoses will provide a huge boon to the country. It will be easier for public health researchers, for example, to see warning signs of a possible flu pandemic — and easier for insurers to root out fraudulent claims. “How many times are people going to be bitten by an orca? Probably not very many,” said Lynne Thomas Gordon, chief executive of the American Health Information Management Association. “But what if you’re a researcher trying to find that? You can just press a button and find that information.” Depending on who you listen to, we are either hopelessly behind the rest of the world in implementing common-sense international standards or else the only country in the world that's holding out against the madness. Read the whole thing and decide for yourself.

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Merck to pay $100 million in NuvaRing contraceptive settlement

Today's post was shared by FairWarning and comes from www.reuters.com

Merck & Co said on Friday it will pay $100 million to resolve all U.S. product liability lawsuits alleging it downplayed serious health risks involving its NuvaRing intrauterine contraceptive device. The product, which contains the hormones estrogen and progestin commonly found in birth control bills, is associated with an increased risk of developing blood clots that can cause heart attacks, strokes or sudden deaths. Available to women in the United States since 2001, NuvaRing is one of several contraceptive products linked to this higher risk. Merck, the second-biggest U.S. drugmaker, denied any fault under the agreement, which must be accepted by 95 percent of about 3,800 eligible patients involved in lawsuits pending in federal and state courts. A lawyer for the plaintiffs, Roger Denton of Schlichter, Bogard and Denton, said the settlement, reached after nearly a year of negotiations, is "an outstanding result and in the best interests of all the women who have suffered an injury associated with the use of Nuvaring." Under the settlement, Merck would pay a fraction of what at least one company has paid in a similar settlement. German drugmaker Bayer AG said last year it had paid nearly $1.6 billion to settle thousands of lawsuits involving accusations that its Yaz and Yazmin birth control pills caused blood clots that led to strokes and heart attacks. Merck shares were up 1 percent at $54.32 on the New York Stock Exchange, in line with a 1.2-percent...

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California's Drought Could Be the Worst in 500 Years

California's workers' compensation system is about to be afflicted with yet another issue....drought and its economic consequences upon the workers' compensation system. Today's post was shared by Mother Jones and comes from www.motherjones.com

The remains of Cachuma Lake, the main water source for 200,000 people in southern Santa Barbara County. Ruaridh Stewart/ZUMA The Golden State is in the midst of a three-year drought—and scientists believe that this year may end up being the driest in the last half millennium, according to University of California-Berkeley professor B. Lynn Ingram. Californians are scared, with good reason: Fire danger in the state is high, and drinking-water supplies are low. But the drought will have repercussions outside the state's borders, as well. California produces a good chunk of the nation's food: half of all our fruits and vegetables, along with a significant amount of dairy and wine. So how will this historically dry period affect Californians—and the rest of us? Here are a few important facts to keep in mind: How bad is it? According to the United States Drought Monitor, most of the state is experiencing "extreme drought," the second highest of six rankings. About 10 percent of the state is experiencing "exceptional drought," the highest possible level. As of this week, 17 communities are in danger of running out of water, forcing some to buy it or run pipes from other districts. CA drought map CA drought map key What do scientists say about the drought? Scientists can't predict how wet or dry a specific season is going to be, but they can forecast drought trends over time, and they've been warning us for decades that the droughts will become...

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Apprehensive, Many Doctors Shift to Jobs With Salaries

Workers' Compensation will soon be impacted by the full economic force and effect of The Affordable Care Act. The economics of the costs of the delivery of medical care will soon be the issue that determines whether workers' compensation continues as a viable program. Today's post that is hared from the NYTimes.com highlights the issue. Dr. Suzanne Salamon, with a patient at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, said she has had trouble filling a prestigious fellowship because of relatively low salaries. Katherine Taylor for The New York Times American physicians, worried about changes in the health care market, are streaming into salaried jobs with hospitals. Though the shift from private practice has been most pronounced in primary care, specialists are following. Last year, 64 percent of job offers filled through Merritt Hawkins, one of the nation’s leading physician placement firms, involved hospital employment, compared with only 11 percent in 2004. The firm anticipates a rise to 75 percent in the next two years. Today, about 60 percent of family doctors and pediatricians, 50 percent of surgeons and 25 percent of surgical subspecialists — such as ophthalmologists and ear, nose and throat surgeons — are employees rather than independent, according to the American Medical Association. “We’re seeing it changing fast,” said Mark E. Smith, president of Merritt Hawkins. Health economists are nearly unanimous that the...

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Medicines Made in India Set Off Safety Worries

NEW DELHI — India, the second-largest exporter of over-the-counter and prescription drugs to the United States, is coming under increased scrutiny by American regulators for safety lapses, falsified drug test results and selling fake medicines.


Dr. Margaret A. Hamburg, the commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration, arrived in India this week to express her growing unease with the safety of Indian medicines because of “recent lapses in quality at a handful of pharmaceutical firms.”


India’s pharmaceutical industry supplies 40 percent of over-the-counter and generic prescription drugs consumed in the United States, so the increased scrutiny could have profound implications for American consumers.


F.D.A. investigators are blitzing Indian drug plants, financing the inspections with some of the roughly $300 million in annual fees from generic drug makers collected as part of a 2012 law requiring increased scrutiny of overseas plants. The agency inspected 160 Indian drug plants last year, three times as many as in 2009. The increased scrutiny has led to a flood of new penalties, including half of the warning letters the agency issued last year to drug makers.


Dr. Hamburg was met by Indian officials and executives who, shocked by recent F.D.A. export bans of generic versions of popular medicines — such as the acne drug Accutane,...


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Intimidation: Missouri Senate passes online database for workers' comp

Privacy is a basic premises of workers' compensation law and the State of Missouri is taking a major step to eliminate it and intimidate injure worker. Today's post is shared from therolladailynews.com An online database of workers' compensation claims would be created under legislation passed by the Missouri Senate. Under the measure, SB526, passed on Thursday, businesses could provide a potential employee's name and Social Security number to identify the date of workers' compensation claims and whether the claim is open or closed. Sponsoring Sen. Mike Cunningham, a Rogersville Republican, says the information is already available but only by written request. Supporters say the bill would help businesses control workers' compensation costs. A similar bill was vetoed by Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon last year. He cited privacy concerns and called it "an affront to the privacy of our citizens." Senators voted 26-7 to send the measure to the House.

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Rescinding the Cuts to Veteran's Pensions Was In the Cards From the Start

Today's post was shared by Mother Jones and comes from www.motherjones.com

December's budget deal between Paul Ryan and Patty Murray included a bit of relief from the 2011 sequestration cuts, with the relief split evenly between domestic and military budgets. That even split was one of the guiding principles of the deal. But part of the military relief was paid for by $7 billion in cuts to veterans' pensions, something that immediately prompted a storm of protest and, eventually, a move to rescind the cuts. Jared Bernstein comments: True, that’s not huge bucks in the scheme of things. But the violation of this budget principle should not be taken lightly. A key point of the budget machinations that brought us to where we are today is that automatic spending cuts should be split between evenly between defense and non-defense (forget for a moment, that it’s not the discretionary side of the budget that’s responsible for our longer term fiscal challenges anyway). If Congress starts stealing from domestic programs to boost defense, it will unfairly and unwisely exacerbate already unsustainable pressures on domestic spending. I'd take a slightly different lesson from this: Democrats got snookered. Only a little bit, and they knew they were being played, but they still got snookered. It was obvious from the start that cuts to veterans' benefits would be unpopular and unlikely to stand, but Democrats agreed to them anyway in order to get the budget deal across the finish line. Maybe that was the right thing to do, but it was no...

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