AHA Looks for More 340B Drug Pricing Enforcement

May 24, 2022 - The American Hospital Association lead a cohort of five industry organizations to call for 340B drug pricing enforcement, as two US Courts of Appeals heart cases on the matter.

Elsewhere in the healthcare industry, leaders at DirectTrust celebrate an ADT notification data standard win, while researchers from CHOP note that some patients are better fits than others for telehealth use. Those telehealth use findings should direct more judicious adoption of the technology, the CHOP researchers said.

DirectTrust ADT Notification OK’d as Data Standard

DirectTrust announced that the Event Notifications via the Direct Standard has been approved by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) as a national data standard. DirectTrust developed Event Notifications via the Direct Standard to improve communication between hospitals and care teams and address the new CMS rule on Admissions, Discharges, and Transfers (ADT) notifications that went into place on May 1, 2021. “We are excited ANSI has recognized Event Notifications via the Direct Standard as a national standard,” Scott Stuewe, DirectTrust president and CEO, said in a public statement. READ MORE.

GE Healthcare Invests $50M for Home Ultrasounds

GE Healthcare will invest up to $50 million in start-up Pulsenmore to accelerate the global adoption of ultrasound solutions and pursue FDA clearance and commercial expansion. The complete offering includes a handheld ultrasound device that docks with the user’s smartphone, a mobile app for the patient to conduct consultation with a clinician, a web application for clinician-side interaction with the platform, and a software API enabling integration of Pulsenmore’s online services with organization health records. READ MORE.

AHA and Co Push for 340B Enforcement

Five hospital organizations, including the American Hospital Association (AHA) and 340B Health, have urged two US Courts of Appeals to uphold the 340B drug pricing requirement for pharmaceutical companies to provide discounted drugs to safety-net hospitals through contract pharmacies. The two groups, along with America’s Essential Hospitals, Association of American Medical Colleges, and Children’s Hospital Association, filed amicus briefs with the US Courts of Appeals for the Third Circuit and the District of Columbia Circuit. The cases involved drug companies Sanofi, Novo Nordisk, Novartis, and United Therapeutics, all of which are among the 16 pharmaceutical manufacturers limiting 340B drug discounts under the drug pricing program. READ MORE.

Patient Outreach Tech Improves Medication Adherence for PrEP

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With the right combination of patient engagement, patient outreach, and medication adherence, Paul Lovely, the executive director at the CARE Center at Dignity Health, said it's completely realistic to tamp down on HIV. “There are a lot of tools in the toolbox—getting tested, wearing a condom—which we've said forever but they’re not always the best or easiest options for folks,” Lovely told PatientEngagementHIT in a Zoom call. “PrEP really works well. And if we get a certain number of people on PrEP and can keep them engaged in care and keep them on their PrEP consistently, we can really work toward getting to zero new infections in the community.” And using patient outreach and intake technology, the CARE Center has been able to facilitate that consistent medication adherence, helping to reduce the risk for HIV. READ MORE.

Telehealth Not a Fit for Pediatric Neurology Patients

Despite the common benefits of telehealth, researchers from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) found that pediatric neurology patients received better results following in-person visits. “This study reaffirmed our previous findings that telemedicine is effective for a large majority of child neurology visits, while identifying which patients are more likely to require in-person visits,” said Ingo Helbig, MD, a pediatric neurologist at CHOP, director of the genomic and data science core of ENGIN and senior author of this study. “Telemedicine must be applied equitably, and our study also showed that families of color and socially vulnerable patient groups may have lower access to telemedicine visits,” continued Dr. Helbig. READ MORE.

AI Might Predict Autism in Kids in Primary Care Settings

A new study shows that implementing an artificial intelligence-based medical device in primary care settings can help clinicians accurately diagnose autism spectrum disorder in children. The tool bases its recommendations on a machine-learning (ML) algorithm that selects behavioral features predictive of ASD. The algorithm was developed and validated using patient record data from children with diverse presentations, conditions, and comorbidities who were either diagnosed with ASD or confirmed not to have it using standard diagnostic tools. READ MORE.