(HealthDay)—A California judge has ruled against local governments that sued drug companies for billions of dollars to recover their costs of dealing with the opioid epidemic. In a tentative ruling issued Monday, Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter Wilson rejected the plaintiffs’ claims the companies used deceptive marketing to increase unnecessary prescriptions of opioid painkillers, […]
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Study suggests people with rare diseases face significantly higher health care costs
A new, retrospective study of medical and insurance records indicates health care costs for people with a rare disease have been underestimated and are three to five times greater than the costs for people without a rare disease. The study, led by the National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), provides […]
Could an app help kids with severe ear condition avoid surgery?
A pair of special headphones plus a free app might help kids with hearing difficulty due to “glue ear,” a new, small study suggests. Glue ear is slang for a condition called otitis media with effusion (OME), where thick fluid builds up in the middle ear. It’s very common in young children but strikes older […]
Men with young-onset type 2 diabetes at higher risk of retinopathy, study finds
New research being presented at the Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD), held online this year, found that men who are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes (T2D) at a young age are more likely to develop retinopathy than those diagnosed aged 50-plus. Men diagnosed with T2D before the age […]
UK kids with cancer face funding lottery for fertility preservation services
Children and young people with cancer in the UK face something of a funding lottery for services to preserve their fertility, with specialist treatment centers heavily reliant on charities to stump up the cash needed, particularly in England, finds the first study of its kind, published online in the Archives of Disease in Childhood. This is […]
Only a minority of those with alcohol use disorders receives medication
Only a minority of Swedes with alcohol use disorders are prescribed alcohol medication, a situation that has remained largely unchanged in the country since the mid-2000. That is according to a study at Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Prescriptions of alcohol medication are also unevenly distributed in the society, […]
A cancer treatment with built-in light
Therapies should be highly effective and as free as possible of side effects—a big challenge, particularly in the case of cancer. A Chinese research team has now developed a novel form of photodynamic tumor therapy for the treatment of deep tumors that works without external irradiation. The light source is built into the drug and […]
Why did I get so ill with Covid even though I've had both jabs?
Why I got so ill with Covid even though I’ve had both jabs: JO MACFARLANE was floored by the virus last week – so why do experts say her case isn’t as worrying as it sounds? Like more than three-quarters of the UK population over 16, Jo is fully vaccinated Her first dose of Pfizer […]
Postop pneumonia risk up with pediatric neurologic comorbidity
(HealthDay)—Children with neurologic comorbidities undergoing surgery have an elevated risk for pneumonia within 30 days after surgery, according to a study published online Aug. 4 in Pediatrics. Christian Mpody, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., from Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, and colleagues conducted a retrospective study involving children who underwent inpatient surgery between 2012 and 2018 […]
With so few virus deaths, Australians debate vaccine risks
Australia has weathered the pandemic far better than many nations—recording just a single coronavirus death since last October—but its success means many Australians are not in a rush to get vaccinated and that could delay the country’s return to normalcy. Concerns are growing about the economic cost to Australia of being left behind by countries […]