Live: MA Senate Debates Health Care Cost Bill
As we speak, a debate on S.2260, the Senate’s health care cost bill, is underway. You can watch it live here. But get comfortable: staffers report there are 265 filed amendments to consider. Update at...
View ArticleBrown And Warren On Health Care: Two Views Of The Problem
He doesn’t want to turn Medicare into a voucher program (like many of his GOP colleagues) — neither does she. He wants to cut “waste, fraud and abuse.” She wants to cut costs. WBUR’s Martha Bebinger...
View ArticleEssay Contest: $1,000 For Best Tales Of Health Care Sticker Shocks
Apple-picking. Leaf-peeping. Turkey-eating. And now we have yet another autumn tradition: The annual “Costs of Care” essay contest, seeking “the best stories from patients, doctors, and nurses...
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Lesson Of The $446 Ear Rinse: Medical Bills That Make You Say ‘What?!’
(Photo: Robin Lubbock/WBUR) THIS COMMUNICATION IS FROM A DEBT COLLECTOR. THIS IS AN ATTEMPT TO COLLECT A DEBT. ANY INFORMATION OBTAINED WILL BE USED FOR THAT PURPOSE. Get your attention, all those...
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Deluge Of Medicare Data On Docs: Is It Useful? Well, It’s A Step…
Yay, transparency. It’s surely a good thing that Medicare has been releasing gushes of data lately on its health-care payments, most recently on payments to individual physicians. And it’s surely...
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A First-Year Victory In The Mass. Fight To Control Health Costs
(Source: Center for Health Information and Analysis) Two years ago, Massachusetts set what was considered an ambitious goal: The state would not let that persistent monster, rising health care costs,...
View ArticleGov. Baker, If You Met My Immigrant Patients, You'd Support 'Safe Communities...
A primary care doctor describes the fear she sees among her immigrant patients and wishes the governor could see it as well, in hopes it would persuade him to support a "sanctuary state" bill.
View ArticleGlioblastoma Is A Grim Diagnosis, But There Are Some Signs Of Hope
With rapid progress in research, the longer Sen. John McCain and other glioblastoma patients can hang on, the better their chances that some new treatment will help them.
View ArticleOur Dogs Can Get Lyme Vaccines And We (Still) Can't. When Might We?
New vaccines or antibodies against Lyme disease in humans won't be available for several years at best, but at least there are projects underway, including clinical trials that began this year.
View ArticleAgainst Medical Advice: Sometimes, When Patients Defy Accepted Wisdom, So...
Keeping the whole patient in view, including the social challenges they'll return to after their short stint in a hospital, is as much a part of medical decision-making as diagnosis and prescription.
View ArticleAnalyst: MassHealth Enrollment Has Stabilized, So Baker's Proposals May Not...
The retired president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation says Gov. Charlie Baker "has put forward probably the most sweeping changes in Medicaid or MassHealth in the 50 years of its existence,"...
View ArticleMedical Ethics: In The Charlie Gard Case, Listen To The Nurses
In the tragic case of Charlie Gard, the British baby with brain damage whose fate pitted doctors against parents, a medical ethicist would give special consideration to his nurses.
View ArticleHouse Rejects Gov. Baker's MassHealth Reforms
Baker wanted to move an estimated 140,000 non-disabled people off MassHealth and into subsidized insurance provided through the state's Health Connector.
View Article'Mosaic' HIV Vaccine Looks Good In Early Trial, Boston Researcher Tells AIDS...
It's a "mosaic" vaccine that tries to cover the many varieties of HIV around the globe by computer-generating synthetic HIV sequences -- and it could be ready for a big clinical trial in Africa this...
View ArticleEarly, Unofficial Doctor's Office Data Supports Prediction Of Heavy Lyme...
Overall doctors are diagnosing about 15 percent more Lyme disease cases than they did last year, according to athenahealth -- with a lot of geographical variation.
View ArticleBaker And 9 Other Governors Urge Senate To Reject 'Skinny Repeal' Of Obamacare
"Skinny repeal," the 10 governors write, "is expected to accelerate health plans leaving the individual market, increase premiums, and result in fewer Americans having access to coverage."
View ArticleWinchester Hospital Reports Possible Scabies Outbreak
Officials at Winchester Hospital say more than 20 hospital employees are receiving treatment after it was discovered that a patient was showing symptoms of an active infection.
View ArticleHarvard Psychiatrist: How Trump's Speech Was Toxic For Boy Scouts Beyond...
A child psychiatrist lays out specific ways that President Trump's speech to the Boy Scout Jamboree could be toxic to the boys who heard it, and how to counteract them.
View ArticleHow Profits From Opium Shaped 19th-Century Boston
In a city steeped in history, very few residents understand the powerful legacy of opium money.
View ArticleMass. General Chief Decries Transgender Ban, As More Doctors Speak Out...
"Not only was I moved by Dr. Slavin’s strong and direct public stand against the ban, I was also bit surprised by it, as I suspect many of my colleagues were. Traditionally, health professionals have...
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