In a revealing snapshot of American mental health, the CDC recently reported that nearly 1 in 4 adults in the United States may be taking psychotropic medications. This staggering number should both draw attention and raise questions. Are we truly addressing the root causes of psychiatric illness, or are we sedating a nation in pain?
As a psychiatrist and internist who has worked at the intersection of …
An excerpt from Your Body, Your Health Care.
Tens of millions of American women—more than four out of five women who have had sexual intercourse—have used oral contraceptives, which are crucial for reducing unwanted pregnancies and the incidence of abortion. Obtaining a physician’s prescription can add up to $200 plus time and inconvenience to the cost of “the pill.” Nearly a third of American women who seek prescriptions for oral …
Everyone seems so scared of the word government regulation when it comes to health care. Why? In part, this is because those against regulations (everyone making money off health care) make sure to scare laypeople into equating such action with socialism. Fear of concept is not a good argument against regulating monopolies that are bankrupting millions of Americans. Pretty sure most Americans would be happy to have limitations placed on …
The 340B drug discount program was enacted more than 30 years ago to lower the cost of medications so providers could deliver more comprehensive services for vulnerable patients. As care delivery has evolved greatly over that time, the program has not appropriately changed to match it and is no longer effectively meeting its original intent. The program’s rapid growth and misaligned incentives have led to a muddied, complex system with …
Across industries, artificial intelligence is revolutionizing how we approach innovation, and the life sciences and drug development sectors are no exception. This transformative technology is reshaping the way researchers discover and develop new products, particularly in the quest for groundbreaking treatments. While an AI-derived drug may feel like a distant reality, the integration of cutting-edge science, biomathematics, and computational power is accelerating the pace of discovery and testing. These advancements …
Starting January 1, 2025, the Medicare Prescription Payment Plan (MPPP) will give providers a powerful way to address one of the biggest barriers to effective care: cost-related medication nonadherence. With 54 million Medicare beneficiaries eligible, this program has the potential to improve adherence, reduce hospital readmissions, and ensure better health outcomes on a large scale. By helping patients access the program, providers can play a pivotal role in transforming patient …
If you think the labyrinth of U.S. government agencies and congressional subcommittees is complicated, be grateful you are not a pharmacy owner! Just to get your drugs reimbursed, you must navigate a river of upstream, midstream, and downstream suppliers, health plans and insurers, employers and other payers (including federal and state governments), rebate aggregators, “white and brown baggers,” and an alphabet soup of entities/concepts called things like PSAOs, GPOs, NADACs, …
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We dive into the controversial world of direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising with health reporter Martha Rosenberg. Drawing from her extensive knowledge, Martha unpacks how DTC drug ads manipulate consumers, fuel hypochondria, and create demand …
A million vulnerable patients have died in the last decade, and while I have no doubt the rate of overdose and poisoning will drop nationwide—killing a million vulnerable patients has that effect eventually—I choose not to contribute to that death rate. This decision is in accordance with my deeply held beliefs. In 2014, Governor Asa Hutchinson signed the Arkansas Conscience Protection Act into law, supposedly protecting health care professionals who …
As health care predictive algorithms, including the Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs (PDMP), expand their reach beyond traditional enforcement of health care regulations, the concept of a social credit score has emerged as a powerful but controversial tool. Like predictive policing, social credit scores use an individual’s behaviors, online activity, and social interactions to assess their perceived trustworthiness and risk to society and are used as fodder for the prosecution of …
Having worked as a copywriter and creative director at some of the world’s top ad agencies, including McCann Erickson (now McCann Worldgroup), I am vehemently critical of new advertising. Why? I know the tricks and how they manipulate well — think the old TV series Mad Men.
Leading the list of ads that I hate are direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug ads which began in the late 1990s. I am especially critical of …
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Suppose you are looking for multivitamin supplements. You pick up two containers of multivitamins and wonder which one you should get. At first glance, they have similar labels, but then you notice that one has a comment indicating that the supplement was manufactured in a registered GMP-compliant facility, and the other does not.
Then you ask yourself the following questions: How much of what ingredients are included in proprietary blends? Where …
I have a problem with some of the continuing medical education courses offered by large health care institutions, even those like Harvard and Mayo, which have outstanding reputations for evidence-based medicine. That’s because what they teach, although scientifically sound and in line with the Department of Health and Human Services and CDC recommendations, can get you prosecuted and convicted by the DEA. If you get targeted for practicing the way …
As a U.S. health care writer and patient advocate for almost 30 years, I read a lot. Recently, some of that reading is in court transcripts of doctors being persecuted out of medicine or into jail by various prosecutors and their hired “experts.” I use the term “persecuted” intentionally. I believe that “medical experts” in many court or Medical Board proceedings are simply “hired guns” – clinical predators hired for …
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In the state of New York (you already know it’s going to be bad), a doctor and a pharmacist were arrested in a sting operation conducted by a joint task force of the DEA, FBI, IRS, and probably CIA and CBS, though I have no proof of the latter two. The doctor, Mordechai Bar, and the pharmacist, Feroze Nazirbage, have been accused of “violating their oaths,” something you almost never …
As long as you live, you will never hear an article from news media contending that “America Runs On Duncan.” Why? Because the line is a marketing allegation created by the advertising company and designed to sell product.
Yet news media repeat medical claims from drug makers found in journals like they are news––which gives Pharma companies free advertising and can mislead consumers and patients.
The most recent example is the “news” …
In most physician prosecutions for treating pain or addiction, there is never any actual evidence of criminal intent. Just the nebulous argument that a doctor “ignored the risk of overdose,” “ignored the risk of addiction,” or performed “an insufficient medical exam.” I have a big problem with these because the doctor didn’t ignore anything in about 80 percent of the cases I evaluated. Indeed, the DEA had to lie to …
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A doctor in Virginia named Joel Smithers was serving a 40-year sentence in an Atlanta prison when he won his appeal to the 4th Circuit. No, he didn’t shoot someone. That’s probably 25 years. He treated patients in pain. Now, he will get a new trial where he will be bludgeoned again with false metrics and innuendo. To ensure that the benefit of the doubt prevails, a Reuters article starts …
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