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Showing posts with label Institute of Medicine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Institute of Medicine. Show all posts

Thursday, September 27, 2012

IOM: Military Needs Better Care for Addicts

By David Pittman
MedPage Today
Originally published September 17, 2012


The U.S. Defense Department needs more providers trained in treating substance abuse in the armed forces, according to an Institute of Medicine report.
The prevalence of comorbid behavioral conditions "necessitates access to providers with advanced levels of training rather than certified counselors or peer support by individuals in recovery," the report, released Monday, read.
The Department of Defense (DOD) asked the IOM to assess the way it handles the prevention, screening, diagnosis, and treatment of substance use disorders (SUDs) for service members, National Guard troops, members of the Reserves, and military dependents.
IOM researchers held public information gathering meetings, conducted five site visits to military bases to meet with primary care and behavioral health providers, and received information and data on services from the military.
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Specifically, the IOM found:
  • Shortages of SUDs counselors across all branches
  • Wide variation in training and credentialing requirements for counselors across the branches
  • Outdated training manuals for Air Force and Navy substance abuse counselors
  • A noticeable shortage of a workforce trained in SUD prevention including physicians trained in addiction medicine or psychiatry


Thursday, September 20, 2012

Study of U.S. Health Care System Finds Both Waste and Opportunity to Improve

By Annie Lowrey
The New York Times
Originally published on September 11, 2012

The American medical system squanders 30 cents of every dollar spent on health care, according to new calculations by the respected Institute of Medicine. But in all that waste and misuse, policy experts and economists see a significant opportunity — a way to curb runaway health spending, to improve medical outcomes and even to put the economy on sounder footing.

“Everybody from Paul Krugman to Paul Ryan agrees it is essential to restrain costs,” said Dr. Mark D. Smith, the president of the California HealthCare Foundation and the chairman of the committee that wrote the report, referring to the liberal economist and Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times, and the conservative Wisconsin congressman who is Mitt Romney’s vice-presidential running mate. “The health care industry agrees, too.”

The Institute of Medicine report — its research led by 18 best-of-class clinicians, policy experts and business leaders — details how the American medical system wastes an estimated $750 billion a year while failing to deliver reliable, top-notch care. That is roughly equivalent to the annual cost of health coverage for 150 million workers, or the budget of the Defense Department, or the 2008 bank bailout.

Friday, September 7, 2012

Do Post-Market Drug Trials Need a Higher Dose of Ethics?

Patients who sign up for trials testing more than one already approved intervention do not always know if one is being tested for harmful side effects

By Katherine Harmon
Scientific American
Originally published August 23, 2012

Here is an excerpt:

What you might not know—even after you sign up for the trial and have inked the informed-consent form—is that scattered reports are starting to suggest that the new medication might occasionally cause severe side effects. And the real reason the trial is being conducted with these previously released drugs is to test whether the new medication really is a lot riskier to everyone or just to a subset of patients.

If you found that out, would you still sign up for the trial? The problem is that many patients—and often even the institutional review boards that approve the trials—are never informed of these lingering questions.

This is one of the big ethical holes often left open in post-market trials, says Ruth Faden, director of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics, who co-authored a new essay on this topic in The New England Journal of Medicine, which was published online August 22. She and a team of co-authors released a formal Institute of Medicine (IOM) report earlier this year recommending that the FDA improve this and other ethical aspects of post-market trials—especially those it requires.

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Panel calls for annual PTSD screening

By Kevin Freking
The Associated Press
Originally published July 13, 2012

The Institute of Medicine recommended Friday that soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan undergo annual screening for post-traumatic stress disorder and that federal agencies conduct more research to determine how well the various treatments for PTSD are working.

Of the 2.6 million service members deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, it's estimated that 13 percent to 20 percent have symptoms of PTSD.

Federal agencies have increasingly dedicated more resources to screen and treat soldiers, but considerable gaps remain, according to the Institute of Medicine, an independent group of experts that advises the federal government on medical issues. Its recommendations often make their way into laws drafted by Congress and policies implemented by federal agencies.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Many on Medical Guideline Panels Have Conflicts of Interest

By Amanda Gardner
HealthDay Reporter

More than half of panel members who gather to write clinical practice guidelines on diabetes and high cholesterol have conflicts of interest, new research suggests.

"The concern is that compensation by industry on some of these panels can pose a potential risk of industry influence on the guideline recommendations," said Dr. Jennifer Neuman, lead author of a paper published online Oct. 11 in the BMJ.

Clinical practice guidelines are meant to direct health care professionals on how to best care for patients.

In the United States and Canada, most organizations (including nonprofit and governmental bodies) have their own protocol for divulging conflicts of interest.

And recently, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) published recommendations on how organizations should manage conflicts of interest when drawing up guidelines. Among other things, the institute advocated excluding individuals with financial ties to the drug industry.

The rest of the story can be read here.