Most People With TB Report No Persistent Cough
A significant proportion of people in the community with pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) have subclinical disease, according to a meta-analysis involving survey studies across Africa and Asia. In adjusted analyses, 82.8% (95% CI 78.6-86.6) of participants with TB reported no persistent cough and 62.5% (95% CI 56.6-68.7) reported no cough at all, according to Frank Cobelens, […]
Oncologists Risk Self-Referral Violations Over Medicare Mail-Order Drug Rule
A new interpretation of a decades-old law could put community oncology practices in the crosshairs of regulators who monitor and enforce provisions against self-referral and add a barrier to patient access. Enacted by Congress in 1989, the Medicare Physician Self-Referral Law, commonly called the Stark law, prohibits physicians from referring patients to receive services from […]
Opinion | What Does AI Say About the Claims on Ivermectin for COVID?
Teres is a critical care physician and clinical instructor in public health and community medicine. Oppenlander is an associate professor of statistics and bioethics. Strosberg is a professor of healthcare policy and bioethics. Science is like baseball. To score a run — to convincingly show that a drug or intervention is safe and effective — […]
Drugs used to treat Type 2 diabetes reduce alcohol cravings, use in individuals with obesity
In social media posts on the community network Reddit, users reported reduced cravings for alcohol when taking drugs intended to treat Type 2 diabetes and obesity. Across a number of threads — with titles such as “Did scientists accidentally invent an anti-addiction drug?” and “I don’t know if this is a side effect but … […]
Opinion | Challenges in Developing Long COVID Criteria
Jason is a psychology professor and community researcher. Hansel is a research assistant. In a recent JAMA article, researchers provided a new approach for identifying individuals with post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC), commonly referred to as long COVID. Because this article — from Tanayott Thaweethai, PhD, and colleagues — was part of the large, federally […]
Return of Rule Nixing Delivery of Rx Drugs to Medicare Patients Drawing Docs’ Ire
Community oncologists are up in arms about a little-known consequence of the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE): the return of a rule barring them from mailing or home-delivering chemotherapy drugs to their Medicare patients. The rule comes from a nine-page Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) document published in September 2021 on the federal […]
Masking Yields Small Reduction in COVID Risk, Review Concludes
Use of masks in both community settings and healthcare settings may slightly reduce risk of COVID-19, but the evidence base leaves much to be desired, the final installment of a living, rapid review of multiple studies found. “The strength of evidence remained low for reduced risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection with surgical masks versus no mask […]
‘Permission To Not Be In Survival Mode’: How Rest Liberates Black People
Illustration: Daniel Fishel for HuffPost Rest isn’t unproductive. For the Black community, it’s necessary for survival. The benefits of rest are well-known: It’s rejuvenating, calming and necessary for someone’s mental and physical health. The importance of rest is even more significant for Black people, according to Tricia Hersey, an activist and the founder of the […]
How Well Does the Monkeypox Vax Work? No One Knows for Sure
Across an American gay male community worried about catching monkeypox, one message suggests this is all temporary: A few months of sexual caution plus vaccination will usher in a care-free autumn. “For your own safety, and to spare you the horrors of this disease,” sex columnist Dan Savage suggested on Twitter last weekend, “you might […]
Better Outcomes Tied to More HCV Treatment for People Who Inject Drugs
A greater uptake in hepatitis C virus (HCV) treatment for people who inject drugs (PWID) at a community center led to decreases in liver disease and mortality, a longitudinal cohort study found. Among 1,323 PWID with chronic HCV at a Baltimore community-based center, the number of those with HCV RNA declined from 100% in 2006 […]