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HCV screening projected to save 120,000 boomers' lives
Screening for hepatitis-C may soon become a routine screening for Baby Boomers.
Baby boomers may soon add hepatitis-C (HCV) to their list of routine annual screenings along with colorectal cancer, cholesterol, osteoporosis, and cervical cancer, when a proposed expansion of current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines is put into place.
CDC's proposed expansion of its current HCV risk-based guidelines includes a simple, 1-time blood test for anyone born from 1945 through 1965. More than 75% of American adults with hepatitis C are baby boomers.
"These guidelines are unprecedented in the liver and viral hepatitis realm," Tram Tran, MD, medical director of Liver Transplantation at the Liver Disease and Transplant Center at Cedars-Sinai, told Formulary. "Instead of screening based on symptoms, the recommendation is focused on a particular age group, in this case, baby boomers."
This recommendation is important, according to Dr Tran, because it is expected that there will be a huge influx of patients who will require a higher level of expertise and management of their disease. "That requires some infrastructure, such as a liver program and hepatologists," she said.
According to CDC, too many infections are being missed, since individuals, and even doctors, may be uncomfortable discussing behaviors related to hepatitis C risk. In addition, standard, routine tests of liver function miss more than half of all cases of HCV infection. Currently, CDC recommends testing for those who have a known risk for HCV, including anyone who has ever injected illegal drugs, patients who have ever received long-term hemodialysis treatment, or people living with HIV.
"Hepatitis C is a leading cause of liver cancer and cirrhosis, as well as the chief reason for the need for liver transplants in the United States," Dr Tran said.
Dr Tran added that many patients with HCV don't have symptoms. "Proactive testing will ensure more cases are caught early," she said. "Some treatments are showing 70% cure rates."
This recommendation will continue to motivate the industry to advance, according to Tran. "It's already such a fast-moving disease state, and we've been making great strides in how hepatitis C is managed and treated," she said. "There will be numerous patients who will require treatment, and this should spur the creation of treatments that are well tolerated and affordable."
For more on HCV, go to http://www.cdc.gov/hepatitis/HCV/HCVfaq.htm
Coalition promotes important acetaminophen dosing reminders
November 18th 2014It may come as a surprise that each year Americans catch approximately 1 billion colds, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that as many as 20% get the flu. This cold and flu season, 7 in 10 patients will reach for an over-the-counter (OTC) medicine to treat their coughs, stuffy noses, and sniffles. It’s an important time of the year to remind patients to double check their medicine labels so they don’t double up on medicines containing acetaminophen.
Support consumer access to specialty medications through value-based insurance design
June 30th 2014The driving force behind consumer cost-sharing provisions for specialty medications is the acquisition cost and not clinical value. This appears to be true for almost all public and private health plans, says a new report from researchers at the University of Michigan Center for Value-Based Insurance Design (V-BID Center) and the National Pharmaceutical Council (NPC).
Management of antipsychotic medication polypharmacy
June 13th 2013Within our healthcare-driven society, the increase in the identification and diagnosis of mental illnesses has led to a proportional increase in the prescribing of psychotropic medications. The prevalence of mental illnesses and subsequent treatment approaches may employ monotherapy as first-line treatment, but in many cases the use of combination of therapy can occur, leading to polypharmacy.1 Polypharmacy can be defined in several ways but it generally recognized as the use of multiple medications by one patient and the most common definition is the concurrent use of five more medications. The presence of polyharmacy has the potential to contribute to non-compliance, drug-drug interactions, medication errors, adverse events, or poor quality of life.
Medical innovation improves outcomes
June 12th 2013I have been diagnosed with stage 4 cancer of the pancreas, a disease that’s long been considered not just incurable, but almost impossible to treat-a recalcitrant disease that some practitioners feel has given oncology a bad name. I was told my life would be measured in weeks.
