Utilization of prescription-assistance program for medically uninsured cancer patients: A case study of a public hospital experience in New York state.

2013 ◽  
Vol 31 (15_suppl) ◽  
pp. e17537-e17537
Author(s):  
Limin Gao ◽  
Jivin Joseph ◽  
Marcelle Levy-Santoro ◽  
Vladimir Gotlieb ◽  
Alan S. Multz

e17537 Background: With the advances in early detection, prevention, and treatment of some cancers, mortality rates in the United States have been consistently falling. However, with these successes have come substantial increases in the cost of cancer care. Antineoplastics are the leading therapeutic classes in hospital drug expenditures. Lack of insurance is associated with lower rates of cancer screening, later stage at diagnosis, and increased cancer mortality. Prescription assistance programs (PAPs) are offered by pharmaceutical manufacturers to provide medications at no out-of-pocket cost to medically indigent patients. To assist the Cancer Care Center at NUMC with drug costs for chemotherapies and maintain the quality care for patients, the Pharmacy department instituted a Patient Assistance Program (PAP) to obtain medication from the drug companies at no cost. NUMC is a “safety net” teaching hospital in suburban New York. It serves mostly an indigent population and is a Level 1 Trauma Center with over 77,000 emergency department visits per year. Methods: We followed all patients requiring assistance with chemotherapy who enrolled in our PAPs from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2012. Individuals potentially eligible for PAPs were identified by Oncologists and by the pharmacy department. Medications included both oral and parenteral chemotherapy drugs and antiemetics. Results: The program served 341 patients in 2011 and 579 patients in 2012. The total number of visits in the clinic over 24 months was 9,405. The total cost savings of the medications was $908,944.11 in 2011 and $1,715,538.37 in 2012. Conclusions: PAPs provide a valuable safety net to ensure that cancer patients without insurance receive needed prescription medications. The rising cost of health care and the high proportion of indigent patients have financially burdened the hospital. A pharmacy-based program to procure free medications for uninsured cancer outpatients has helped to defray the Cancer Care Center’s expense of providing care at NUMC, increased patients’ compliance with chemo-protocols and allowed many patients to receive the treatment they otherwise would not be able to afford.

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 104-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Limin Gao ◽  
Jivin Joseph ◽  
Marcelle Santoro- Levy ◽  
Vladimir K. Gotlieb ◽  
Alan S. Multz

Purpose: With the advances in early detection, prevention, and treatment of some cancers, mortality rates in the United States have been consistently falling. However, with these successes have come substantial increases in the cost of cancer care. Antineoplastics are the leading class in hospital drug expenditures. Cancer treatments are causing a serious financial burden for patients, families, hospitals, and society at large, especially for those who are uninsured. Prescription assistance programs (PAPs) are offered by pharmaceutical manufacturers to provide medications at no out-of-pocket cost to medically indigent patients. To assist the Cancer Care Center at Nassau University Medical Center (NUMC) with drug costs for chemotherapies, a clinical pharmacist–managed PAP was implemented to procure chemotherapy medications from pharmaceutical manufacturers. NUMC is a safety-net teaching hospital in suburban New York. It serves mostly an indigent population, and its Level I trauma center has more than 77,000 emergency department visits per year. Methods: We observed all patients requiring assistance with chemotherapy who enrolled in PAPs from January 1, 2011, through December 31, 2012. The total number of visits in the clinic over 24 months was 9,405. Individuals potentially eligible for the PAP were identified by oncologists. Patients received a referral to the PAP when they mentioned to office personnel that they had difficulty obtaining medications or expressed financial concerns related to management. Results: The clinical pharmacist spent the majority of his time assisting uninsured individuals, working with charity pools from the drug manufacturers, and obtaining medications through the PAP. The program served 341 patients in 2011 and 579 patients in 2012. Medications obtained for these patients included both oral and parenteral chemotherapy drugs and antiemetics. The total cost savings of the medications was $908,944.11 in 2011 and $1,715,538.37 in 2012. In 2012, a total of 783 prescriptions were processed, and 775 were approved by the manufacturers (98.9%). Conclusion: PAPs provide a valuable safety net to ensure that uninsured patients with cancer receive needed prescription medications. The rising cost of health care and the high proportion of indigent patients have financially burdened the hospital. For the pharmacy department, this has resulted in a lack of compensation for pharmaceuticals dispensed to indigent patients. A pharmacy-based program to procure free medications for uninsured patients with cancer has helped to defray the expenses of the Cancer Care Center in providing care at NUMC, increased patient compliance with chemotherapy protocols, and allowed many patients to receive the treatments they otherwise would not have been able to afford.


Author(s):  
Nicholas P Piedmonte ◽  
Vanessa C Vinci ◽  
Thomas J Daniels ◽  
Bryon P Backenson ◽  
Richard C Falco

Abstract The Asian longhorned tick, Haemaphysalis longicornis Neumann, is a species native to eastern Asia that has recently been discovered in the United States. In its native range, H. longicornis transmits pathogens that cause disease in humans and livestock. It is currently unknown whether H. longicornis will act as a vector in the United States. Understanding its seasonal activity patterns will be important in identifying which times of the year represent greatest potential risk to humans and livestock should this species become a threat to animal or public health. A study site was established in Yonkers, NY near the residence associated with the first reported human bite from H. longicornis in the United States. Ticks were collected once each week from July 2018 to November 2019. Haemaphysalis longicornis larvae were most active from August to November, nymphs from April to July, and adult females from June to September. This pattern of activity suggests that H. longicornis is capable of completing a generation within a single year and matches the patterns observed in its other ranges in the northern hemisphere. The data presented here contribute to a growing database for H. longicornis phenology in the northeastern United States. Potential implications of the short life cycle for the tick’s vectorial capacity are discussed.


Author(s):  
Coby Klein ◽  
Mitchell Baker ◽  
Andrei Alyokhin ◽  
David Mota-Sanchez

Abstract Eastern New York State is frequently the site of Colorado potato beetle (Leptinotarsa decemlineata, Say) populations with the highest observed levels of insecticide resistance to a range of active ingredients. The dominance of a resistant phenotype will affect its rate of increase and the potential for management. On organic farms on Long Island, L. decemlineata evolved high levels of resistance to spinosad in a short period of time and that resistance has spread across the eastern part of the Island. Resistance has also emerged in other parts of the country as well. To clarify the level of dominance or recessiveness of spinosad resistance in different parts of the United States and how resistance differs in separate beetle populations, we sampled in 2010 beetle populations from Maine, Michigan, and Long Island. In addition, a highly resistant Long Island population was assessed in 2012. All populations were hybridized with a laboratory-susceptible strain to determine dominance. None of the populations sampled in 2010 were significantly different from additive resistance, but the Long Island population sampled in 2012 was not significantly different from fully recessive. Recessive inheritance of high-level resistance may help manage its increase.


Medical Care ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 53 (12) ◽  
pp. 1018-1026 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer W. Mack ◽  
Kun Chen ◽  
Francis P. Boscoe ◽  
Foster C. Gesten ◽  
Patrick J. Roohan ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (7) ◽  
pp. 71-89
Author(s):  
Amy Barber, BSc ◽  
Annaëlle Vinzent, BS ◽  
Imani Williams, BA

Background: The COVID-19 crisis placed extraordinary demands on the supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) at the beginning of 2020. These were coupled with shocks to the supply chain resulting from the disease. Many typically well-resourced health systems faced subsequent shortages of equipment and had to implement new strategies to manage their stocks. Stockpiles of protective equipment were held in both the United States and United Kingdom intended to prevent shortages. Method: Cross-comparative case study approach by applying Pettigrew and Whipp’s framework for change management. Setting: The health systems of England and New York state from January 2020 to the end of April 2020. Results: Both cases reacted slowly to their outbreaks and faced problems with supplying enough PPE to their health systems. Their stockpiles were not enough to prevent shortages, with many distribution problems resulting from inadequate governance mechanisms. No sustainable responses to supply disruptions were implemented during the study period in either case. Health systems planned interventions along each part of the supply chain from production and importing, to usage guidelines. Conclusion: Global supply chains are vulnerable to disruptions caused by international crises, and existing mitigation strategies have not been wholly successful. The existence of stockpiles is insufficient to preventing shortages of necessary equipment in clinical settings. Both the governance and quality of stockpiles, as well as distribution channels are important for preventing shortages. At the time of writing, it is not possible to judge the strength of strategies adopted in these cases.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erica Lasek-Nesselquist ◽  
Navjot Singh ◽  
Alexis Russell ◽  
Daryl Lamson ◽  
John Kelly ◽  
...  

AbstractNew York State, in particular the New York City metropolitan area, was the early epicenter of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in the United States. Similar to initial pandemic dynamics in many metropolitan areas, multiple introductions from various locations appear to have contributed to the swell of positive cases. However, representation and analysis of samples from New York regions outside the greater New York City area were lacking, as were SARS-CoV-2 genomes from the earliest cases associated with the Westchester County outbreak, which represents the first outbreak recorded in New York State. The Wadsworth Center, the public health laboratory of New York State, sought to characterize the transmission dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 across the entire state of New York from March to September with the addition of over 600 genomes from under-sampled and previously unsampled New York counties and to more fully understand the breadth of the initial outbreak in Westchester County. Additional sequencing confirmed the dominance of B.1 and descendant lineages (collectively referred to as B.1.X) in New York State. Community structure, phylogenetic, and phylogeographic analyses suggested that the Westchester outbreak was associated with continued transmission of the virus throughout the state, even after travel restrictions and the on-pause measures of March, contributing to a substantial proportion of the B.1 transmission clusters as of September 30th, 2020.


2010 ◽  
Vol 84 (11) ◽  
pp. 5715-5718 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elodie Ghedin ◽  
David E. Wentworth ◽  
Rebecca A. Halpin ◽  
Xudong Lin ◽  
Jayati Bera ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The initial wave of swine-origin influenza A virus (pandemic H1N1/09) in the United States during the spring and summer of 2009 also resulted in an increased vigilance and sampling of seasonal influenza viruses (H1N1 and H3N2), even though they are normally characterized by very low incidence outside of the winter months. To explore the nature of virus evolution during this influenza “off-season,” we conducted a phylogenetic analysis of H1N1 and H3N2 sequences sampled during April to June 2009 in New York State. Our analysis revealed that multiple lineages of both viruses were introduced and cocirculated during this time, as is typical of influenza virus during the winter. Strikingly, however, we also found strong evidence for the presence of a large transmission chain of H3N2 viruses centered on the south-east of New York State and which continued until at least 1 June 2009. These results suggest that the unseasonal transmission of influenza A viruses may be more widespread than is usually supposed.


PEDIATRICS ◽  
1970 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 164-165

Officers Elected: At the annual meeting of the Ambulatory Pediatric Association in Atlantic City in April 1970, the following officers and members of the Executive Council were elected: President John H. Kennell, President Elect Donald L. Fink, Executive Council Members: Ray E. Helfer and Roland B. Scott. Institites for Physicians and Nurses in the Care of Premature and Other Highrisk Infants, sponsored by the New York State Department of Health and the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare, and conducted at the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center five times during the academic year, will begin in September, 1970.


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