Florida hospitals rely on the state’s NICA program to protect themselves from costly lawsuits. When parents resist, some of those same hospitals ask a judge to appoint an “independent guardian” to take the decision away. More
Why hasn't the Biden administration ended this self-defeating policy from the Trump administration? More
This cohort study uses national commercial claims data to evaluate the frequency and cost of out-of-network bills for outpatient laboratory services compared with in-network laboratory services. More
A recent study finds that medical device companies spend more than pharma on payments to physicians, but spend it in different ways. More
Better communication could help reduce inequities, but our medical infrastructure isn’t designed to take that into account More
After a year of trauma, doctors, nurses and other health workers are struggling to cope. More than half are burned out. More than 6 in 10 have struggled with worsening mental health. More
The findings echo NBC News reporting in March that overworked, understaffed pharmacists at chain drug stores say they are reaching a breaking point. More
Better regulations and reviews are needed so the FDA can ensure that consumer-facing health and medical apps are safe and effective. More
Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi writes on the struggles faced by Asian Americans working in medicine, who have endured biased comments and discrimination. More
The adoption of expensive medical technology by individual providers to compete for patients is one of the reasons that U.S. healthcare is the world’s most expensive on a per capita basis. Many experts see proton beam as a classic example of an American-style medical arms race. “There’s real harm in spending money on something that’s not better and is more expensive. That harm is a hospital not investing in something else that could improve its community or improve the health of more patients,” Shannon Brownlee, special adviser to the president of the Lown Institute, wrote in a recent blog post about proton beam therapy. More
After battling the coronavirus for more than a year, Massachusetts hospitals have shifted from managing a raging crisis to incorporating COVID-19 into their daily work. More
The Virginia hospital giant had already stopped suing patients with less than $107,000 in household income. More
Ignorance is neither neutral nor benign, especially when it cloaks evidence of harm. And when ignorance is produced and entrenched by gatekeeper medical institutions, as has been the case with obfuscation of at least 200 years of knowledge about racism and health, the damage is compounded. More
There is evidence that for-profit nursing homes and hospices are putting profits ahead of people, taking a deadly toll during the pandemic. More
Vice President Kamala Harris weighs in on Black maternal health issues ranging from bias training for doctors to extending Medicaid coverage. More
The coronavirus pandemic has provided a clear example of how quickly social economic disparities become health disparities. More
The U.S. government invested $800 million in plasma when the country was desperate for Covid-19 treatments. A year later, the program has fizzled. More
Clinicians should know the rough probability of a patient having a certain disease based on their symptoms and test results. Yet health care practitioners are not as good as you might expect at predicting patients' disease risk, a new study finds. More
Lown Institute intern Emily Acker has had more interactions with the health care system than the typical young adult. Here's how that has informed her experience as a public health advocate and researcher. More
A misguided federal program called the Unapproved Drugs Initiative, which put the FDA’s stamp of approval on old drugs, led to higher prices. It’s scrapped. So now what? More