Tuesday, April 21, 2009

News Clipping Archives

 

Maryland / Regional

Steps Retraced After D.C. Man Diagnosed With Measles (Washington Post)

Maryland among worst in disciplining physicians (Daily Record)

Nursing program at Stevenson given boost (Daily Record)

Bar savors permission to smoke (Baltimore Sun)

Hopkins in pilot study on blood transfusion complications (Baltimore Sun)

Guest Column: There are things we can all do to help save the Chesapeake Bay (Capital News)

 

National / International

Manufacturers release tons of pharmaceuticals into US water supplies  (Baltimore Sun)

Ovary removal found to raise risk of death (Baltimore Sun)

Health-Care Dialogue Alarms Obama's Allies (Washington Post)

Avian Flu Cases in Egypt Raise Alarms (New York Times)

NY pharmacies agree to translate drug instructions (Frederick News-Post)

More people live with paralysis than doctors knew (Frederick News-Post)

Mayo Clinic backs new personal health record site (Frederick News-Post)

 

Opinion

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Maryland / Regional

 

Steps Retraced After D.C. Man Diagnosed With Measles

 

By Jenna Johnson

Washington Post

Tuesday, April 22, 2009

 

Health officials said today that a D.C. man was diagnosed with measles late last week, prompting authorities to retrace the his steps throughout the area to identify anyone else who may have exposed to the highly infectious disease and prevent it from spreading further.

 

This is the fifth case of measles in the region this year, but it is not related to the other cases. Still, the rare outbreak has prompted health officials in the District, Virginia and Maryland to focus on the small pockets of unimmunized individuals: Mostly, babies who have not yet been vaccinated and people who were born outside the U.S.

 

The District man contracted the virus during a three-week trip to India but did not show symptoms until after he returned home, said D.C. Department of Health Director Pierre Vigilance. Doctors believe the man's wife also has measles but they are still awaiting test results. Vigilance said the man had never been immunized, but wouldn't comment on his citizenship or why he had not been immunized.

 

"The reasons don't matter to us," Vigilance said at a news conference this afternoon. "We just want to contain this."

 

By the time the man realized he had measles and sought medical attention, he had already visited eight places in the District, Northern Virginia and Montgomery County. County health officials have released a list of those places and urge any unimmunized people who visited those locations during a given time frame to contact their local health department. [See below.]

 

Usually the virus causes a red skin rash, high fevers and watery eyes, and lasts for about a week. It can take as long as 21 days after exposure for the first symptoms to appear. While most people recover within a week, measles can lead to pneumonia and, in rare cases, can be fatal. Anyone who thinks they might have measles is encouraged to call ahead before arriving at a doctors office or hospital to avoid spreading the virus to other patients.

 

Measles cases have nearly disappeared in the United States because a vaccination is required of all children attending public schools or foreign-born individuals who become U.S. citizens. Often measles outbreaks begin when an unimmunized person visits another country where measles is still prevalent and then returns to the U.S. The virus is most commonly spread through sneezing and coughing, and can remain in the air or on surfaces for two hours.

 

The other four measles cases were in Montgomery County. In February, a man contracted measles while traveling abroad and then infected a co-worker. That employee then went to Shady Grove Adventist Hospital in March, where he infected an 8-month old baby.

 

A fourth man was diagnosed with measles earlier this month, but his case is not related to the earlier ones. Officials have contacted people he may have come into contact with at Shady Grove's emergency room on the evenings of April 5 and 6, and the hospital's short-stay unit during most of the day April 7. They also contacted members of the man's church. So far, no additional cases have surfaced but people could still show signs as late as April 29, said Ulder Tillman, Montgomery County's health officer.

 

Given the nature of the outbreaks, Fran Phillips, Maryland's deputy secretary for public health services, said officials are looking into using a portion of the $3.8 million in stimulus money the state received for immunization programs to target adults.

 

"One of the difficulties we have is adults who were born in countries without an immunization mandate who can infect people who have not been immunized before,'' she said. "We are discovering that with international travel and with foreign born people living in Maryland there are communities of unimmunized people living in our midst.''

 

Here is a list of times and places where there was exposure to measles. Anyone who thinks they were exposed to the virus and has not been immunized or already had measles, should contact authorities at the following numbers:

 

In Arlington County, call (800) 533-4148; Montgomery County, (240) 777-4200; D.C., 311 or (202) 737-4404.

 

Saturday, April 4

* Used book fair at Stone Ridge School in Bethesda, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

 

* Vegetable Garden restaurant on Rockville Pike in Rockville, 12 to 3 p.m.

 

* Jiffy Lube on Nicholson Lane in Rockville, 1 to 3:30 p.m.

 

* Potbelly restaurant on 3rd Street SW near the Federal Center Metro station, 3:30 to 7 p.m.

 

Sunday, April 5

* Saigon Saigon restaurant in Pentagon Row in Arlington, 7 p.m. to 11 p.m.

 

* Harris Teeter grocery store in Pentagon Row in Arlington, 9 p.m. to 11:30 p.m.

 

Wednesday, April 8

* Safeway grocery store on M Street SW, 4 to 6:30 p.m.

 

Friday, April 10

* Safeway grocery store on M Street SW, 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.

 

Staff writer Lori Aratani contributed to this report.

 

Copyright 2009 Washington Post.

 

Maryland among worst in disciplining physicians

 

Associated Press

Daily Record

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

WASHINGTON - Maryland is among the worst states in the country in disciplining physicians, a study by a consumer watchdog group found, while Washington is one of the most improved jurisdictions.

 

Public Citizen's annual ranking of state medical boards found that the rate of disciplinary action for doctors last year was 21.5 percent lower than in 2004. That's 2.92 serious discipline actions per 1,000 doctors in 2008 compared with 3.72 actions per 1,000 in 2004.

 

Actions can include license revocations, surrenders, suspensions and probations or restrictions.

 

"The overall national downward trend of serious disciplinary actions against physicians is troubling because it indicates many states are not living up to their obligations to protect patients from bad doctors," said Sidney Wolfe, a physician and director of Public Citizen's health research group.

 

Maryland is ranked 45th. It has been among the worst 10 states for the past six rankings, Wolfe said. Virginia is ranked 28th. Washington is among the five most improved. It was ranked 42nd in 2003 and 17th in 2008.

 

"The progress in these states is commendable because the medical boards have figured out ways ... to improve the protection for patients from doctors who need to be disciplined but, in the past, were disciplined much less rigorously," Wolfe said.

 

The Washington Post found in 2005 that the D.C. medical board rarely punished doctors. This was true even after they were disciplined in Maryland and Virginia for questionable medical care, criminal wrongdoing or substance abuse problems.

 

The Post's report prompted District officials to allocate more funding for staff and improved technology.

 

"We are one of the most improved boards in the country," said Feseha Woldu, senior deputy director of the District's Health Regulation and Licensing Administration.

 

The report ranks Alaska first in disciplining doctors.

 

Irving Pinder, executive director of the Maryland Board of Physicians, called the findings flawed.

 

"I've always argued that Public Citizen's statistics are very misleading because ... they assume the pool of doctors is the same in every state," Pinder said. "Maryland has some of the best doctors ... in the country. If you need to go in for major surgery, would you want to be in Alaska or Maryland?"

 

Copyright 2009 Daily Record.

 

Nursing program at Stevenson given boost

 

By Staff and Wire Reports

Daily Record

Monday, April 20, 2009

 

Stevenson University announced that its nursing program has been accredited by the Board of Commissioners for the National League for Nursing Accrediting Commission.

 

Stevenson received eight years of continuing accreditation, the maximum number of years NLNAC can award, and is scheduled for the next evaluation in the fall of 2016.

 

Stevenson graduates approximately 120 students from its nursing programs each year. The university offers a traditional bachelor's degree in nursing for undergraduates, as well as an accelerated program of study for registered nurses wishing to earn a bachelor's degree.

 

Copyright 2009 Daily Record.

 

Bar savors permission to smoke

Waivers let some taverns dodge statewide ban

 

By Joe Burris

Baltimore Sun

Monday, April 20, 2009

 

They've become a rarity in Maryland bars, but on Tuesday afternoon they filled the Crossroads Inn in Keymar: smokers, lighting up and puffing away without shame or trepidation.

 

What's more, seated or standing alongside were nonsmokers, enjoying themselves without fanning away the fumes or complaining about the hazards of secondhand smoke.

 

"It doesn't bother me," said Robert Howard. The Taneytown resident surveyed the place to distinguish smokers and nonsmokers before spotting regular patron James Brown of Keysville at the other end of the bar.

 

"Hey Jim, do you smoke?" Howard asked.

 

"Like a train," Brown replied, just before lighting up.

 

Such gatherings are common at the Crossroads. The Carroll County bar is one of 11 places in Maryland that have been granted a temporary waiver from the state's Clean Indoor Air Act of 2007, which prohibits smoking in virtually all indoor public places.

 

To receive a waiver, an establishment must show a 15 percent decrease in food and beverage sales over a two-month period compared with the same period during the previous two years. The waivers expire Jan. 31, 2011.

 

Crossroads owner Tim Brandenburg said business at the bar dropped 60 percent after the ban took effect, as many of his customers opted for smoking bars just over the Pennsylvania border.

 

With the waiver, business has returned to normal levels, he said. The Crossroads hops with smokers and nonsmokers alike - loud banter, lively music and the cracking sound of billiards. And though Brandenburg has a separate room for nonsmokers, many choose to hang out with the smoking crowd instead.

 

In fact, the only day that the bar isn't bustling is on Mondays, when the Crossroads must comply with the smoking ban. The one-day prohibition was enacted at the start of the year, part of the state's plan to phase out smoking at places with waivers. Next year, such venues must designate two or three nonsmoking days.

 

Brandenburg cringes at the thought of losing another smoking day, and on Mondays he gets a glimpse of what might become of his bar when the waiver expires.

 

Last Monday afternoon, the Crossroads was as quiet as a morgue. At a time when many people usually pour in after work, only three patrons were present.

 

On a smoking day, Brandenburg says, his bar can ring up as much as $1,000 in sales. On Monday, receipts totaled $138.

 

"Without the smoking, it's a ghost town here," said Brandenburg, a former drywall contractor who purchased the Crossroads five years ago. "When it comes time to take smoking out of here completely, I'm out of business."

 

That's because Brandenburg's tavern is a blue-collar, everybody-knows-your-name gathering place where smoking is part of the ambience. Smokers who frequent the Crossroads say bars and smoking are intertwined, while the nonsmokers say they don't mind the fumes and enjoy the bar scene.

 

Both assert that prohibiting people from lighting up in a bar is unreasonable.

 

"If they cut down smoking here completely, I wouldn't come in at all," Brown said. "I think they should have bars that are nonsmoking and bars that are smoking. I can see both sides of it. I can see the health issues. But on the other hand, if you don't want to be around that element ... they should have bars for nonsmokers."

 

Howard says he welcomes the ban in office buildings and workplaces, but not in bars. In a previous job as an office manager for Giant Food, he recalled going into a break room to eat. "I would think, 'This is gross.'

 

"But in a bar? In a bar, people should be allowed to smoke. I think [the ban] is terrible. For small-business owners, it's affected them in an adverse way."

 

Last year, Brandenburg posted a sign chiding the governor for the ban: "Impeach O'Malley. No Smoking, No Business."

 

After receiving a waiver, Brandenburg replaced the sign with huge placards: "This is a Smoking Bar." Situated at the corner of routes 77 and 194, the Crossroads draws motorists from as far away as the Washington area. Brandenburg says they stop for a smoke and a drink or a bite to eat en route to Western Maryland or Pennsylvania.

 

When the Crossroads was initially hit hard by the ban, some patrons organized a fundraiser that took in $1,500 to help keep Brandenburg's business afloat. He said many of them aren't aware that the Crossroads must go smokeless in less than two years.

 

"After smoking is done in here, the way I look at it is, we're all done," Brandenburg said.

 

That would make public smoking options more scarce. The Crossroads is one of only three public establishments in the region with a waiver. The other two are in Baltimore: the Ropewalk Tavern, a Federal Hill bar where smoking is allowed in a room on the third floor; and the Havana Club, a downtown cigar bar and nightclub where smoking is allowed throughout the premises.

 

Dr. Clifford Mitchell, director of the state environmental health coordination program, said three applications for waivers are pending, and three venues that applied have been denied.

 

Some establishments, Mitchell said, are exempt from the ban. Tobacco retailers can permit smoking on their premises, and hotels can offer smoking rooms.

 

"The impressive thing about this is, overwhelmingly, people have not only complied with the act but they have complied without a great deal of difficulty," Mitchell said. "In some cases people have reported a decline in business, but the business comes back. Right now, one of the great challenges to businesses is the economy, not the Clean Air Act."

 

Mitchell said local health officials are responsible for enforcing the ban. In Carroll County, Health Officer Larry Leitch said, the ban has been met with mixed reactions. Some restaurant patrons have told him that the air in the places they frequent has never been cleaner. Smokers, meanwhile, complain that their rights have been trampled upon.

 

Leitch has cited two restaurants for violating the ban, issuing written reprimands for the first-time offenses. A second violation would bring a $100 fine, followed by $500 and $1,000 penalties for third and fourth offenses.

 

It will be up to Leitch to decide whether the Crossroads must add one or two more nonsmoking days in 2010.

 

"I'll have to address that when the time comes up to make the next decision," Leitch said. "The thing that [Brandenburg] has to realize is that, as of Feb. 1, 2011, he has to be totally smoke-free."

 

Brandenburg is seeking legal representation to see if he has recourse though the courts. He also hopes to draw up a petition to persuade the legislature to exempt bars from the ban altogether.

 

"I just wish they would reconsider the bars," he said. "For restaurants, it's OK. Don't bring smoking back into the restaurants. But apparently the nonsmokers don't have any respect for the smokers anymore. They're going to try to take away everything possible away from us."

 

Buying time

The state considers applications for temporary waivers from the smoking ban for establishments that show a 15 percent decrease in food and beverage sales over a two-month period compared with the same period during the previous two years. The waivers expire Jan. 31, 2011.

 

Applications granted: 11

Denied: 3

Pending: 3

 

Establishments that received waivers:

 

Allegany County

 

The Wilderness Tavern

 

Shooters Bar & Grill

 

Smitty's

 

Cozy Inn

 

Baltimore

 

Ropewalk Tavern

 

Havana Club

 

Carroll County

 

Crossroads Inn

 

Charles County

 

Murphy's Pub

 

VFW Post 1800

 

VFW Post 8810

 

Frederick County

 

Improved Order of Red Men of Maryland, 19 Chippewa Tribe

 

Establishments that were denied:

 

The Poncabird Pub, Baltimore

 

CJ's Tavern, Kent County

 

Loyal Order of the Moose Chapter 495, St. Mary's County

 

Source: Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene

 

Copyright 2009 Baltimore Sun.

 

Hopkins in pilot study on blood transfusion complications

U.S. trails other countries in tracking incidence of dangerous reactions

 

By Robert Little

Baltimore Sun

Monday, April 20, 2009

 

The Johns Hopkins Hospital and a handful of other medical centers around the country are set this week to begin collectively monitoring and tracking dangerous reactions to blood transfusions, the first piece of a nationwide "biovigilance" program that is arriving in the United States years later than in most other developed nations.

 

The ultimate goal of the project, a collaboration between federal agencies and private medical associations, is to reduce the number of infections, allergic reactions, clerical errors and other complications related to blood transfusions. Such complications resulted in at least 46 deaths in the U.S. last year.

 

But physicians also call it a long overdue effort to better understand the risks of a common medical practice - more than 30 million blood products are transfused in the United States each year - that has scarcely been evaluated on a large scale.

 

The monitoring system also comes as civilian hospitals have increased use of plasma - among the riskiest blood components - to treat injured patients, based on treatments used by military doctors in Iraq.

 

"We've sort of fallen behind efforts in the rest of the world," said Dr. Paul Ness, director of transfusion medicine at Hopkins, one of nine institutions participating in a pilot study that organizers hope to implement nationwide in the fall.

 

"We'd like to be able to educate recipients about potential risks, but what, really, is the incidence of these reactions? We don't know," Ness said.

 

Blood transfusions are fairly routine treatments for cancer patients, trauma victims, surgery patients and other hospital patients. At Hopkins, Ness said, doctors transfuse roughly 45,000 units of the most common blood component each year.

 

Serious complications are rare. The number of annual deaths attributed to transfusion reactions nationwide declined to 46 last year, from 52 the year before and 63 in 2006.

 

But deaths, which are required to be reported to the Food and Drug Administration, are only one measurement of safety, said Dr. Matthew Kuehnert, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Office of Blood, Organ and Other Tissue Safety. Things like allergic reactions or treatable infections can have a huge effect on the cost and the outcome of a patient's medical treatment, Kuehnert said, yet doctors know very little about the scope or the frequency of such reactions because there is no nationwide monitoring program.

 

"People see blood as being safe, and it is - very safe," said Kuehnert, whose agency is managing the data collection effort. "But there are still reactions, and some of them can be prevented."

 

The monitoring program, which is voluntary, asks hospital blood banks to report information about bad reactions or other incidents to a central databank. Most hospitals record such information anyway, but agreement on a universal set of definitions and reporting requirements eluded the program's organizers for more than three years. A main goal of the pilot program is to determine how much work the program will require.

 

Transfusion specialists have talked for decades about creating a national monitoring program, but because of the United States' fractionated health care system - with no central, regulated institution responsible for blood collection and distribution - little has been done. Countries with nationalized or heavily regulated health systems acted first, and their findings have already led to changes in transfusion practices worldwide.

 

The British program, for instance, determined after several years of data collection that a rare but deadly reaction called Transfusion Related Acute Lung Injury was linked to plasma from female donors who had once been pregnant. Many of the world's blood banks subsequently shifted to male-only plasma, and cases of TRALI declined.

 

Organizers say an American system could have a considerable impact on global practice, if only because of its potentially massive size. So far roughly 15 percent of the country's hospitals have agreed to participate when the program is rolled out nationwide. And according to Barbee Whitaker, director of data and special programs for the American Association of Blood Banks, the program would still be the largest in the world if 10 percent signed up .

 

Debates about transfusion risks are common among civilian blood bankers and trauma specialists today, in light of a controversial but potentially groundbreaking practice that emerged from combat hospitals in Iraq.

 

Military doctors who treated patients in Iraq and studied data from the war zone have promoted a fourfold increase in the standard dose of transfused plasma for trauma patients. Military leaders consider it the most significant medical lesson of the war.

 

The military practice, widely adopted among civilian hospitals, is thought by some to prevent many trauma-related complications before they develop. But plasma has also been implicated in TRALI and other complications.

 

The monitoring program can't determine whether a particular component or transfusion strategy is effective, Ness said, but it can help establish the relative risks of plasma and other components and track the frequency of complications around the United States.

 

The program will also track less serious concerns, such as minor allergic reactions or the use of expired blood. Individual hospitals could use the data to identify weaknesses and measure themselves against a national standard, Kuehnert said.

 

"All of these events are pretty rare in any one hospital, so it's hard for someone to make improvements based on something they might only see happen once," said Whitaker, the blood bank official. "But once we know what's there, we can talk about how we prevent it from happening again."

 

Copyright 2009 Baltimore Sun.

 

Guest Column: There are things we can all do to help save the Chesapeake Bay

 

By Joanna Conti

Capital News

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

The Chesapeake needs you! Every summer, our crabs, fish and oysters face a terrible menace to their survival - as much as 40-plus percent of the Chesapeake Bay becomes a dead zone with insufficient oxygen for them to breathe. Not surprisingly, the bay's marine life is dying off.

 

In the last 17 years, the population of blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay has plummeted 67 percent. Oysters, which used to be the bay's most profitable commercial fishery, have declined to 1 percent of the levels seen in the 1950s and 1960s. Fish kills of 100,000 or more fish at a time regularly occur each summer.

 

Governmental plans to restore the bay were first announced with great fanfare 25 years ago. Almost $6 billion in spending later, key water quality measures such as the level of dissolved oxygen in the water have continued to decline despite the achievement of significant reductions in the amount of pollution reaching the bay. Every year another dismal report finds the bay on life support.

 

What is it going to take?

 

In fact, we have been successful reducing pollution from some sources. There have been fairly impressive decreases in the amount of pollution entering the bay from both wastewater treatment facilities and from agricultural lands since 1985. However, pollution that enters the bay from two other sources - air pollution and urban/suburban runoff - has not been going down significantly. In fact, the pollution washing off our yards, streets and parking lots has actually increased since 1985 and is offsetting the progress made in other areas.

 

Forty percent of the pollution killing the bay comes from urban/suburban runoff and from air pollution. We can complain all we want about how government isn't doing its job, how the EPA inflated progress, etc. But the fact is that the government can't do all that much more to reduce air pollution or the pollution running off roads, parking lots and yards. Only you and I can.

 

Every single one of us is doing things that pollute the bay and very few of us are taking steps to reduce our impact. Fortunately, there are a lot of things we can do that will make a difference:

 

Reducing pollution from your yard or neighborhood:

 

Reduce or eliminate lawn fertilizer use

 

Upgrade your septic system

 

Pick up dog poop and other animal waste

 

Install water barrels

 

Build a rain garden

 

Grow oysters under your pier

 

Reduce air pollution:

 

Plant trees

 

Drive a fuel-efficient car

 

Drive fewer miles

 

Reduce your energy consumption

 

Since air pollution and urban/suburban runoff are responsible for 40 percent of the nitrogen killing the bay, restoring the bay is going to require all of us to take action to reduce the pollution we personally contribute. Things like using less fertilizer, planting trees and picking up dog poop yield surprisingly large results for a small amount of effort.

 

Because what gets measured gets done, Make Maryland Great is launching the Bay Hero program, where each of us can set personal pollution reduction goals and then track exactly how many pounds of pollution are eliminated as a result of our efforts. Folks who become Bay Heroes also can recruit others to join with them on group projects such as building a rain garden around their church's parking lot. Our goal is to build a community of people working together to reduce the amount of nonpoint source pollution we personally contribute to the bay and to encourage others to take action.

 

Ready to do your part to save the Chesapeake Bay? Become a Bay Hero at www.bayhero.com. It's way past time to restore our beautiful bay.

 

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The writer is president of Make Maryland Great (www.makemarylandgreat.com), a group dedicated to solving some of the most challenging problems facing Maryland.

 

Copyright 2009 Capital News.

 

National / International

 

Manufacturers release tons of pharmaceuticals into US water supplies

 

Associated Press

Jeff Donn, Justin Pritchard, and Martha Mendoza

Baltimore Sun

Monday, April 20, 2009

 

U.S. manufacturers, including major drugmakers, have legally released at least 271 million pounds of pharmaceuticals into waterways that often provide drinking water — contamination the federal government has consistently overlooked, according to an Associated Press investigation.

 

Hundreds of active pharmaceutical ingredients are used in a variety of manufacturing, including drugmaking: For example, lithium is used to make ceramics and treat bipolar disorder; nitroglycerin is a heart drug and also used in explosives; copper shows up in everything from pipes to contraceptives.

 

Federal and industry officials say they don't know the extent to which pharmaceuticals are released by U.S. manufacturers because no one tracks them — as drugs. But a close analysis of 20 years of federal records found that, in fact, the government unintentionally keeps data on a few, allowing a glimpse of the pharmaceuticals coming from factories.

 

As part of its ongoing PharmaWater investigation about trace concentrations of pharmaceuticals in drinking water, AP identified 22 compounds that show up on two lists: the EPA monitors them as industrial chemicals that are released into rivers, lakes and other bodies of water under federal pollution laws, while the Food and Drug Administration classifies them as active pharmaceutical ingredients.

 

The data don't show precisely how much of the 271 million pounds comes from drugmakers versus other manufacturers; also, the figure is a massive undercount because of the limited federal government tracking.

 

To date, drugmakers have dismissed the suggestion that their manufacturing contributes significantly to what's being found in water. Federal drug and water regulators agree.

 

But some researchers say the lack of required testing amounts to a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy about whether drugmakers are contributing to water pollution.

 

"It doesn't pass the straight-face test to say pharmaceutical manufacturers are not emitting any of the compounds they're creating," said Kyla Bennett, who spent 10 years as an EPA enforcement officer before becoming an ecologist and environmental attorney.

 

Pilot studies in the U.S. and abroad are now confirming those doubts.

 

Last year, the AP reported that trace amounts of a wide range of pharmaceuticals — including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones — have been found in American drinking water supplies. Including recent findings in Dallas, Cleveland and Maryland's Prince George's and Montgomery counties, pharmaceuticals have been detected in the drinking water of at least 51 million Americans.

 

Most cities and water providers still do not test. Some scientists say that wherever researchers look, they will find pharma-tainted water.

 

Consumers are considered the biggest contributors to the contamination. We consume drugs, then excrete what our bodies don't absorb. Other times, we flush unused drugs down toilets. The AP also found that an estimated 250 million pounds of pharmaceuticals and contaminated packaging are thrown away each year by hospitals and long-term care facilities.

 

Researchers have found that even extremely diluted concentrations of drugs harm fish, frogs and other aquatic species. Also, researchers report that human cells fail to grow normally in the laboratory when exposed to trace concentrations of certain drugs. Some scientists say they are increasingly concerned that the consumption of combinations of many drugs, even in small amounts, could harm humans over decades.

 

Utilities say the water is safe. Scientists, doctors and the EPA say there are no confirmed human risks associated with consuming minute concentrations of drugs. But those experts also agree that dangers cannot be ruled out, especially given the emerging research.

___

 

Two common industrial chemicals that are also pharmaceuticals — the antiseptics phenol and hydrogen peroxide — account for 92 percent of the 271 million pounds identified as coming from drugmakers and other manufacturers. Both can be toxic and both are considered to be ubiquitous in the environment.

 

However, the list of 22 includes other troubling releases of chemicals that can be used to make drugs and other products: 8 million pounds of the skin bleaching cream hydroquinone, 3 million pounds of nicotine compounds that can be used in quit-smoking patches, 10,000 pounds of the antibiotic tetracycline hydrochloride. Others include treatments for head lice and worms.

 

Residues are often released into the environment when manufacturing equipment is cleaned.

 

A small fraction of pharmaceuticals also leach out of landfills where they are dumped. Pharmaceuticals released onto land include the chemo agent fluorouracil, the epilepsy medicine phenytoin and the sedative pentobarbital sodium. The overall amount may be considerable, given the volume of what has been buried — 572 million pounds of the 22 monitored drugs since 1988.

 

In one case, government data shows that in Columbus, Ohio, pharmaceutical maker Boehringer Ingelheim Roxane Inc. discharged an estimated 2,285 pounds of lithium carbonate — which is considered slightly toxic to aquatic invertebrates and freshwater fish — to a local wastewater treatment plant between 1995 and 2006. Company spokeswoman Marybeth C. McGuire said the pharmaceutical plant, which uses lithium to make drugs for bipolar disorder, has violated no laws or regulations. McGuire said all the lithium discharged, an annual average of 190 pounds, was lost when residues stuck to mixing equipment were washed down the drain.

___

 

Pharmaceutical company officials point out that active ingredients represent profits, so there's a huge incentive not to let any escape. They also say extremely strict manufacturing regulations — albeit aimed at other chemicals — help prevent leakage, and that whatever traces may get away are handled by onsite wastewater treatment.

 

"Manufacturers have to be in compliance with all relevant environmental laws," said Alan Goldhammer, a scientist and vice president at the industry trade group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.

 

Goldhammer conceded some drug residues could be released in wastewater, but stressed "it would not cause any environmental issues because it was not a toxic substance at the level that it was being released at."

 

Several big drugmakers were asked this simple question: Have you tested wastewater from your plants to find out whether any active pharmaceuticals are escaping, and if so what have you found?

 

No drugmaker answered directly.

 

"Based on research that we have reviewed from the past 20 years, pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities are not a significant source of pharmaceuticals that contribute to environmental risk," GlaxoSmithKline said in a statement.

 

AstraZeneca spokeswoman Kate Klemas said the company's manufacturing processes "are designed to avoid, or otherwise minimize the loss of product to the environment" and thus "ensure that any residual losses of pharmaceuticals to the environment that do occur are at levels that would be unlikely to pose a threat to human health or the environment."

 

One major manufacturer, Pfizer Inc., acknowledged that it tested some of its wastewater — but outside the United States.

 

The company's director of hazard communication and environmental toxicology, Frank Mastrocco, said Pfizer has sampled effluent from some of its foreign drug factories. Without disclosing details, he said the results left Pfizer "confident that the current controls and processes in place at these facilities are adequately protective of human health and the environment."

 

It's not just the industry that isn't testing.

 

FDA spokesman Christopher Kelly noted that his agency is not responsible for what comes out on the waste end of drug factories. At the EPA, acting assistant administrator for water Mike Shapiro — whose agency's Web site says pharmaceutical releases from manufacturing are "well defined and controlled" — did not mention factories as a source of pharmaceutical pollution when asked by the AP how drugs get into drinking water.

 

"Pharmaceuticals get into water in many ways," he said in a written statement. "It's commonly believed the majority come from human and animal excretion. A portion also comes from flushing unused drugs down the toilet or drain; a practice EPA generally discourages."

 

His position echoes that of a line of federal drug and water regulators as well as drugmakers, who concluded in the 1990s — before highly sensitive tests now used had been developed — that manufacturing is not a meaningful source of pharmaceuticals in the environment.

 

Pharmaceutical makers typically are excused from having to submit an environmental review for new products, and the FDA has never rejected a drug application based on potential environmental impact. Also at play are pressures not to delay potentially lifesaving drugs. What's more, because the EPA hasn't concluded at what level, if any, pharmaceuticals are bad for the environment or harmful to people, drugmakers almost never have to report the release of pharmaceuticals they produce.

 

"The government could get a national snapshot of the water if they chose to," said Jennifer Sass, a senior scientist for the Natural Resources Defense Council, "and it seems logical that we would want to find out what's coming out of these plants."

 

Ajit Ghorpade, an environmental engineer who worked for several major pharmaceutical companies before his current job helping run a wastewater treatment plant, said drugmakers have no impetus to take measurements that the government doesn't require.

 

"Obviously nobody wants to spend the time or their dime to prove this," he said. "It's like asking me why I don't drive a hybrid car? Why should I? It's not required."

__

 

After contacting the nation's leading drugmakers and filing public records requests, the AP found two federal agencies that have tested.

 

Both the EPA and the U.S. Geological Survey have studies under way comparing sewage at treatment plants that receive wastewater from drugmaking factories against sewage at treatment plants that do not.

 

Preliminary USGS results, slated for publication later this year, show that treated wastewater from sewage plants serving drug factories had significantly more medicine residues. Data from the EPA study show a disproportionate concentration in wastewater of an antibiotic that a major Michigan factory was producing at the time the samples were taken.

 

Meanwhile, other researchers recorded concentrations of codeine in the southern reaches of the Delaware River that were at least 10 times higher than the rest of the river.

 

The scientists from the Delaware River Basin Commission won't have to look far when they try to track down potential sources later this year. One mile from the sampling site, just off shore of Pennsville, N.J., there's a pipe that spits out treated wastewater from a municipal plant. The plant accepts sewage from a pharmaceutical factory owned by Siegfried Ltd. The factory makes codeine.

 

"We have implemented programs to not only reduce the volume of waste materials generated but to minimize the amount of pharmaceutical ingredients in the water," said Siegfried spokeswoman Rita van Eck.

 

Another codeine plant, run by Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Noramco Inc., is about seven miles away. A Noramco spokesman acknowledged that the Wilmington, Del., factory had voluntarily tested its wastewater and found codeine in trace concentrations thousands of times greater than what was found in the Delaware River. "The amounts of codeine we measured in the wastewater, prior to releasing it to the City of Wilmington, are not considered to be hazardous to the environment," said a company spokesman.

 

In another instance, equipment-cleaning water sent down the drain of an Upsher-Smith Laboratories, Inc. factory in Denver consistently contains traces of warfarin, a blood thinner, according to results obtained under a public records act request. Officials at the company and the Denver Metro Wastewater Reclamation District said they believe the concentrations are safe.

 

Warfarin, which also is a common rat poison and pesticide, is so effective at inhibiting growth of aquatic plants and animals it's actually deliberately introduced to clean plants and tiny aquatic animals from ballast water of ships.

 

"With regard to wastewater management we are subject to a variety of federal, state and local regulation and oversight," said Joel Green, Upsher-Smith's vice president and general counsel. "And we work hard to maintain systems to promote compliance."

 

Baylor University professor Bryan Brooks, who has published more than a dozen studies related to pharmaceuticals in the environment, said assurances that drugmakers run clean shops are not enough.

 

"I have no reason to believe them or not believe them," he said. "We don't have peer-reviewed studies to support or not support their claims."

 

Associated Press Writer Don Mitchell in Denver contributed to this report.

 

The AP National Investigative Team can be reached at investigate (at) ap.org

 

Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

 

Ovary removal found to raise risk of death

Study addresses outcome of usual practice in hysterectomy

 

Tribune Newspapers

By Deborah L. Shelton

Baltimore Sun

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

Women who have healthy ovaries removed when they have a hysterectomy face a higher risk of death, including from coronary heart disease and lung cancer, than those who keep their ovaries, new research shows.

 

The finding, from a study published in the May issue of the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology, challenges conventional wisdom that removing ovaries along with the uterus offers the best chance for long-term survival.

 

Doctors have recommended for decades that women who get a hysterectomy consider having both ovaries removed - a surgical procedure called a bilateral oophorectomy - to prevent ovarian cancer later in life.

 

Ovarian cancer is rare, accounting for about 3 percent of all cancers and 1 percent of cancer deaths in women. But it is difficult to detect and treat, so many women opt to have their ovaries taken out.

 

Of the 600,000 women who get a hysterectomy in the United States each year, about 300,000 also have their ovaries removed - about 50 percent of those between the ages 40 and 44 and 78 percent of those between the ages of 45 and 64.

 

But the study authors said routine removal is often not a good choice. Though the risk of ovarian and breast cancer declined after ovary removal, women's risk of heart disease and stroke nearly doubled, and risk of death overall rose by 40 percent.

 

"For the last 35 years, most doctors have been routinely advising women undergoing hysterectomy to have their ovaries removed to prevent ovarian cancer," said lead author Dr. William H. Parker, who is on the adjunct faculty at the John Wayne Cancer Institute at St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica, Calif. "We believe that such an automatic recommendation is no longer warranted."

 

Removing the ovaries did not appear to provide an overall survival benefit for any age group of women, in large part because heart disease, stroke and lung cancer are all far more common than ovarian cancer.

 

Copyright 2009 Baltimore Sun.

 

Health-Care Dialogue Alarms Obama's Allies

 

By Ceci Connolly

Washington Post

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

As Congress returns to begin an intense debate over reshaping the nation's $2.2 trillion health-care system, prominent left-leaning organizations and liberal House members are issuing a warning to their Democratic allies: Don't cave on us.

 

The early skirmishing -- essentially amounting to friendly fire -- is perhaps the clearest indication yet of the uphill battle President Obama faces in delivering on his promise to make affordable, high-quality care available to every American.

 

Disputes over whether to create a new government-sponsored insurance program to compete with private companies shine a light on the intraparty fissures that may prove more problematic than any partisan brawl.

 

More than 70 House Democrats recently warned party leaders that they will not support a broad health reform bill that does not offer consumers a government-sponsored policy, and two unions withdrew from a high-profile health coalition because it would not endorse a public plan.

 

"It's way too early" to abandon what it considers a central plank in health reform, said Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union. He said the organization pulled out of the bipartisan Health Reform Dialogue because it feared its friends in the coalition were sacrificing core principles too soon. "You don't make compromises with your allies."

 

Last week, two top administration officials suggested that Obama is open to compromise on the public plan, comments that set off alarm bells in some corners of his party.

 

"That's what got the left nervous. I took that as a signal to Senator Grassley" that Obama is willing to negotiate around an issue Grassley has vehemently opposed, said Len Nichols, health policy director at the New America Foundation, a nonprofit think tank, referring to Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa). "It was the first time the president indicated he could live without it."

 

During last year's campaign, Obama proposed offering a government-sponsored plan as a low-cost alternative for Americans who are having trouble purchasing insurance in the private market. Proponents say it would reduce costs because it would not need to make a profit or pay large executive salaries.

 

Many Republicans and industry executives say that any program modeled after Medicare -- with its power to set prices -- would have an unfair advantage over private-sector competitors and eventually force some companies out of business.

 

"The sacred cow on the left and the right is the public plan," said former senator Thomas A. Daschle, who was Obama's first choice to oversee the reform effort.

 

In comments last week, Nancy-Ann DeParle, head of the White House Office of Health Reform, said the ultimate solution may rest in how a public plan is defined.

 

"There are different breeds of public plans that could be part of this," she said, explaining that the Medicare model is not the only approach.

 

Yesterday, a spokeswoman clarified that Obama has not taken the idea off the table but is willing to consider any proposal that meets his broad goals. "The administration is open to all ideas for achieving those goals," Linda Douglass said.

 

To date, the health reform debate has been cordial, with a wide spectrum of interests talking up a willingness to compromise. The amiable tone stands in marked contrast to the vitriol of 1993 that quickly buried a reform effort by the Clintons.

 

But that amiable tone is precisely what troubles liberal advocacy groups such as Consumer Watchdog.

 

The California-based nonprofit, in unusually harsh rhetoric, is accusing the Obama administration and congressional Democrats of negotiating a deal with industry lobbyists at the expense of average Americans.

 

"This process has gotten away from the public because it is being carried out behind closed doors with lobbyists in the room but no consumer advocates," said Jamie Court, the group's president. "We've got to make our views known before we are presented with a fait accompli."

 

Court complained about efforts by top Senate Democrats to negotiate in private the broad outlines of what could become a comprehensive agreement. Over many months, Sens. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.) have convened brainstorming sessions with lobbyists representing doctors, hospitals, insurers, drugmakers, the American Cancer Society, the seniors lobby AARP and others. The two chairmen reiterated yesterday that they plan to develop a single bill.

 

The formal legislative process will start today, when Baucus convenes the first meeting of the Senate Finance Committee.

 

But in a letter to Kennedy, Court chastised the longtime lawmaker for compromising on health legislation in the past and warned Kennedy against succumbing again to the "for-profit, waste-enhancing" private insurance industry.

 

"Don't let the institution of the United States Senate use your name and credibility for something that goes against the principles you fought for your entire life," it said.

 

Kennedy spokesman Anthony Coley said the senator "believes that Americans should have the option of buying a public insurance plan if they believe that's the best choice for their families."

 

Families USA has also been involved in the private talks.

 

"The meetings taking place on the Hill involve numerous consumer organizations," said Ron Pollack, vice president of the pro-reform liberal group. "We've had meetings that involved over 100 consumer organizations, providing them with a briefing and enabling their input."

 

Douglass disputed suggestions of a rift in the party. "The Democrats are extraordinarily unified this time around," she said.

 

Yet even administration allies acknowledged tensions over the public plan option.

 

"This issue has become so vituperative, a serious conversation about how to structure a public plan has gotten secondary attention," Pollack said.

 

Nichols, who has proposed creating a semi-public option that would have publicly appointed managers but no rate-setting authority, said the disagreement signals a new phase in the overall debate. As he put it: "We've gotten past the kumbaya phase."

 

Copyright 2009 Washington Post.

 

Avian Flu Cases in Egypt Raise Alarms

 

By Donald G. McNeil Jr.

New York Times

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

An unusual pattern of avian flu cases in Egypt — almost all are in toddlers, all of whom have survived — has led some flu-tracking Web sites to speculate that dozens of silent cases are circulating there.

 

That would be an alarming development, but other experts, including those at the World Health Organization, say such fears are exaggerated. Although thousands of Egyptians have rushed their children to hospitals this flu season, there is no evidence yet of asymptomatic avian flu cases or any significant mutation in the H5N1 virus.

 

“Right now, it’s all hot air,” said Dr. Robert G. Webster, a flu expert at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis. “I hope to hell it’s not happening, because it would mean the virus is adapting to humans. But there’s not a shred of data.”

 

Bird flu has faded from world headlines because it has not caused a pandemic. But the disease is still circulating in poultry in Egypt, Indonesia, China, Vietnam and along the India-Bangladesh border. It has mutated into at least 10 strains and occasionally infects humans.

 

An April 8 Reuters article from Cairo quoted a visiting W.H.O. expert saying his agency feared “something strange happening in Egypt” and would help the government test the blood of healthy people for antibodies this summer.

 

Antibodies to the flu would indicate they had recovered from silent infections.

 

But a W.H.O. spokesman said privately that the agency was just helping the Egyptians with a long-planned study and the article had “jumped the gun.”

 

Translations of Egyptian media reports posted on flu-tracking sites say dozens of suspected cases have been hospitalized, but some seem to confuse avian flu with seasonal flu and even confirmed poultry cases. The Egyptian health ministry, which works closely with a United States Navy laboratory based in Cairo, has confirmed 15 human cases this year, with no deaths; almost all were in young children.

 

Dr. Nikki Shindo, a W.H.O. medical officer who works in Egypt, said the surge in toddler cases and survivals had a possible explanation. The government has loudly warned its citizens to avoid sick poultry and has trained doctors in remote clinics to give Tamiflu quickly and move cases to state hospitals, where treatment is free. In a country where chickens are both kept as pets and eaten, toddlers still touch dying birds but poultry workers would not.

 

Egypt’s outbreak response contrasts sharply to Indonesia’s, where the sick often take herbal medicine first and where rural clinics lack Tamiflu, she said.

 

Dr. Arnold S. Monto, a flu expert at the University of Michigan School of Public Health who also teaches in Egypt, said even geography helps. All cases are along the Nile and easily moved to Cairo, while travel among Indonesia’s thousands of islands is slower.

 

Also, he said, the government has been more aggressive since it was criticized by opposition parties for not wiping out the poultry epidemic that began in 2006.

 

Henry L. Niman, a biochemist who tracks flu mutations, has speculated that a mild strain of H5N1 is more common in Egypt than has been found because nasal swabs for flu are inaccurate. He noted that mild cases were found in Qena, Egypt, in 2007, and has called for more testing and for releasing the genetic sequences of strains found in both poultry and people.

 

Dr. Tim Uyeki, a flu specialist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, said there had been mild cases of H5N1 among children in several countries. There have also, he said, been studies in Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia and Nigeria similar to the one proposed for Egypt in which the blood of cullers, poultry workers and relatives of sick people has been tested.

 

“Those are the ideal people to look at,” he said. “And there was zero or extremely low prevalence of antibodies,” meaning silent infections were very uncommon.

 

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company.

 

NY pharmacies agree to translate drug instructions

 

Frederick News-Post

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

Many non-English speakers will soon be able to read prescription drug instructions in their primary language.

 

Five companies announced Tuesday that pharmacies at more than 700 stores statewide will translate the information.

 

The companies are Target, Wal-Mart, Costco, Duane Reade (dwayn REED') and A&P.

 

The companies agreed with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to counsel and provide written translations in Spanish, Chinese, Italian, Russian and French.

 

(This version CORRECTS that agreement covers stores statewide, not nationwide.)

Press Association

 

Copyright © 2009 Associated Press.

 

More people live with paralysis than doctors knew

 

By Lauran Neergaard

Frederick News-Post

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

Roughly one in 50 Americans has some degree of paralysis, and five times more people than doctors thought are living with a spinal-cord injury - nearly 1.3 million - says a startling study released Tuesday.

 

It's a largely hidden population that neither the government nor medical organizations had ever attempted to fully count, and the findings promise to help health authorities understand the scope of need.

 

"Paralysis is not rare," said Dr. Edwin Trevathan, disabilities chief at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which helped design the study. "These data demand that we recommit ... to help this population."

 

"Those are startling, startling numbers," said Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., who has a spinal-cord injury himself and urged more investment in not just medical research but transportation, job opportunities and other day-to-day needs of the paralyzed.

 

The report found that overall, almost 5.6 million people have some degree of paralysis due to a variety of neurologic problems. Stroke and spinal-cord injury are the leading causes, but they also include multiple sclerosis, brain injuries, birth defects, surgical complications and a list of other ailments.

 

That's about 30 percent higher than previous estimates. But for spinal-cord injury alone, previous estimates were woeful - suggesting just a quarter million people were living with the trauma, a count that mostly included people like the late actor Christopher Reeve, who wound up at specialty treatment centers.

 

How could so many people have been missed? Partly, people are living much longer with paralysis, said CDC's Trevathan.

 

And they're now starting to face the added complications of aging on top of a disability.

 

"There's no road map for somebody like me," said Alan T. Brown of Hollywood, Fla., who broke his neck 21 years ago, just before his 21st birthday.

 

From a youth spent in wheelchair marathons, he's entering middle age suddenly needing more care, like an electric wheelchair instead of a manual. He's getting more infections, 17 urinary-tract infections last year alone. That's on top of the extra hurdles to arrange routine care, like a colonoscopy.

 

"This is finally going to open up people's lives to see what we live with," he said Tuesday.

 

For the new study, funded by the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation, University of New Mexico researchers designed a survey of 33,000 U.S. households to measure the full gamut of paralysis - how many people either cannot move or have difficulty moving an extremity.

 

The study paints a sobering picture of the cycle of paralysis and poverty. Sixty percent of people with paralysis have annual household incomes of less than $25,000. Worse, about a quarter report household incomes below $10,000, compared with 7 percent of the U.S. population, the study found.

 

Patients often lose their jobs, and caregiving needs can cost a spouse a job, too, ending employer-provided insurance. Treatment, including the physical therapy that can improve independence and sometimes movement, is costly. There are income limits to qualify for Medicaid, and cash-strapped states are limiting coverage.

 

The Reeve foundation plans to use the findings to push for health policy changes, including ending a federal requirement that disabled workers wait 24 months before getting health care through Medicare. Also on its target list: insurance policies that forbid $400 air cushions for wheelchairs until someone's already suffered a pressure-caused skin ulcer that can require a $75,000 hospital stay.

 

Florida's Brown knows he's lucky, able to pursue a lucrative public relations career and be a mentor to other spinal-cord patients despite being mostly paralyzed from the chest down. Before his injury, he had a private insurance policy that lasted until recently. Now, he said, he's paying tens of thousands of dollars yearly out-of-pocket, and worries about how his wife and two young sons will cope if he ever has to quit working.

 

"I thought I was bigger than the chair. I finally realized the chair is bigger than me," Brown said.

 

On the Net:

Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation: http://www.christopherreeve.org/

 

Copyright 2009 Frederick News-Post.

 

Mayo Clinic backs new personal health record site

 

By Jessica Mintz

Frederick News-Post

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

 

The Mayo Clinic has combined its medical expertise with Microsoft Corp.'s technology in a free Web site launching Tuesday that will let people store personal health and medical information.

 

The Mayo Clinic Health Manager, as the site is called, is one of many emerging services for so-called personal health records. The sites, from companies such as Microsoft and Google Inc. and major health insurers, are meant to give people an easy way to stash medical information and transfer it to a new clinic, hospital or specialist. But those providers aren't necessarily ready for such an electronic revolution, which for now means it takes some work on the patient's part to set up and maintain the records.

 

The Mayo Clinic Health Manager uses Microsoft's HealthVault system to store medical histories, test results, immunization files and other records from doctors' offices and hospital visits, along with data from home devices like heart rate monitors.

 

Anyone can sign up for an account, not just Mayo Clinic patients. Users can give access to different slices of their health information to doctors and family members as the need arises.

 

The site prompts people to get started by answering questions about their family medical history and current and past health problems, allergies and medications. Based on that information plus age, gender and other factors, the site recommends additional tasks - scheduling a mammogram, for instance - and articles for further reading.

 

People can add contact details for doctors, pharmacies and insurance companies and set reminders for upcoming appointments.

 

Dr. Sidna Tulledge-Scheitel, an internist and medical director of global products and services at Mayo Clinic, hopes the site will help people better manage chronic conditions such as diabetes, high cholesterol and high blood pressure at home. Tulledge-Scheitel said that without a system like Health Manager, she has to hope a refrigerator magnet suffices to remind asthma patients to regularly perform some self-diagnostic exams. The site would remind them to do it monthly. (The system doesn't send e-mail reminders for privacy reasons, so the patient has to be in the habit of logging on to the site frequently.)

 

Advocates of electronic medical records say the technology is more cost-effective than paper files and reduces medical errors. But the rollout has been slow, which is why the federal stimulus package this year included incentives for doctors and hospitals to adopt electronic health records.

 

In the health care system of the future, sites like Mayo Clinic's might connect seamlessly with pharmacies, hospitals and doctors' offices to update records. Today, however, while Microsoft's HealthVault system can connect to some pharmacies, insurance companies and providers, most doctors have yet to invest in an electronic system. For patients, that means typing the results of surgeries, lab tests and other information into the Health Manager themselves.

 

Privacy advocates urge people who want to set up a personal health record online to read the fine print. Deven McGraw, director of the health privacy project at the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology, said sites like the Mayo Clinic Health Manager aren't currently covered by national laws that specify cases in which health care systems can access and share information without patients' consent.

 

On the Net:

http://www.mayoclinic.com

Press Association

 

Copyright © 2009 Associated Press.

 

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