Month: January 2017

Maybe For-Profit Hospitals Aren’t So Bad

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By Shailin Thomas

For-profit hospitals have taken their fair share of flack over the years. Much maligned by many in the medical community, they are seen as money-hungry corporate machines that pervert the medical profession by putting the bottom line before patient care. This skepticism of profit-driven hospitals feels right. Medicine has long been the purview of charitable organizations and religious institutions. It’s supposed to be a calling — a public service to which practitioners are drawn — not a check to cash at the bank.

As for-profit hospitals proliferated, there was research done suggesting they had quality and cost issues stemming from their profit motives. For-profit hospitals had higher mortality rates, employed fewer trained professionals per bed, and were more expensive than their non-profit and government counterparts. Researchers speculated that this was the result of duties owned to shareholders by corporate leaders or compensation incentives for executives based on profitability rather than quality of care. These studies seemed to confirm what many thought they already knew: medicine and money don’t mix well.

More recent studies, however, suggest that for-profit hospitals may have turned over a new leaf. Since 2010, for-profit hospitals have out-performed non-profits in the “Top Performer” evaluation carried out by The Joint Commission — an organization that accredits hospitals in the US — with a higher percentage of for-profit hospitals qualifying for the honor than non-profits. A study published in JAMA from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health found that hospitals that converted from non-profit to for-profit improved their financial position by increasing their total margins and experienced no change in mortality rates.

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PFC Spotlight Series: Faculty Affiliate Ameet Sarpatwari

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Learn more about the Petrie-Flom Center’s work through our Spotlight Series, which features interviews with Student and Academic Fellow alumni, as well as current Faculty Affiliates.

sarpatwari_peopleThis week’s post features Ameet Sarpatwari, J.D., Ph.D., who is an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School, an Associate Epidemiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Assistant Director of the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL). His research draws upon his interdisciplinary training as an epidemiologist and lawyer and focuses on the effects of laws and regulations on therapeutic development, approval, use, and related public health outcomes.

Read the article to learn more about his contributions to the Center and its mission!

Pharmacist Vaccination Laws, 1990-2016

Temple University Center for Public Health Law Research Leave a comment

Since the 1990s, there has been a growing movement to improve access to immunization services by giving pharmacists the authority to administer vaccines.

The newest map on LawAtlas.org explores state laws from 1990 to 2016 that give pharmacists authority to administer vaccines and establish requirements for third-party vaccination authorization, patient age restrictions, and specific vaccination practice requirements, such as training, reporting, record-keeping, notification, malpractice insurance, and emergency exceptions.

As of January 1, 2016:

  • Pharmacists were explicitly authorized to administer vaccines in 46 states and the District of Columbia.
  • Thirteen states and the District of Columbia permit exceptions to vaccination requirements for emergencies or epidemics.
  • Ten states grant pharmacists prescriptive authority to administer vaccines (i.e., pharmacists can vaccinate without a third-party authorization).
US map shows every sate except AL, MS, TN, WA have laws
As of January 1, 2016, every state except Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Washington had laws that authorized pharmacists to vaccinate.

The dataset was created by Cason Schmit, JD, Research Assistant Professor, Texas A&M University, and Allison Reddick, JD, MPH, Associate Attorney at Hill & Ponton, PA.

Check out the latest map and data at LawAtlas.org.

Public Variant Databases: Data Share with Care

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By Adrian Thorogood, BCL, LLB

If every individual has millions of unique variants in their DNA, how can clinicians be expected to tease out a handful of disease causing mutations from a haystack of inconsequential variants? To aid their cause, public human genomic variant databases have sprung up to catalog variants that cause (or do not cause) disease. These databases aggregate, curate and share data from research publications and from clinical sequencing laboratories who have identified a  “pathogenic”, “unknown” or “benign” variant when testing a patient.

International sharing of variant data is “crucial” to improving human health. To inform patient diagnosis or treatment, it is essential that data be accurate and up to date. If variants are collaboratively interpreted by laboratories, databases and treating physicians, who is ultimately responsible for the quality of data? If one actor in the chain does a shoddy job of interpreting variants, resulting in harm to patients, who could be liable? This is the question I pose with Professors Bartha Knoppers and Robert Cook-Deegan in a recent article in Genetics and Medicine: “Public Variant Databases: Liability?”. Read More

Monthly Round-Up of What to Read on Pharma Law and Policy

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By Ameet Sarpatwari and Aaron S. Kesselheim

Each month, members of the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL) review the peer-reviewed medical literature to identify interesting empirical studies, policy analyses, and editorials on health law and policy issues relevant to current or potential future work in the Division.

Below are the abstracts/summaries for papers identified from the month of December. The selections feature topics ranging from the rising price of the opioid reversal agent naloxone, to the interpretation of surrogate endpoints in the era of the 21st Century Cures Act, to a comparative assessment of pharmaceutical licensing and reimbursement in the European Union, United States, and Japan. A full posting of abstracts/summaries of these articles may be found on our website.

  1. Califf RM, Robb MA, Bindman AB, Briggs JP, Collins FS, Conway PH, et al. Transforming Evidence Generation to Support Health and Health Care Decisions. N Engl J Med. 2016;375(24):2395-2400.
  2. Gupta R, Shah ND, Ross JS. The Rising Price of Naloxone – Risks to Efforts to Stem Overdose Deaths. N Engl J Med. 2016;375(23):2213-2215.
  3. Oye KA, Eichler HG, Hoos A, Mori Y, Mullin TM, Pearson M. Pharmaceuticals Licensing and Reimbursement in the European Union, United States, and Japan. Clin Pharmacol Ther. 2016;100(6):626-632.
  4. Knopf K, Baum M, Shimp WS, Bennett CL, Faith D, Fishman ML, Hrushesky WJ. Interpretation of surrogate endpoints in the era of the 21st Century Cures Act. BMJ. 2016;355:i6286.
  5. Robertson C, Kesselheim AS. Regulating Off-Label Promotion – A Critical Test. N Engl J Med. 2016;375(24):2313-2315.
  6. Sinha MS, Kesselheim AS. Regulatory Incentives for Antibiotic Drug Development: A Review of Recent Proposals. Bioorg Med Chem. 2016;24(24):6446-6451.
  7. Wolf MS, Davis TC, Curtis LM, Bailey SC, Knox JP, Bergeron A, Abbet M, Shrank WH, Parker RM, Wood AJ. A Patient-Centered Prescription Drug Label to Promote Appropriate Medication Use and Adherence. J Gen Intern Med. 2016;31(12):1482-1489.

REGISTER NOW (1/23)! PFC’s 5th Annual Health Law Year in P/Review

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

p-review-logoHealth Law Year in P/Review
Featured Panel: The End of ObamaCare? Health Care Reform Under A New Administration
January 23, 2017 
Wasserstein Hall, Milstein West AB
Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA
Register for this event

The Fifth Annual Health Law Year in P/Review symposium will feature leading experts discussing major developments during 2016 and what to watch out for in 2017. The discussion at this day-long event will cover hot topics in such areas as health policy under the new administration, regulatory issues in clinical research, law at the end-of-life, patient rights and advocacy, pharmaceutical policy, reproductive health, and public health law.

This year’s Health Law Year in P/Review is sponsored by the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School, Harvard Health Publications at Harvard Medical School, Health Affairs, the Hastings Center, the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL) in the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School, with support from the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund. 

Agenda

8:30 – 9:00am, Registration

A continental breakfast will be available.

9:00 – 9:05am, Welcome Remarks

  • I. Glenn Cohen, Professor of Law and Faculty Director, Petrie-Flom Center, Harvard Law School
  • Holly Fernandez Lynch, Executive Director, Petrie-Flom Center and Faculty, Center for Bioethics, Harvard Medical School

9:05 – 10:30am: The End of ObamaCare? Health Care Reform Under A New Administration

  • Joseph R. Antos, Wilson H. Taylor Scholar in Health Care and Retirement Policy, American Enterprise Institute
  • David Blumenthal, President, The Commonwealth Fund
  • Michael K. Gusmano, Research Scholar, The Hastings Center
  • John McDonough, Professor of the Practice of Public Health, Director of the Center for Executive and Continuing Professional Education, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health
  • Abigail R. Moncrieff, Associate Professor of Law and Peter Paul Career Development Professor, Boston University School of Law
  • Moderator: Einer Elhauge, Caroll and Milton Petrie Professor of Law and Founding Faculty Director, Petrie-Flom Center, Harvard Law School

10:30 – 10:45am, Break

10:45 – 11:10am, Precision Medicine Initiative/Cancer Moonshot

11:10 – 11:35am, Common Rule Update

  • Holly Fernandez Lynch, Executive Director, Petrie-Flom Center and Faculty, Center for Bioethics, Harvard Medical School

11:35am – 12:00pm, Clinical Trial Data Sharing

  • TBD, MRCT Center at Harvard

12:00 – 12:25pm, All-Payer Claims Databases

  • Gregory D. Curfman, Editor-in-Chief, Harvard Health Publications, Harvard Medical School

12:25 – 1:00pm, Lunch

Lunch will be provided.

1:00 – 1:25pm, Defining Death, Aid in Dying, and Family Rights

  • Paul Ford, Lecturer, Harvard Medical School, Winter 2017; Director, NeuroEthics Program, Cleveland Clinic; Director of Education, Department of Bioethics, Cleveland Clinic; Associate Professor, CCF Lerner College of Medicine of CWRU

1:25 – 1:50pm, Patient Advocacy, FDA, and Right to Try

  • Jerry Avorn, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Chief of the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital

1:50 – 2:15pm, Drug Pricing and Cost

  • Ameet Sarpatwari, Instructor in Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital

2:15 – 2:40pm, Health IP

2:40 – 2:55pm, Break

2:55 – 3:20pm, Women’s Health

  • Aziza Ahmed, Professor of Law, Northeastern University School of Law

3:20 – 3:45pm, Reproductive Technology and Regulatory Oversight

  • I. Glenn Cohen, Professor of Law and Faculty Director, Petrie-Flom Center, Harvard Law School

3:45 – 4:10pm, Legal Responses to Zika

  • George Annas, William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Law, Bioethics & Human Rights, Boston University School of Public Health; Professor in the Boston University School of Medicine, and School of Law

4:10 – 4:35pm, Flint, Water Safety, and Public Health Infrastructure

  • Wendy Parmet, Matthews Distinguished University Professor of Law, Director of the Center for Health Policy and Law, and Associate Dean for Interdisciplinary Education and Research Support; Professor of Public Policy and Urban Affairs, Northeastern University School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs

4:35 – 5:00pm, Concussion Litigation and Legislation in Sports

  • Christopher Deubert, Senior Law and Ethics Associate, Petrie-Flom Center Law and Ethics Initiative, Football Players Health Study at Harvard University

5:00pm, Adjourn

Learn More

How did our prognosticators do in predicting health law and policy developments they expected in 2016? Check out videos of all of the presentations at the 4th Annual Health Law Year in P/Review event, held in January 2016, and find out!

Register Now!

This event is free and open to the public, but seating is limited and registration is required. Register now!

Sponsored by the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School, Harvard Health Publications at Harvard Medical School, Health Affairs, the Hastings Center, the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL) in the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School, with support from the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund. 

The Best-Laid Plans For Health Care

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

This new post by Petrie-Flom’s Faculty Director I. Glenn Cohen appears on the Health Affairs Blog as the first entry in a series that will stem from our Fifth Annual Health Law Year in P/Review event to be held at Harvard Law School on Monday, January 23, 2017.

“The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” This phrase, adapted from the 1785 Robert Burns Poem “To a Mouse” and made as the source of the title of a Steinbeck novella, may become the mantra for health policy in 2017.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was the largest and most ambitious alteration to American health policy in a generation. By the middle of 2016, it appeared to be largely “settling into place,” and the quartet of Supreme Court encounters with the law have by now been largely resolved. The Constitutional commerce and taxation clause challenges of NFIB v. Sebelius have been decided, with the Court weakening Medicaid expansion and causing other problems, albeit not ones that threatened the vitality of the overarching statutory scheme due to preservation of the individual mandate.

The decision in King v. Burwell left funding for the insurance Exchanges intact. Controversy over the contraceptive coverage requirements stemming from the Act remains, with the Court punting on the extent to which its analysis from Burwell v. Hobby Lobby ought to apply to challenges raised by other types of objectors in Zubik v. Burwell, leaving the litigants with a strange “Can’t you guys just work this out on remand?” sort of resolution. […]

Read the full post here!

Let’s All Worry About The Effects of Patent Injunctions Against Drug Manufacturers

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By Rachel Sachs

Yesterday, a federal district judge made an important ruling in the ongoing patent dispute between Amgen’s cholesterol-lowering drug Repatha and Sanofi and Regeneron’s drug, Praluent.  Early in 2016, Amgen’s patents covering the products had been found both valid and infringed, and now Judge Sue Robinson has granted Amgen’s request for an injunction against Sanofi and Regeneron, blocking the two companies from selling Praluent.  (The injunction takes effect in 30 days, giving the companies time to appeal.)

This is very strange.  Let’s be clear: Judge Robinson looked at a situation involving two competing, chemically distinct (though similar) drugs for the same condition and opted to kick one of them off the market, putting Amgen in a monopoly position and taking some number of patients off of the drug they’ve been taking.  As far as Pharma Policy Twitter (h/t Forbes’ always-excellent Matthew Herper) can tell, an injunction of this type happens about once a decade – in 2008 with Amgen and Hoffman-LaRoche regarding an EPO product, and in 1996 with Novo Nordisk and Genentech over hGH products.  (Please send along other examples, if you have them!)

A number of commentators have already weighed in on Judge Robinson’s order, with Professor Jake Sherkow providing a particularly thoughtful tweetstorm on the subject. I largely agree with Professor Sherkow’s analysis, but I want to emphasize two aspects of the case that have not yet received sufficient attention: the first is the decision to ask for the injunction, and the second is the practical effect the injunction will have on patients, on the market, and on the gathering of information about PCSK9 products going forward.

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American Psychiatric Association Releases Formal Position Statement on Euthanasia

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By Wendy S. Salkin

End of Life Care, NIH
Image Source: NIH Consensus Development Project

Last month, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) released a position statement on medical euthanasia. The statement, approved by the APA Assembly in November and approved by the Board of Trustees in December, states:

The American Psychiatric Association, in concert with the American Medical Association’s position on medical euthanasia, holds that a psychiatrist should not prescribe or administer any intervention to a non-terminally ill person for the purpose of causing death.

According to the APA Operations Manual, APA position statements “provide the basis for statements made on behalf of the APA before government bodies and agencies and communicated to the media and the general public.”

For those who are wondering, What’s the American Medical Association’s [AMA] position on medical euthanasia?, here is your answer: From Section 8 of Chapter 5 (“Opinions on Caring for Patients at the End of Life”) of the AMA Code of Ethics: Read More

Mapping Emergency Suspension Powers

Temple University Center for Public Health Law Research Leave a comment

Together with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Public Health Management Corporation, the Policy Surveillance Program recently released a new map addressing Emergency Powers laws.

Emergencies might involve dangers to public health, such as an outbreak of the flu; natural disasters, such as floods or earthquakes; or threats to security, such as acts of terror. In 41 states and the District of Columbia, governors are explicitly permitted to suspend laws that would interfere with an efficient, effective response to an emergency. Some states also permit governors to amend laws or create new ones during emergencies.

This new map covers laws granting broad powers to governors to manage emergencies in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

PHLR spoke with the researchers, Kelly Thompson, JD, Law and Policy Manager at the National Nurse-Led Care Consortium, an affiliate of Public Health Management Corporation, and Nick Anderson, JD, ORISE Fellow at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to discuss their work.

Read on for the full interview! Read More