Indianapolis was highlighted in a new national study because its hospitals have been particularly aggressive at expanding their geographic reach—raising concerns among health insurers and even hospitals themselves that new medical facilities and market power can only lead to higher prices.
Indiana still has one of the highest circumcision rates in the nation, at 82 percent.
Eli Lilly and Co.’s newest drug is a boon for Alzheimer’s research but is likely to bring the Indianapolis drugmaker less than $100 million in annual sales—at least initially, according to one of the few analysts to make a forecast.
The agent, called Amyvid, is not expected to produce high-dollar sales for Lilly, but it could help to identify patients with Alzheimer’s—and those without it—earlier, perhaps improving treatment and focusing research efforts.
In the midst of Mega Millions mania, statisticians were telling would-be bettors that the odds of winning the big jackpot were far lower than the odds of being struck by lighting.
Indianapolis-based Prosolia Inc. has licensed technology from the estate of John B. Fenn, a chemistry professor who won the 2002 Nobel Prize for developing new mass spectrometry. Prosolia makes instruments that can identify chemicals on paper, skin, fluids and other surfaces. The eight-person firm hopes the technology allows it to launch new products next year to broaden its portfolio. Prosolia CEO Justin Wiseman said the Fenn technology “opens up less-penetrated markets in environmental, security, medical and food chemistry. We foresee several new product innovations from the Fenn technology, which we plan to commercialize in the near future."
Carmel-based CNO Financial Group Inc. has agreed to repay five customers more than $1 million that a former independent insurance agent stole from them, according to a report by A.M. Best Co. Jasmine Jamrus-Kassim sold annuities for Chicago-based Bankers Life and Casualty Co., a subsidiary of CNO Financial. She was arrested in March 2011 after an investigation by Washington state insurance regulators and has now been sentenced to six years in prison. The victims, age 74 to 90, thought the money was being reinvested but Kassim instead spent it to pay for online psychics, clothes, jewelry and a trip to Mexico, according to records from the Washington investigation.
Endocyte Inc. will submit its ovarian cancer drug EC145 for European market approval in the third quarter after the European Commission granted it "orphan drug" status. The submission means West Lafayette-based Endocyte could have its first commercial product as early as 2013. European regulators granted EC145 orphan status because large numbers of women have ovarian cancers that do not respond to typical chemotherapy treatments. And no new drug has been approved to treat ovarian cancer in 10 years. The European Commission also granted orphan status to an imaging agent Endocyte has developed, called EC20, which lights up ovarian tumors in women that have a genetic variation that makes them bond hungrily to folate. That’s important because EC145 is a combination of a powerful chemotherapy agent and folate, so that it enters cancerous cells but does not enter healthy cells. That allows EC145 to be more deadly to cancer, without serious side effects, than patients can tolerate with traditional chemotherapy agents.
A four-physician OB/GYN practice has merged with Indiana University Health Ball Memorial after a long-standing partnership. The Voss Center for Women of Muncie joined the IU Health system March 1. In addition to its four doctors, the practice includes four nurse practitioners. Hospitals are increasingly employing physicians, as financial pressures increase on independent practices and as reimbursement from public and private health plans encourages doctors and hospitals to work more closely to improve patient health.
Decision by industry giant Pfizer Inc. to abandon its generic insulin project is good news for Eli Lilly and Co.
Keystone Group, Turkish immigrant Ersal Ozdemir’s 10-year-old development firm, is orchestrating some of central Indiana’s most ambitious projects, including a $15M Broad Ripple parking garage and the $60M million mixed-use Sophia Square in Carmel.
Individual liberty has limits when the health of the public is at stake.
Concept is likely ahead of technical ability to make it work.
Physician liaisons are becoming key in recruiting efforts.
Hospitals around Indianapolis and the nation are expanding programs to help people before they become patients. They are trying to teach cooking as well as treat cancer, to do social work as well as do surgery.
Even though researchers at the Indianapolis-based Regenstrief Institute Inc. demonstrated more than 20 years ago that electronic health records and test ordering systems significantly reduced costs in Indianapolis’ Wishard Health Services’ system, a recent study of electronic health records among office-based physicians came to the opposite conclusion.
Like it or not—and most of the time we like it—technology has changed the world we live in.
Community Health Network and Johnson Memorial Hospital plan to spend $14 million to build a medical office building and outpatient center in Bargersville. The 70,000-square-foot facility is scheduled to be completed in mid-2013.
Franciscan St. Francis Health said its plans to build an emergency room and physician office building in Greenwood are on hold due to uncertainty over the effects of health care reform.
Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield has renewed its push to bring online care to the Indiana market, including video. It has asked the state’s Medical Licensing Board to relax a 2003 rule that stands in its way.
Threats to cut federal Medicare funds that pay for residency training for doctors have eased but not gone away since they were formally proposed by some members of the Congressional super committee last fall. Dr. Peter Nalin, the associate dean of graduate medical education at the Indiana University School of Medicine, said such cuts would be disastrous at a time when patient demands increasingly outstrip the supply of physicians.
The Big 3 automakers spent 35 percent more in the Indianapolis area to provide health care for workers and non-elderly retirees than they did in other auto-heavy cities—and two-thirds of that difference can be blamed on “excess prices” by Indianapolis hospitals.
