Indiana panel OKs allowing prescriptions for cold meds
Under the revised proposal, pharmacists will have the option of requiring a pseudoephedrine prescription for some customers.
Health Care & Insurance
Articles
Anthem profit falls well short of analysts’ expectations
The Indianapolis-based health insurer Anthem Inc. saw medical enrollment slip and overhead rise in the fourth quarter, pushing down profit by 64 percent. Shares fell more than 3 percent Wednesday morning.
Lawmakers hear another pitch for cold-medicine prescriptions
Supporters of a proposal to allow pharmacists to require prescriptions to buy medicine with pseudoephedrine say the requirement is the only way to curb Indiana's methamphetamine problem.
5 things to look for Thursday in Lilly’s earnings
Executives at Eli Lilly and Co. are telling investors the worst is behind the company and only good things await. But the drugmaker still has a few things to prove.
Proposal for cold medicine prescriptions being scaled back
The new version of the Indiana bill would classify pseudoephedrine in a way that most consumers would be able to buy it, but pharmacists could require a prescription from suspicious customers.
Anthem merger partner banned from Medicare sales for ‘widespread failures’
Cigna Corp., which has agreed to a $48 billion merger with Indianapolis-based Anthem Inc., has committed systemic violations that threatened patients’ health, U.S. regulators say.
Senate passes bill to open adoption records
Adoptees born between 1941 and 1994 would be able to access their birth records under a bill passed Thursday by the Indiana Senate.
Health officials finish euthanizing 400K birds at Indiana farms
Animal health officials responding to a bird flu outbreak in southwest Indiana say crews have finished euthanizing more than 400,000 birds at 10 affected commercial poultry farms.
U.S. to limit Obamacare sign-up periods to help insurers
The U.S. government will limit a process that allowed people to sign up for health insurance under Obamacare outside of the normal enrollment period, after insurers complained that the special periods were letting people into the program only when they got sick.
UPDATE: Pharmacist consultation bill clears senate committee
Indiana pharmacists could get the legal right to refuse to sell a common cold medicine used to make methamphetamine to suspicious customers under a bill a Senate committee approved Tuesday.
Officials hope rapid action contains Indiana turkey flu outbreak
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has quarantined and destroyed hundreds of thousands of turkeys and chickens in Indiana in an effort to avoid a repeat of last year’s outbreak that cost the industry $3.3 billion.
Teen births fall in Indiana, nation
Teen births have fallen to a record low in the United States and dropped sharply in Indiana too, a development that could save taxpayers millions of dollars in public health services and other assistance.
Lawmakers won’t seek ban on over-counter pseudoephedrine
Indiana legislators are poised to start debates on how to combat growing methamphetamine production in Indiana, but adding a prescription requirement for one of the illegal drug's key ingredients is off the table.
Thank you and farewell
Just as a reminder, this is the end of my run as the voice of The Dose. I’m handing over the blog, starting Friday, to John Russell, IBJ’s new health care reporter.
Anthem seeks $3B more in drug savings from Express Scripts
Anthem, which contracts with Express Scripts to manage drug costs for its members, said the pharmacy manager should be passing along about $3 billion a year more in the savings it negotiates from drug companies.
Indy drug firm scores multi-million-dollar help from NIH
Indianapolis-based Chondrial Therapeutics LLC has been accepted into a program run by the National Institutes of Health that will provide the drug company with services worth at least $5 million, the company estimates.
Anthem stock jumps on better health plan enrollment
Investors bid up shares of Anthem Inc. on Tuesday morning after the Indianapolis-based health insurer said its health plan membership ended the year at higher levels than expected.
Once debt-laden, IU Health’s finances in tip-top shape
When CEO Dan Evans relinquishes the reins of Indiana University Health in April, he will hand his successor Dennis Murphy a hospital system with a pristine balance sheet. That’s a big change for IU Health, which when the Great Recession hit was debt-laden and cash-strapped.
There is too much money in unhealthy behavior
I spell out the top 5 reasons, starting with Hoosiers’ poor health, why health care in Indiana is even more messed up than it is around the rest of the country.
Firm aims to nationally distribute brain care innovation
Preferred Population Health Management is trying to get hospital systems, health insurers and area agencies on aging to use a set of tools and techniques to help dementia patients and their families—tools that were developed by the medical staff at Eskenazi Health, the Indiana University School of Medicine and the Regenstrief Institute.