Know What's Happening in Healthcare
Know What's Happening in Healthcare
FDA approves KRESLADI, first CIRM‑backed gene‑editing therapy
The FDA cleared KRESLADI, a gene‑editing treatment from Rocket Pharmaceuticals for severe leukocyte adhesion deficiency‑I in children, eliminating the need for a bone‑marrow donor. It is the first product directly funded by California’s Institute for Regenerative Medicine to receive approval.
Also developing:
By the numbers: Syneron Bio raises $150M Series B
The FDA has cleared Mammotome’s Mammotome Prima MR Dual Vacuum‑Assisted Breast Biopsy System and its HydroMARK Plus MR biopsy site marker, marking the first in‑room MR‑guided biopsy solution. The system positions the vacuum‑assisted device beside the patient in the scanner, reduces tubing by 75%, and uses an eight‑gauge needle that captures tissue samples up to 78% larger than comparable tools. HydroMARK Plus employs hydrogel and titanium components to stay visible on T1 and T2 MRI sequences and remain in tissue for up to a year. Mammotome plans a U.S. commercial rollout later this summer, with a debut at the April 2026 Society of Breast Imaging symposium.
Healthcare hiring is accelerating, and medical assistants are among the fastest‑growing occupations. Traditional community‑college pathways cannot keep pace with the rising demand driven by an aging population, physician shortages, and cost pressures. Accredited online medical assistant programs now offer rigorous...
The FDA withdrew its long‑standing proposal to ban anyone under 18 from using indoor tanning beds, a rule first introduced in 2015. The decision came after Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr. publicly advocated for less government suppression of "sunshine," aligning with...
CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz is spearheading an aggressive fraud crackdown in the home‑based care sector, mirroring recent actions in the durable medical equipment (DME) market. Industry leaders, including the National Alliance for Care at Home, back the effort but...
Lifepoint Health partnered with AI‑driven Eon to launch the Eon Breast platform, extending incidental‑finding management across its 80‑hospital network. The solution consolidates screening and incidental alerts, enabling early detection of breast and other cancers and has been deployed in 53...
Jean Verlus, a home‑care registered nurse at VNS Health, was named to the Frontline Honors Awards Class of 2025, recognizing his exceptional dedication and patient‑centered care. He recounts his personal journey into nursing, the misconceptions he faced about home care,...
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has launched a new public‑idea portal under its Comprehensive Regulations to Uncover Suspicious Healthcare initiative. CMS Chief Operating Officer Kimberly Brandt invited citizens, providers, and industry experts to submit suggestions for strengthening...
The article condemns the growing wave of violence against health‑care workers, underscored by the 2026 murder of nurse Alex Pretti in Minnesota. It blends personal testimony from a retired nurse with a broader call for systemic change, arguing that assaults...
The letter highlights a critical gap in emerging anxiety‑disorder treatments: their limited applicability to religiously themed obsessive‑compulsive disorder, or scrupulosity. It proposes adapting Positive Affect Treatment and exposure‑based protocols with religion‑informed elements such as sacred savoring and faith‑based expectancy violation....
BIOTECanada has praised the federal government’s launch of the Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences Sector Task Force, signaling a strategic push to strengthen Canada’s biotech and pharma ecosystem. The task force is tasked with reviewing investment incentives, regulatory frameworks, and market...
ECU Health in Greenville, North Carolina, received conditional state approval for a $138 million expansion of its medical center. The project will add five new operating rooms—four dedicated to C‑sections and one trauma suite—and renovate existing surgical spaces. The expansion is...
A University of Pennsylvania study links higher hospital advertising spend to increased emergency‑department visits and Medicare costs. A 10 percent rise in ad impressions—about 150 extra spots—adds nine admissions per 100,000 beneficiaries, indicating a 6 percent advertising elasticity. The research combines traditional...
On December 2025 the FDA officially qualified dual‑energy X‑ray absorptiometry (DXA) bone density scans as the first surrogate endpoint for fracture outcomes in osteoporosis trials involving post‑menopausal women. The qualification, achieved through a request from the Foundation for the National...
The FDA has added a new warning to the Gilenya (fingolimod) label after identifying 35 cases where patients experienced severe disability following drug discontinuation. The worsening, which can occur 2 to 24 weeks after stopping treatment, often exceeds typical MS...
The New Brunswick government introduced Bill No. 25 to amend the 2008 Midwifery Act, broadening midwives’ scope to cover the full child‑bearing continuum and permitting student midwives to gain supervised clinical experience. The legislation also restructures the Midwifery Council by adding...
University of Missouri System has appointed Jody Mitori as its chief marketing and communications officer. Mitori, who most recently served as executive director of strategic communications at Washington University School of Medicine and previously held five years of marketing leadership...
A Somali doctor warns that the UK’s hostile‑environment policies and NHS‑Home Office data‑sharing are eroding trust among Somali migrants, prompting avoidance of primary, mental health and vaccination services. The letter cites stark disparities: only 14% of Somali respondents accessed needed...
A new ICD-10 diagnosis code, T50.B25x, has been introduced to capture injuries linked to COVID‑19 vaccinations. The code is not yet reflected on the official ICD‑10 database, suggesting a brief rollout lag. Advocacy group React19 is credited with prompting the...
The OpenSAFELY cohort study examined Pfizer vaccination in English children aged 5‑15, finding virtually no COVID‑related deaths and fewer than seven critical‑care admissions during an early‑pandemic window. Vaccine impact was limited to modest, short‑term reductions in infection and a slight...
Katrine Bosley: There's no question “hopes and aspirations” got ahead of the pace of any new science on gene editing #STATBreakthrough Seng Cheng: “The promise of gene therapy is correct. I think it has made that promise. and that's demonstrated by...
Providence, the 51‑hospital system, announced it is evaluating strategic options for its insurance subsidiary, Providence Health Plan, including a possible sale. The move comes as the plan reported a $102 million loss on $2.5 billion revenue last year and a dip to...
Aspen Valley Health, a Colorado critical access hospital, has become an Epic host for other rural providers through Epic’s Community Connect program. After abandoning a large‑system partnership in 2017, the hospital implemented Epic independently and now ranks near the top...
CoverMyMeds senior manager Kimberly Howard explains that aligning hub services with field reimbursement teams creates a seamless patient‑support workflow. Hubs handle benefit investigations while field reimbursement managers guide providers through prior‑authorizations, and shared data bridges the two functions. When manufacturers...
Fitch Ratings upgraded Tenet Healthcare’s credit rating to BB from BB‑, citing a stronger competitive position and improved liquidity. The for‑profit system posted double‑digit revenue growth in its high‑margin ambulatory surgery segment and sold 14 hospitals, funding a $2.1 billion debt...
Jane Grogan from $BIIB again, on the fundamental challenge of drug discovery: do you believe what early experiments tell you? "We need to understand when [models] can be predictive and when they help at answering our hypothesis... “If you...
Health systems face a "perfect storm" of falling reimbursements, rising costs and physician burnout, prompting leaders to seek new revenue streams. Keith Elgart of Concierge Choice Physicians explained that flexible, hybrid concierge programs can generate additional income while fitting into...
![Why Early Detection Matters: Transforming Lung Cancer Care [PODCAST]](/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=75,format=auto,fit=cover/https://kevinmd.com/wp-content/uploads/unnamed-2-7.jpg)
Early detection of lung cancer, especially through low‑dose CT screening, can cut mortality by 20% and prevent one death per 320 screened. Yet only 18% of eligible U.S. patients undergo screening, due to awareness and access barriers. Eli Lilly’s senior oncology...
A Finnish cohort of 2,601 men revealed that 68% were vitamin D deficient, and those with the lowest levels faced twice the risk of chronic headaches compared to men with higher concentrations. The study also noted a seasonal pattern, with headaches...
Basecamp Research announced the launch of its Trillion Gene Atlas, a project to collect and model genomic data from over 100 million species, expanding known genetic diversity a hundred‑fold. Backed by $85 million in venture funding, the initiative partners with Anthropic, Ultima...
$BIIB’s Jane Grogan on the impact of China on biotech innovation. “There's three times more PhDs that have been given last year in China than in the US. ... That's a lot of bright young things out there who are going...
$BMY chief scientist Robert Plenge: says there is “a joke” drug developers often repeat. “It's an overnight sensation a decade in the making. These things can actually be going on for a very long time, and then suddenly the field catches...
The FDA announced that the 32 mg intravenous dose of ondansetron (Zofran) will be withdrawn from the market due to its association with QT‑interval prolongation and the risk of Torsades de Pointes. The agency is coordinating a voluntary recall of all...
This week's Biotech Scorecard newsletter: Six drugmakers, six months: Charting the FDA’s course in the post-Prasad era $REPL Pierre Fabre $ATRA $QURE $CAPR $RGNX https://t.co/sGa7G6YTDn
Major scoop from @ShelbyJLiv: Verily has raised $300M, ending Alphabet's majority control over the company https://t.co/6kjuC2FND7
The UK Covid‑19 Inquiry’s Module 3 report exposes the profound mental‑health toll on NHS staff, revealing that 69 % of intensive‑care workers met criteria for moderate or severe functional impairment during the January 2021 surge. The inquiry links this impairment to presenteeism, heightened...
New @ScienceMagazine Discovery of a circuit that connects stress and skin inflammation https://t.co/Dkmmcs96JT https://t.co/chrXyKrG2N https://t.co/7nOPn9fCoU
This definitely looks like a cardiac safety signal at the higher doses. The GLP-1's all slightly increase pulse rate as a starting point.
Intel’s latest discussion highlights AI‑powered care navigation as a solution to fragmented patient journeys, especially for complex diagnoses. The conversation, featuring Digital Medicine Society CEO Jennifer Goldsack and Intel’s Alex Flores, underscores how legacy IT systems and data silos impede...
Hospital waiting lists in Wales fell for an eighth consecutive month, with 713,048 patient pathways recorded in January – roughly 28,000 fewer than the previous month. The decline follows a £120 million Welsh government investment that added 187,000 outpatient appointments and...
The 4 biomarkers to meaningfully assess a person's risk of coronary artery disease @rayshafarah @aklfahed @pnatarajanmd @JACCJournals @uk_biobank https://t.co/CPfBPVRENq https://t.co/xTlj2ykr45
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced it will wield its $1.2 trillion provider‑payment authority to cement value‑based care as the dominant model for American health care. At the QualCon conference, CMS unveiled the MAHA ELEVATE initiative—a three‑year, $100 million program...
U.S. medical schools allocate fewer than 20 hours to nutrition education, leaving many GI fellows without formal diet training for inflammatory bowel disease. A one‑hour online module dramatically improved fellows' knowledge, confidence, and intention to refer patients to nutrition services....
Verily has closed a $300 million Series X Capital‑led round and re‑incorporated as Verily Health Inc., shifting Alphabet from a controlling owner to a significant minority shareholder. The funding will accelerate its AI‑native precision health platform, Verily Pre, aimed at unifying fragmented...
An anesthesiologist recounts a recent case where missing pre‑operative documentation forced a last‑minute delay for a pancreatic endoscopy, exposing the hidden costs of workarounds in peri‑operative care. He argues that these shortcuts are symptoms of broken systems rather than clever...
The author invites a high‑stakes debate on whether COVID‑19 vaccines produced a net mortality benefit, demanding analysis of all‑cause mortality data from mid‑2021 to the end of 2022. Participants must rely on up to three official government datasets and five...
The FDA has issued a safety communication indicating that lamotrigine (Lamictal) may increase the risk of serious arrhythmias in patients with existing heart disease. The agency ordered in‑vitro studies after reports of abnormal ECGs, chest pain, loss of consciousness, and...
Perplexity AI has partnered with b.well Connected Health to let users securely link their electronic health records to the search engine. b.well’s extensive FHIR‑based network spans over 2.4 million providers and 350+ health plans, providing cleaned, standardized data through its 13‑step...
The FDA issued a Drug Safety Communication requiring manufacturers of long‑acting beta‑agonists (LABAs) to complete five post‑market, randomized, double‑blind trials evaluating LABA plus inhaled corticosteroid therapy versus corticosteroid alone. Four adult and adolescent studies will each enroll 11,700 patients, covering...
Alberta has tabled the Safeguards for Last Resort Termination of Life Act, which would bar medical assistance in dying (MAID) for anyone under 18, for patients whose sole condition is a mental illness, and for cases where death is not...
The blog reports that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is likely to be ousted from the Health and Human Services post after a federal judge blocked his revised vaccine schedule, with 43% of Americans supporting his removal. It also notes the...
