Vulnerabilities in the Medicare Hospice Program Affect Quality Care and Program Integrity: An OIG Portfolio

Vulnerabilities in the Medicare Hospice Program Affect Quality Care and Program Integrity: An OIG Portfolio 

Vulnerabilities in the Medicare Hospice Program Affect Quality Care and Program Integrity
What OIG Found Hospice care can provide great comfort to beneficiaries, families, and caregivers at the end of a beneficiary’s life. Use of hospice care has grown steadily over the past decade, with Medicare paying $16.7 billion for this care in 2016. 
However, OIG has identified vulnerabilities in the program. OIG found that hospices do not always provide needed services to beneficiaries and sometimes provide poor quality care. In some cases, hospices were not able to manage effectively symptoms or medications, leaving beneficiaries in unnecessary pain for many days. 

Doctors Make Mistakes. A New Documentary Explores What Happens When They Do—and How to Fix It

People accept it as fact: that to err is human. Every misstep is an opportunity to learn and improve.

But when the mistakes are made by doctors, lives can be compromised, or even lost. Among malpractice claims, about 30% are due to diagnostic errors,according to a report by Coverys, a malpractice services provider. In the U.S. in 2017, surgeons either operated on the wrong patient, the wrong site or performed the wrong procedure 95 times, according to the Joint Commission, which accredits and certifies many healthcare systems in the country.

The Truth Shall Set You Free: FDA Reveals Secret Human Experimentation at Northwestern University

URGENT CALL TO ACTION:

1. The purpose of this report is to make public the willful negligence actions of Dr. McCarthy of Northwestern University who implanted heart valves that did not have FDA approval, and did so, without receiving consent from his patients in a clinical trial which was published without the University Human Subject protections approval.
2. A recent FDA freedom of information act validates the facts outlined above, which was not available until December 18, 2018. The evidence was provided to Northwestern University with no response from the VP for research.

Whoa: Israeli scientists say they’ve found a ‘complete cure for cancer,’ expect it ready in a year

The Israeli company in question is called Accelerated Evolution Biotechnologies Ltd., and it’s led by an Israeli scientist named Dan Aridor. Not only does Aridor say his treatment will cure all cancer, he says it will be quick, inexpensive and with little to nothing in the way of side-effects.

Sound too good to be true? Of course it does, but so do most things we thought were unimaginable until they were right in front of us.

WHY I AM OPPOSED TO ASSISTED SUICIDE AND EUTHANASIA Thirteen diverse perspectives

WHY I AM OPPOSED TO ASSISTED SUICIDE AND EUTHANASIA

Thirteen diverse perspectives

Articulate and persuasive arguments against legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia have been expressed by a broad range of individuals and organisations from diverse perspectives, professional backgrounds, political views and life experiences.

From these thirteen diverse perspectives there emerges a common view that legalising assisted suicide or euthanasia can never be done safely.

Doctors 'pull the plug on the WRONG patient

'I killed somebody that I didn't even know': Doctors 'pull the plug on the WRONG patient after seeking permission from the sister of a DIFFERENT man who had the same name and age'

A New York City hospital is being sued for switching off the life support of the wrong patient, after they misidentified him and asked permission from the sister of a man with the same name.   

Freddy Clarence Williams, 40, died on July 29 at St. Barnabas Hospital in Brooklyn after Shirell Williams gave doctors permission to withdraw his life support because he was brain dead. 

Pharmaceutical Marketing Increased the Deaths From Opioid Overdoses in Past 5 Years

The last few years have not been easy for the health authorities of the United States. Since some media began to reveal the disturbing figures of addiction to some opiates, the alarms went off. Being one of the most powerful analgesics to treat pain, these medications have been added to the list of the main addictions. A figure summarizes the problem: more than 42 thousand people died in 2016 due to excessive consumption in past 5 years of time. The reasons why the intake of these substances skyrocketed are multiple. In the difficult equation that should be analyzed to understand that epidemic, many factors come into play. One of them has just been evaluated in an article published in the JAMA Network Open: the gifts that doctors often offer some pharmaceutical houses.